Chords for Adjusting the string height on a Cigar Box Guitar

Tempo:
129.3 bpm
Chords used:

E

Ab

B

Eb

A

Tuning:Standard Tuning (EADGBE)Capo:+0fret
Show Tuner
Adjusting the string height on a Cigar Box Guitar chords
Start Jamming...
[A] [D]
[G]
[D] [Bm] Hi, it's Dan from HumidorGuitars.com [B] again [N] and what I want to talk to you today about
is getting your string height set correctly.
Sometimes after you've built your guitar and you've got the neck on, you've got the box
all finished and you've bridged and nut are in, you go to string it up and you look at
it and your strings are really high.
They may be so high that they're, it makes the guitar not playable.
What I want to talk about today is how to prevent that from happening as you're [E] building
[G] and how to fix it if it's happened and you didn't notice it and now you've got a guitar
with high [D] action, you don't want to have to build another one.
[A] After building another one, it's [Gm] not necessarily bad.
[B] But before I do that, I want to explain a couple of [Ab] terms that have to do with string action.
First thing I want to talk about is the break angle of the strings that are crossing either
the bridge or the nut.
In this case, I have a bridge here and the angle of this string here [B] crosses the bridge.
This angle of this piece right here has to be steep [Dbm] enough that it puts sufficient [Eb] downward
pressure on the bridge so that the strings don't buzz and that you get good transfer
of your vibrations from the strings into the lid and into your pickup.
And you have [A] a break angle that is for the bridge and you will also have a break angle
for the [C] nut.
In this case, I don't have a steep break [Ab] angle as I normally do, but in this case it doesn't
[E] buzz so I wasn't too worried about it.
Another thing [N] you want to keep an eye on is when you put a neck on a box, you want the
fingerboard to be high enough above the lid that you're not going to have a problem lowering
your nut low enough to get a string action.
What I mean is you'll notice here, this particular guitar does not have an add-on fingerboard
and the height of the fingerboard itself is maybe a couple of sixteenths, maybe an eighth
of an inch above [E] the lid of the box.
I did that because I [Eb] intended on playing the [A] slide so I wanted the strings to be a little bit [Ab] higher.
What you can do is, with my H-Upman, this is an add-on [N] fingerboard.
This is a 1x2 neck with a quarter inch thick red oak piece that I put on as a fingerboard.
It's a full quarter of an inch above the top of the lid.
This allows me to use a standard quarter-twenty [Eb]
bolt and nut for the bridge and still get
a [E] decent, nice [N] low action.
When you're building, try not to make the fingerboard be flush with the lid of the box.
You don't want it totally flush or you're going to have a real hard time keeping the
string action where you want it.
A quarter of an inch is just a guideline.
You can use whatever you want, but that's what I use and it seems to work pretty well.
You can go a little higher or a little lower.
Like all the other videos, this is just the way I do it.
It's just a [E] guideline.
If somebody else tells you to do it a different way, that may be good too.
The second thing I want to talk about is [Ab] the angle of the neck to the box.
What I mean by that is how far back [N] this neck leans.
Does the headstock go down this way?
Does it lay back from the body?
Most guitars have a couple of degrees of angle on it where the neck, the headpiece is actually
down a couple of degrees.
Two to three degrees would be a good starting spot.
The way I do it [Ab] is the piece of wood that goes through the inside of the [E] box, you'll
notice that this [B] is through the [N] body, through the neck build here.
If you take this piece right here and you make it a little bit thinner than this piece
right here, the end result is that the neck will lay back down a little bit.
So that's one way [B] that you can do it.
You can shave maybe an eighth of an inch or so [E] off of there.
I would experiment a little bit before you [Abm] screw up a perfectly good neck.
That will help keep your string action down.
With this particular guitar, [F] since it doesn't have an add-on fingerboard, I just put the
nut on there [N]
and if I didn't have something to hold the strings down, they would either
just hover above the top of the nut and not even touch [Abm] or they would touch but they would
buzz really [N] bad every time I plucked a string.
So I just have a plain old piece of flat [Eb] aluminum that I cut and drilled a couple of holes in
it and I put the strings on there and I just screw this down and it holds the strings against the nut.
It works pretty good.
They also have regular string trees they call them.
These are some store-bought ones here.
These are just little buttons and they've got [N] a slot that runs on the bottom side of it.
So this is my four-string Queen Bee that I built.
These are just little brass ones.
They've got a slot on the bottom.
The string runs underneath them and you just screw that right into the headstock and it
holds them down.
Notice I've got a nice break angle going up here across the nut.
So you can do that as well.
There are a million different ways that you can hold them down.
