Anyone versed in guitar mechanics?

[RB]

My sister bought a cheap harmony electric guitar for my nephew for christmas. Since I used to have long hair and wail on a guitar, she brought it to me to tune. Thing is, it won't tune.

I can tune it open, but the notes do not follow proper scale progression up the fret board, especially the E, A and D string. At the 12th fret, where the notes should match only an octive apart, they are sharp.

I've never faced this dilema before. Is there some sort of bridge adjustment I can do to resolve the issue?

[scalf3]

I don't know a ton about guitars but what about putting a good quality set of strings on it?

[RB]

It's apparently an intonation problem. I may have to replace the bridge screws with shorter ones to allow me adequate adjustment...

[dashdeming]

RB, First of all I would like to tell you that you have really made impressive gains in the penis growth department. Here here!!

About the Guitar, the problem most likely has to do with the height of the strings from the fret board. The strings should be as close as possible without buzzing when it is played. When the strings are far away from the board there is a resulting problem when the strings are fretted up the neck. When you fret the strings up the neck you are stretching the strings (like our dicks). Well the real problem is that the differnt gauge strings stretch at different rates at a given distance of movement. So the guitar will be severely out of tune when fretted in this condition. Adjusting fret nuts and bridges are a way to lower the strings and in some cases you must also change the angle of the neck in relation to the guitar body to get the desired results. I love guitars and have earned a damn good living with them over the years. I have found that I can take even the cheapest guitar and tweak it up to make it talk. Good luck and let me know how it goes. - Dash

[mayhem]

Possibly the tuners themselves are loose. Other than that i would blame the bridge/fretboard setup. I play an ibanez destroyer and gibson sg flametop so i'm not really that good at working on guitars. I would probably also blame the quality of the guitar since alot of low end guitars dont stay in tune and dont even sound good. If its a tremelo guitar then it could be the lock nuts or even the micro tuners.

[fow1]

No expert here but the rule of thumb is that the 12th fret should be half the distance between the nut and the bridge. Flat top man myself - never cared for electrics. Is it an old guitar or a new one someone has tinkered with and got out of adjustment.? If it has the fine tuners on the bridge, you may be able to tweak it in with a good tuner and a lot of patience.

Anyway, an instrument doesn't have to be a cadillac to be a good learning tool but it should functon properly and sound true. Good Luck

[RB]

Thanks all. Turns out most likely the bridge was mounted incorrectly not allowing enough fine tuning to solve the intonation problem. Toy was returned, she found out he really wasn't all that motivated to learn how to play anyway...

[mayhem]

Yeah that would make sense and is the most logical of all problmes resulting in an out of tune guitar. I just got my dunlop crybaby and i have to say its much better than my morley bad horsie. Guitar's are awesome, i'm lookin at a bc rich neck-thru warlock now.