marnold
April 20th, 2011, 08:05 AM
After the posting of the "cover" of Sweet Child O' Mine, I busted out my bass and started playing the familiar opening riff, only to hear the frets buzzing on almost every note. I hadn't checked the relief on the neck in a long time. I found that it had no appreciable relief at all. No wonder it was buzzing. Unfortunately the allen wrench that came with the bass is ridiculously short, to the point that I was in danger of stripping the nut. I went out and bought a new set of metric wrenches and tried again. Over a couple days I moved it between 3/4 to a full turn. Only now is it approaching decent relief.
Not sure how I ended up with so much back-bow. I think part of the problem was that I was putting a capo at the first fret and then pressing the string down at the 24th fret. The part of the neck that's bolted to the body isn't really affected by the truss rod at all. I checked it this time where the neck meets the pocket. Still, I'm surprised I didn't notice that before.
Also, here's a little tip. If you put your bass on a bed to take off the truss rod cover, make sure that the body is 100% on the bed and not sliding off. Thankfully, the room is carpeted and the bass landed on the body side before I caught it and not on the headstock, tuners, etc.
Not sure how I ended up with so much back-bow. I think part of the problem was that I was putting a capo at the first fret and then pressing the string down at the 24th fret. The part of the neck that's bolted to the body isn't really affected by the truss rod at all. I checked it this time where the neck meets the pocket. Still, I'm surprised I didn't notice that before.
Also, here's a little tip. If you put your bass on a bed to take off the truss rod cover, make sure that the body is 100% on the bed and not sliding off. Thankfully, the room is carpeted and the bass landed on the body side before I caught it and not on the headstock, tuners, etc.