Check out these necks & frets ...

Vai is already playing a tempered fretboard on one of his Jems and he is espousing it's virtues.

 

Interesting. Looks like it would take a while to correct habits that have taken 20+ years to develop.

 

Would changing string gauges, in particular moving from a regular (9-42, 10-46) to hybrid (Skinny Top-Heavy bottom etc) muck this up ?
Or do you in fact have to specify your string gauge of choice when ordering ?
And surely if you're going to be that specific with it then changing the action height would have an impact as well ?

 

It'll be fun to see the capos that are being developed for those necks. (GRIN)

I see necks like that every year at NAMM, but I've never tried playing on one. Maybe this year ....

I agree that if Juha Ruokangas is using them, that qualifies as an endorsement. Juha is a wonderful builder and he has a great ear for tone wood too.

Dana O.

 

That's crazy. Looks like a fret job by a drunken luthier.

I'd love to try one though. Every chord that bugs me, I tried to visualize on that fretboard and those fret bends seem to fix those nastys I don't like.

 

I was going to say, that's how mine used to look back when I called George Dickel my best friend.

 

I got dizzy looking at it too long.

Seriously.

 

i wonder what it would be like when you bend the string?

 

The theory is that after beating this dead horse for at least 400-500 years, some folks think it still hasn't learned it's lesson.

I guess I can't blame them for wanting to try. The people I feel bad for though is whoever invested money to get this project off the ground. What they apparently haven't learned from General Perronet, Tom Stone, or other folks who have tried slightly different incarnations of this theory, is that it's not likely to sell enough to return much of an investment. Times and markets change of course, but I have doubts that it's going to be much more popular this time around. Oh well.

I'm sure there's plenty of discussions in the archives about this. If you can't find any, I can point you to some other resources.

 

I'm perfectly happy not being perfectly in tune.

 

Yep, perfect pitch is a curse. Like someone else said my whole guitar technique (for what it is worth ) is built around bending notes..........

Best, Pete.

 

Sounds Good

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ6dvR0sqsM

 

It may have virtues. Beauty is not among them.

 

You can find a more technical explanation online somewhere, but it's basically this: the math and physics behind how our ears hear the difference between notes doesn't transfer very well to a guitar. This is due to the physics behind the guitar - the strings, frets, tension, etc. all make it very difficult to have perfect intonation on 21+ parallel frets on our stringed instruments.

These frets try to (and do a pretty damn good job) "correct" our problem of parallel frets by placing frets where each string is intonated perfectly.

 

so how would it handle bends? it seems to me it would "feel" odd bending through a spline shape.

 

They look quite different thats for sure. I just don't know though if they will ever be for me, because I guess I'm just to used to playing out of tune. Actually, maybe they are great, time will tell.
Best Regards!

 

Drunk luthier + master advertiser = tempered frets