Notes on Intonation

Every guitarist should know how to intonate a guitar. What is intonation, you ask? Well, there are many ways to answer that, but basically, it’s how well your guitar is in tune with it’s natural harmonics at the 12th fret. Most modern electric guitars feature six adjustable saddles, so that you can fix intonation when needed for each string. It’s actually really easy to do. So, here’s how it works.

• Tune your guitar to standard tuning, using an electronic tuner.
• Play the low E string, open, and make sure it’s still in tune. Then fret the same string at the 12th fret and play into the tuner. It should give you the same reading for both notes when intonated correctly.
• If the fretted note is higher than the open one, move the saddle back by tightening the screw on the back of the bridge, behind the saddles. If the fretted note is lower, do the opposite, and loosen the screw.
• After the adjustment, re-tune the open string, and check again to see if the fretted 12th string matches. Repeat this process until the two notes match, then repeat for each string.

This information was taken from Ranger’s Guitars, which seems to be a dying website. This is the reason I re-blogged it to save the information. I liked his breakdown and simplicity of the instructions.