Notes on string high E sounds out of tune even picking them alone
I know it sounds silly, but it makes me crazy. Maybe it's my ear, or brain I've been suffering from this on all my guitars (Yamaha acoustic with D'Addario bronses) and others. I've thought it is because the guitar quality.
Recently I've bought a new Ibanez AM 95
not a cheap instrument. I've set up it correctly, using my Fender amp's tuner, and double checked with Guitar Rig 5 tuner, so neck, bridge all set up perfectly, and the instrument in exact tune. I've not only checking the octave when setting up bridge, but checking one note below and above or more, I've checking all notes practically.
All in tune.
First I've equipped it with D'Addario Chromes, 10-45 flat wound jazz, then I changed the E to 11, then 12. Now I changed to Thomastik GB-112 with E 12.
My (paranoid?) problem that all notes on E (high) sounds like out of tune by itself. I thouhgt maybe it is an out tune harmonics coming from other strings, so I'am dumping the other strings, still the same...
When I check every note in the E string with any tuner it seems to be correctly tuned, below 1 cent. The strangest thing I feel the "false" out of tune thing picking a single note (every note on the string), but mainly above 5th fret.
Has anybody similar experience, or it is just me?
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Have you intonated the guitar properly, adjusting the saddles? Using harmonics on 12th and 19th frets? This would need checking and probably adjusting for a different gauge of strings. It sounds like you have done every fret using a tuner - not necessary. The other problem may be the action is high, causing the string to stretch when fretted, putting it out of tune.
"Out of tune with itself" is actually an indication of disharmonicity. Disharmonicity is an effect usually associated with thick strings, however. It comes about by the modes of the string (stable vibrations) not being proper multiples of the fundamental vibration. Usually this is due to different stiffness for different modes. But with a rather thin string like the one you have, it is more likely due to different effective string length. The effective string length becomes larger when the reflection of waves travelling along the string is not perfect at its end.
So my guess is that either nut or saddle fail in being a reliably rigid end point for the string, resulting in imperfect reflection (if you make a photograph of the plucked string with long exposure, the "envelope" of the string vibration needs to converge to a single point on nut and bridge).
Either that, or its "reverse error": you have come to expect a certain disharmonicity by being used to the sound of the thicker strings.
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