Luthiery Laboratories

Doing Things Wrong

September 25, 2020

Snark Tuner

September 25, 2020

You can't beat the convenience of a clip-on tuner. This is a very good one, sensitive, with a very fine readout, good enough even to set intonation. However, it has one very bad feature. It devours batteries. A device like this with no mechanical on/off switch is always on, waiting to sense you press the button. It seems like every few weeks this thing wants another 2032, regardless of whether it was even used. The solution to that is to pull the battery whenever you are not using it, but I forget, and the next time I pick it up, it wants a new one.

I think my old Korg tuner is still running on the AAA batteries it came with.

Reviews, 09/25/20

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Intonation

There are two components to intonation. The first is simple - locating the bridge at the right spot. You'd think that would be obvious, you'd be surprised how often it is gotten wrong. Like my Rickenbacker. The second part is the additional length or 'compensation' needed for each string beyond the scale length. That derives from the string's mechanical resistance to bending, or its stiffness, which is proportional to its diameter. That's why the low fat strings need more compensation than the thinner ones - shortening the string increases its relative stiffness, or the ratio of diameter to length, and causes it to go sharp as you go up the neck. I have never seen a negative compensation, I think theoretically it should not exist.

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