Intonation Test

[Greg Lorisco]

Originally Posted by Tim Bishop

Hitting the harmonics and the fretted note is just one part of tuning up and down the neck. The fretted note is subject to, not only the amount of pressure applied, but to the actual set-up of the instrument as well. This can and most likely WILL vary among players having an impact (negatively or positively) to the overall tuning up and down the neck.

Just one more important piece of information left out here. If you are fortunate enough to have a bridge that allows variable adjustments, you must also consider the saddle adjustment (i.e. forward or backward) to shorten or lengthen the strings length from the nut. This will help you 'dial-in' the fretted note with the same harmonic.

Then, if you are fortunate enough to play a well made bass, while you may not get your neck tuned perfectly up and down the fretboard, you may just find you can get pretty damn close.

The bridge set-up (string length and height) was implied in my post. Sorry I didn’t spell it out. Also implied is that the action is set low enough so there is not a big string stretch when fretting.

What I find is that the E on B, A on E, etc are flat, not sharp. So that would not be string stretch.

Please try this and tell me how your bass rates (truthfully). I would really like to know if me bass is just poor or if they are all like that.