Dead spots

[alyctes]

I have a fretless with a dead spot - which, annoyingly, is the D at 7th "fret" on the G string. 

 

Is there a way to sort this out? 

I don't really understand why it's happening, either.  Can anyone enlighten me?

 

Thanks

 

[itu]

If I remember correctly from acoustic lectures and the story by Ned Steinberger:

1) you could tune the body and

2) the neck

to move the dead spot from certain position. Ned said that he wanted to remove material from the headstock, and the dead spots started to move upwards. After removing the headstock, the dead spots were gone.

 

There were metal (brass?) plates for sale years ago to be attached to the headstock to enhance sound of the instrument. That would change the tuning of a uniform rod (neck). It does not act like a string that is attached to the bass from both ends.

 

https://pages.mtu.edu/~suits/rodvib.html

[Hellzero]

The dead spot on the D on the G string is typical from Fender basses, that's the reason of the enlarged headstock of the second version of the Precision Bass to fight this dead spot, which, by the way, is simply linked to the resonant frequency of the whole instruments.

 

By enlarging or removing the headstock and shaping the body (which is what classical luthiers do when tuning the woods they use, that said, just proving by the absurd that an electric instrument is before all an acoustic instrument) you can get rid of this dead spot by moving it to a place where it's not annoying (it will still be here, but you won't hear it anymore).

 

Changing the mass of the tuners (lighter or heavier) or the bridge (again lighter or heavier) could also help.

 

You can try the Fatfinger, a patented system bought by Fender and now sold by them as a sustain enhancer...

 

https://www.fender.com/en-GB/accessories/miscellaneous/fatfinger-guitar-sustain-enhancer/0992180100.html

Edited May 28, 2023 by Hellzero
Spelling

[Baloney Balderdash]

Short scale basses typically won't have this issue, and as said Fender basses tends to be especially bad with this.

 

But yes, it has all to do with how the bass resonates acoustically, which can cause certain frequencies to be partially cancelled out (another strong argument against those who seem to be convinced that the way a bass resonates/interacts with the string vibrations (reflecting both ways) acoustically somehow magically have absolute no influence whatsoever on the signal that the pickups pick up and reproduce, which is just absolutely absurd, and shows a severe lack of understanding on how physics works, but that's an entirely different discussion).

 

And as said somehow changing the mass of the instrument can to some extend help, or at least lessen, or move/remove the issue, depending.

 

Edited May 29, 2023 by Baloney Balderdash

[alyctes]

Thanks folks.  Sounds as if I should change the strings, see if that helps.

[itu]

This has been here earlier:

https://acoustics.org/pressroom/httpdocs/137th/fleischer.html

[three]

It's a really frustrating problem and I sympathise.  I have dead spots on many basses (I'm pretty sensitive to this) including on a short-scale fretless at around D and Eb on the G.  One of few basses that I have that doesn't have any noticeable dead spots is an early, headless Status SII.  Another is a fretless J type with a Status graphite neck.  This sort of adds weight to some of the comments re: NS and resonances above.  Changing strings can make a short, frequently temporary improvement, as can tweaking the set-up - mainly truss-rod - though I tend to play with a very low action and a flat board (minimal relief).  I've found over the years that dead spots are just something that I have to tolerate.  I've not been able to remove them completely on any bass, though it has been possible to reduce their prominence.  I've not tried a fat-finger, that said, I rarely play Fender-type basses.  I tend to obsess a little with dead spots, though when playing live and even recording, unless they're really severe, they become a bit of a non-issue.  Perhaps better to listen to the bass overall rather than the dead-spot (I'm telling myself this)?  

 

[Linus27]

I pretty much exclusively only play fretless, all Fender's, Jazz and Precision's and they all have dead spots around the D on the G String (7th fret). Some are more severe than others and some are closer to the C# (6th fret) but it's an absolute pain to live with. You just lose all sustain on that note and it sounds like it's being squashed.