You can take a plain old sheet metal screw and screw it in there.
Anything [Dbm] that holds the string down against the nut is [Bb] going to be good.
One thing you [B] need to watch out for is if [Db] you have way [G] too high an action and the strings
are way up here, [Eb] what will happen is every time you press down [C] on a string, you only
want [E] it to travel so far before the string hits the fret.
[Eb] If it has to travel too far, you're actually stretching the string [Gm] and the note is [G] going
to go sharp on you.
It's going to go too high.
It's just [Ab] going to be like if [Db] a regular guitarist would bend the string.
[Dbm]
[Ab] That's the same thing that's going to happen.
You're going to go to play a note, [Gm] but you're actually going to [Db] get this instead and you're
not bending the string because the string is being bent too great [N] of a distance.
That's another reason for wanting to keep it down close.
If you're playing slide, you don't worry about it because all you're doing is gliding the
slide across the [Ab] top so you're not really pressing the [Gb] string down to touch the [B] fret.
What can happen is if you have your string height too high, as you go up the neck playing
your notes, you're going to find that the notes are going sharper and sharper [N] on you
and that could be considerable.
Top it all off, it's going to be hard to play.
One thing you can do is you get all done, you've built your guitar, and now you're looking
at your action.
You're going, holy cow, the string's high.
One thing you can do is say I want to make even lower action on my Zombie Blues Guy guitar.
One thing I can do is I can pull all the frets out, which is a lot of work, but I could do it.
I could add a quarter [Bb] inch fingerboard to it.
That would raise the height of the fingerboard up [N] and allow me to adjust the bridge a little
bit so I could get a nice lower action.
You can lower the size of your nut as long as you don't get down too low so that you
don't get a buzzing noise.
You can lower the height of your bridge.
That's why it's nice to use different sized bolts and nuts because then you can just switch
to a smaller diameter rod or bolt to lower the distance.
Hopefully that helps you out.
Again, as always, post comments, questions if you need further explanation, but hopefully
that will help you get your string action down and make you happy with what you've built.
Keep that in mind next time you build another one.
Good building and good playing.
Thanks for watching.
[D] [A] [D]
[G] [N]
Key:  
E
2311
Ab
134211114
B
12341112
Eb
12341116
A
1231
E
2311
Ab
134211114
B
12341112
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_ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _ [D] _
_ _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _
[D] _ [Bm] Hi, it's Dan from HumidorGuitars.com [B] again [N] and what I want to talk to you today about
is getting your string height set correctly.
_ _ Sometimes after you've built your guitar and you've got the neck on, you've got the box
all finished and you've bridged and nut are in, you go to string it up _ and you look at
it and your strings are really high.
They may be so high that they're, it makes the guitar not playable.
_ _ What I want to talk about today is how to prevent that from happening as you're [E] building
[G] and how to fix it if it's happened and you didn't notice it and now you've got a guitar
with high [D] action, you don't want to have to build another one.
[A] After building another one, it's [Gm] not necessarily bad.
[B] But before I do that, I want to explain a couple of [Ab] terms that have to do with string action.
_ First thing I want to talk about is the break angle of the strings that are crossing either
the bridge or the nut.
In this case, I have a bridge here and the angle of this string here [B] crosses the bridge.
This angle of this piece right here has to be steep [Dbm] enough that it puts sufficient [Eb] downward
pressure on the bridge so that the strings don't buzz and that you get good transfer
of your vibrations from the strings into the lid and into your pickup.
And you have [A] a break angle that is for the bridge and you will also have a break angle
for the [C] nut.
In this case, I don't have a steep break [Ab] angle as I normally do, but in this case it doesn't _ _
[E] buzz so I wasn't too worried about it.
_ Another thing [N] you want to keep an eye on is _ _ when you put a neck on a box, you want the
fingerboard to be high enough above the lid _ that you're not going to have a problem lowering
your nut low enough to get a string action.
What I mean is you'll notice here, this particular guitar does not have an add-on fingerboard
and the height of the _ fingerboard itself is maybe a couple of sixteenths, maybe an eighth
of an inch above _ _ [E] the lid of the box.
I did that because I [Eb] intended on playing the [A] slide so I wanted the strings to be a little bit [Ab] higher.
What you can do is, _ with my H-Upman, this is an add-on [N] fingerboard.
This is a 1x2 neck with a quarter inch thick red oak piece that I put on as a fingerboard.
It's a full quarter of an inch above the top of the lid.
This allows me to use a standard quarter-twenty _ [Eb]
bolt and nut for the bridge and still get
a [E] decent, nice _ [N] low action.
