AJ45 Tuning Issue

james

Hi everyone. 

I bought an Epiphone AJ45 last week from Peach. Opened the box and was pretty smitten, tuned up and all seemed well. 

Now I've had it for a week, it's pretty clear chords are out. 12the fret harmonics seem okay. Fretted notes are all sharp.

Theres a bit of nut binding when tuning. I'm not sure what gauge the strings are, but they feeling higher tension than the Martin lights on my Yamaha APX. 

Can anyone advise what to check/do next to fix this? Otherwise, I really like the guitar and I'm keen to keep it. 

James

Edit: I has a 'plek'd' sticker on it, for what its worth, some degree of set up has been done. 

crunchman

Nut height is the obvious issue.  If you fret it (or put a capo on) at the third fret and there is anything more than a very small barely visible gap between the first fret and the string then the nut is too high.

james

I was just reading a thread in Guitars that said much the same. Makes sense. I'll check that out tonight. In hand with the binding when tuning, perhaps the nut needs attention in general. 

ICBM

The nut *always* needs attention on any factory-made guitar that hasn't had a proper set-up.

Even if you think it's OK, the chances are that it can be better, and even a tiny height difference makes a surprisingly large difference to the playability and how in-tune the guitar sounds in the open chord positions - and the groove cutting makes a lot of difference to the tuning stability.

Winny_Pooh

First thing I would do is check the trussrod and tighten it for minimal relief (gap equivalent to your gstring gauge at the 8th fret), if you are then still getting sharp pitch fretted at the 12th I would send it back. Over time bridges tend to move closer to the nut anyway the problem would only get worse. 

If only the nut issues persist then this can be sorted.

Lewy

Winny_Pooh said:

First thing I would do is check the trussrod and tighten it for minimal relief (gap equivalent to your gstring gauge at the 8th fret), 

With light strings that would be .024" which is a huge amount of relief. A range of .005" to .010" would be more normal.

ICBM

Just under half the G string gauge is about right usually, although it's not critical. Heavier strings usually do need a bit more relief.

james

I can't say as I've ever messed with a truss rod, but I can take some measurements and compare them to the notes above. 

I might get in touch with Peach and see how sending the guitar to my local tech affects my warranty. 

Thank you all for your input thus far. 

Winny_Pooh

Lewy said:

Winny_Pooh said:

First thing I would do is check the trussrod and tighten it for minimal relief (gap equivalent to your gstring gauge at the 8th fret), 

With light strings that would be .024" which is a huge amount of relief. A range of .005" to .010" would be more normal.

If you play acoustics with 12s then it's not that huge. I reckon its a safe measure to start on. 
005 or 010 would create buzzing more likely than not. 

Lewy

Winny_Pooh said:

Lewy said:

Winny_Pooh said:

First thing I would do is check the trussrod and tighten it for minimal relief (gap equivalent to your gstring gauge at the 8th fret), 

With light strings that would be .024" which is a huge amount of relief. A range of .005" to .010" would be more normal.

If you play acoustics with 12s then it's not that huge. I reckon its a safe measure to start on. 
005 or 010 would create buzzing more likely than not. 

Well whatever works for you but Martin spec is a max of .010 and Collings standard spec is 0.005 regardless of gauge. I play mediums with a heavy pick and .003 relief with no buzzes. 

Vive la difference and all that. I'd find that much relief unplayable - or rather I'd find its effect on the action in the middle of the neck unplayable.

james

I managed to have a look last night, but unfortunately didn't have any feeler gauges at the house. Capo at the 1st, fretting at the body join, I could the best part of a 0.73mm (so probably not far off the .024" mentioned by @Lewy )   plectrum in the gap. On the tuner, if in tune is 50% of the scale, all fretted notes registered around 75%.

I tightened the truss rod, the gap reduced, and now the tuner registers at about 55%, so much better, if not perfect. The neck is still in bow, so I think it can be adjusted a little further. I'll pick up my feeler gauges from the garage and be a bit more accurate tonight.