What's an acceptable amount of fret buzz?

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anomaly

anomaly

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When you play a note softly on the low E , A or D string it should ring clear, but you're going to get a bit of buzz for a second when you play a bit harder and let it ring for a bit. There shouldn't be any fret buzz on the lighter unwound strings. Is this everyone elses experience as well with guitars? I mean, all guitars have a bit of it to a degree unless it's got very high action (like 3mm) or a ton of relief in the neck. This is something i've often pondered about my guitars.
 
Totally up to you.
If you play clean a lot, then less is more!
I don't like any buzz, but you're at the mercy of your capabilities and your instruments..
String gauge factors in too..
 
midnightlaundry said:
Totally up to you.
If you play clean a lot, then less is more!
I don't like any buzz, but you're at the mercy of your capabilities and your instruments..
String gauge factors in too..
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You got no buzz at all on your guitars? Even when you hit those wound strings hard? What string guage do you use and what tuning are you in. You got high action?

I'm usually in Eb, with 10 - 46 strings.
 
Of course you can make any guitar buzz if you hit it open hard enough. As far as just how you set up your guitar and leaving aside problems like poorly leveled frets, this is why string gauge, relief, and bridge height if applicable should ultimately be based on how you play.

If you’re heavy handed and don’t think you’re going to change, relatively higher action and heavier gauge strings are probably going to be what you want to avoid not only too much buzzing but also having notes go noticeably sharp on attack.
 
Every guitar has buzz. I think it should have no buzz when you play clean and be able to do it with your level of dynamics.
With a pick you can hog into it and make anything buzz but it's covered up with colossal levels of gain.
 
midnightlaundry said:
Every guitar has buzz. I think it should have no buzz when you play clean and be able to do it with your level of dynamics.
With a pick you can hog into it and make anything buzz but it's covered up with colossal levels of gain.
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Yes, this is the answer I was looking for. Today I was trying to lower the action on one of my guitars without extra fret buzz, So I kept adjusting the truss rod trying to get the perfect amount of relief, but I can't get the action much lower than 2mm at the 12th fret without excessive buzz with the way I play. I guess I'll have to deal with the buzz or raise the action.
 
The way I learned on this was that if you can hear the fret buzz through the speaker cabinet - it is too much.

So that applies to both clean and high gain tones.

My main guitar as a shit ton of fret buzz on the lower strings but I'm heavy handed and have low action. But I can't hear the fret buzz when doing high gain. Conversely, I can play Clean tones doing standard cords fairly cleanly without fret buzz. I think. :LOL:
 
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My LTD’s seem to handle low action better than my Ibanez guitars. Irritating!
 
311splawndude said:
The way I learned on this was that if you can hear the fret buzz through the speaker cabinet - it is too much.

So that applies to both clean and high gain tones.

My main guitar as a shit ton of fret buzz on the lower strings but I'm heavy handed and have low action. But I can't hear the fret buzz when doing high gain. Conversely, I can play Clean tones doing standard cords fairly cleanly without fret buzz. I think. :LOL:
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Ya, both of my ltd Vipers got some fret buzz on the lower strings. I was just wondering how common it is cause I don't get the chance to play many guitars these days living in such a small isolated town, and I've only got 3 guitsars at the moments (used to have 6, but can't recall how they were??). I try to minimize it by raising the action, but then the playability is not there.

Anyways, i can only hear it unplugged so it's not a big deal I suppose. My Yamaha rgx612a super strat has the least amount of fret buzz... I think it's because of the added string tension being a 25.5" scale length vs the 24.75" of the vipers.
 
Another question people, what's the optimal amount of relief a electric guitar should have? So when you press down on the 1st and 24th fret of the low E string how many mm's should there be under the string? say around the 8th fret or 12th fret or somewhere in between there?? less than 1mm right?
 
anomaly said:
Another question people, what's the optimal amount of relief a electric guitar should have? So when you press down on the 1st and 24th fret of the low E string how many mm's should there be under the string? say around the 8th fret or 12th fret or somewhere in between there?? less than 1mm right?
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Dan Erlewine has some great books and videos on Stew-Macs website. I tried to go the measurement route but found it's just easier for me to do it by feel.
 
Agree that the wound strings will rattle almost no matter what, but it should stop reasonably quickly and not continue while you sustain/vibrato the note. The plain strings should be clear and not choke out on bends.

But how much is acceptable? Depends on how much the guitar was.
 
I don't have an exact formula for it, but there's a certain level that annoys me, depending on the guitar and what I'm using it for.

I've got a standard tele with pretty low gain pickups that i use for a lot of really clean to mid-gain stuff stuff, which often calls for some pretty heavy picking to get what I want from it; it's got the action set pretty high to where there's practically none. Guitars with high output humbuckers that are getting cranked through my 5150, I can deal with a little more.

It also depends on the price of the guitar; on an American PRS I would expect notably less fret buzz than I would from on Indonesian SE.
 
It is all personal preference. What can you live with and what can't you live with. Is your neck like you like it? Are your frets level? How hard you pick, alternate or downstrokes? Etc etc. Once you discover what you like it is pretty simple to find your sweet spot. It may take a little time but it is worth it. Proper tools can help you gauge and measure things out to your liking so you can be consistent from one guitar to the next.
 
RockyStar said:
It is all personal preference. What can you live with and what can't you live with. Is your neck like you like it? Are your frets level? How hard you pick, alternate or downstrokes? Etc etc. Once you discover what you like it is pretty simple to find your sweet spot. It may take a little time but it is worth it. Proper tools can help you gauge and measure things out to your liking so you can be consistent from one guitar to the next.
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Ya, I've been tweaking my main guitar's truss rod for a couple days now (it takes time to settle after adjustments) and I think I got it adjusted as good as it's gonna get, same with the bridge height. There's still a little buzz when picking harder but it's relatively quiet otherwise. Ya, frets are good and level. Actually when i first got the guitar the 24th fret was a little high, so I had to file it down a bit. It's all good now.
 
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