Adjustable-Action Neck Tutorial By Luthier Garrett Lee

The Luthier Bench Knowledge Base

Classical Luthier Garrett Lee demonstrates the construction and use of his guitar's Adjustable-Action Neck using the key.

Transcript

00:00Hi, it's Gary, and for those of you who've had guitars of mine built since about 2011,

00:10I'm going to give you a quick tutorial on how to use your key to adjust the action on

00:15your neck using the adjustable action feature on your guitar.

00:20Now the basics of the mechanics is that in your guitar there's a pivot point underneath

00:26the twelfth fret, and in the schematic you can see how adjusting the set screw allows

00:32you to adjust the neck angle and thus the action on your strings.

00:42And the actual construction is shown in this photo.

00:46And since about 2013, I eliminated the retaining bolt.

00:50But your neck is held tightly by the string tension and even as little as one string is

00:55enough to hold it in place.

00:58And so when you change strings though, try to change one string at a time so that you

01:04always have tension that holds your neck in place.

01:09So I'm going to show you now how to use your key to change your action in a very practical

01:14way.

01:16And so the best way to do this is to just lay the guitar in your lap and take the key

01:24and stick it firmly into the set screw.

01:28And it should pop in very firmly.

01:31Now when you turn it, turning it clockwise will change the action and lower the strings

01:39to the frets.

01:41Turning it counterclockwise will raise the action.

01:45That's shown here.

01:49Clockwise turn lowers the action.

01:54Counterclockwise raises the action.

02:01With the turns of the key, you can change the action about half a millimeter above the

02:05twelfth fret for every half turn of the key.

02:10And half a millimeter is quite a bit in terms of playability.

02:14So when you want to change the action, change a little bit at a time and then play it a

02:19little bit and then see how it feels and then adjust accordingly.

02:23So let me play this one and see how it feels.

02:27Now I've found for just ease of this whole process, after you have the key in and it's

02:34in firmly, you can keep it in and then actually play.

02:39So in this current setting, let me check it out.

02:42So usually the buzzing will happen on the bass strings, and that's usually where you

02:49will feel the most labor when you're fretting with your left hand.

02:54And obviously what you want to do is optimize the ease of playability in your left hand

02:59by lowering the strings as low as possible, but not so low that it starts to buzz.

03:07So in this setting, some of the hotspots on most guitars is like F sharp, second fret

03:13on the sixth string, so you can test that.

03:19Or another hotspot typically is on the fourth string, the F sharp again, and you want to

03:29try to play with some of these notes or play your rep and play some of the loudest passages

03:37that might make it buzz.

03:39So in this case, in these positions, it's playing very cleanly and I want to see if

03:45I can actually lower the action.

03:47So I'm going to lower it by about a quarter turn by turning clockwise now, that will lower

03:53the strings.

03:54There's a quarter turn, I'm going to try now.

03:59Now the F sharp on the fourth string is playing kind of buzzy.

04:05So I've gone too far now, and now to really clean it up and optimize it, I'm going to

04:10take the key and go counterclockwise an eighth turn.

04:18That will raise the strings and hopefully clean up this F sharp on the fourth string.

04:26And it does, and that's going to be very acceptable and at the same time very easy on my left

04:32hand.

04:33Okay, so another thing that you can do is have a very low action setting for long practice

04:43sessions to make it really easy on your left hand, and who cares if it buzzes, but then

04:49later on if you have a performance, then you simply raise the action a bit and you're ready

04:55to go.

04:56Okay, so after you've adjusted your action to however you want it for whatever specific

05:02needs you have at that time, then you can just take it out and keep it in your case.

05:10And the last thing that I want to do is encourage you to use the adjustment all the time to

05:16your advantage.

05:17Don't be afraid to use it, you really can't break it, and it's just a great tool that

05:22will give you quite an advantage in your practice and your performance.

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