_ When you're building, try not to make the fingerboard be flush with the lid of the box.
You don't want it totally flush or you're going to have a real hard time keeping the
string action where you want it.
A quarter of an inch is just a guideline.
You can use whatever you want, but that's what I use and it seems to work pretty well.
You can go a little higher or a little lower.
Like all the other videos, this is just the way I do it.
It's just a [E] guideline.
If somebody else tells you to do it a different way, that may be good too.
_ The second thing I want to talk about is [Ab] the _ angle of the neck to the box.
What I mean by that is how far back [N] this neck leans.
Does the headstock _ go down this way?
Does it lay back from the body?
Most guitars have a couple of degrees of angle on it where the neck, the headpiece is actually
down a couple of degrees.
Two to three degrees would be a good starting spot.
The way I do it [Ab] is the piece of wood that goes through the inside of the [E] box, _ you'll
notice that this [B] is through the [N] body, through the neck build here.
If you take this piece right here and you make it a little bit thinner _ than this piece
right here, the end result is that the neck will lay back down a little bit.
So that's one way [B] that you can do it.
You can shave maybe an eighth of an inch or so [E] off of there.
I would experiment a little bit before you [Abm] screw up a perfectly good neck.
That will help keep your string action down. _ _ _ _ _
_ With this particular guitar, [F] since it doesn't have an add-on fingerboard, I just put the
nut on there [N] _
and if I didn't have something to hold the strings down, they would either
just hover above the top of the nut and not even touch [Abm] or they would touch but they would
buzz really [N] bad every time I plucked a string.
So I just have a plain old piece of flat [Eb] aluminum that I cut and drilled a couple of holes in
it and I put the strings on there and I just screw this down and it holds the strings against the nut.
It works pretty good.
They also have _ regular _ _ string trees they call them.
_ These are some store-bought ones here.
These are just little buttons and they've got [N] a slot that runs on the bottom side of it.
So this is my four-string Queen Bee that I built.
These are just little brass ones.
They've got a slot on the bottom.
The string runs underneath them and you just screw that right into the headstock _ and it
holds them down.
Notice I've got a nice break angle going up here across the _ _ nut.
So you can do that as well.
There are a million different ways that you can hold them down.
You can take a plain old sheet metal screw and screw it in there.
Anything [Dbm] that holds the string down against the nut is [Bb] going to be good.
_ _ _ _ One thing you [B] need to watch out for is if [Db] you have way [G] too high an action and the strings
are way up here, [Eb] what will happen is every time you press down [C] on a string, you only
want [E] it to travel so far before the string hits the fret.
_ [Eb] If it has to travel too far, you're actually stretching the string _ _ [Gm] and the note is [G] going
to go sharp on you.
It's going to go too high.
It's just [Ab] going to be like if [Db] a regular guitarist would bend the string.
[Dbm] _ _ _ _ _
[Ab] That's the same thing that's going to happen.
You're going to go to play a note, [Gm] but you're actually going to [Db] get this instead and you're
not bending the string because the string is being bent too great [N] of a distance.
That's another reason for wanting to keep it down close.
If you're playing slide, you don't worry about it because all you're doing is gliding the
slide across the [Ab] top so you're not really pressing the [Gb] string down to touch the [B] fret.
What can happen is if you have your string height too high, as you go up the neck playing
your notes, you're going to find that the notes are going sharper and sharper [N] on you
and that could be considerable.
Top it all off, it's going to be hard to play. _ _
One thing you can do is you get all done, you've built your guitar, and now you're looking
at your action.
You're going, holy cow, the string's high.
One thing you can do is say I want to make even lower action on my Zombie Blues Guy guitar.
One thing I can do is I can pull all the frets out, which is a lot of work, but I could do it.
I could add _ a quarter [Bb] inch _ fingerboard to it.
That would raise the height of the fingerboard up [N] and allow me to adjust the bridge a little
bit so I could get a nice lower action.
You can lower the size of your nut _ as long as you don't get down too low so that you
don't get a buzzing noise.
You can lower the height of your _ bridge.
_ _ That's why it's nice to use different sized bolts and nuts because then you can just switch
to a smaller diameter _ _ rod or _ _ bolt to lower the distance. _ _ _
_ _ Hopefully that helps you out. _ _
Again, as always, post comments, questions if you need further explanation, but hopefully
that will help you get your string action down and make you happy with what you've built. _ _ _
Keep that in mind next time you build another one. _ _
Good building and good playing.
Thanks for watching.
_ [D] _ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _ _ [D] _ _
_ [G] _ _ _ _ [N] _ _ _

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