What’s the best action archtop you’ve ever played??

[MHoranzy]

Curious what your answers might be! I’ve played my friends Moffa Maryan, Sadowsky Jim Hall, and both of them had laser low action and made the 12 gauge strings feel like 10s. No buzzing, just perfect. I thought my carvin sh550 played nice but every note on those axes was right where you expected. Just like butter.

Possibly even better was my friends early 2000s Es-175D. Felt like a guitar couldn’t possibly have lower action without buzzing, yet this one did. It makes me wanna find one, but I’m so scared of the quality control issues that I’d hate to try to order one before trying it out.

what’s been the best you’ve ever played?

[Tal_175]

A guitar's action is a matter of how well it's set up, how level the frets are, how the nut is filed, truss rod, saddle height etc. Any guitar can be set up to have a very low action unless there is something structurally wrong with it.

In general shorter scale length guitars would have lower action due the reduced string length and for those who do big string bends, flatter radius means lower action before the string chokes.

Do you mean best set up out of the factory?

[ThatRhythmMan]

Tal is right. As long as the neck doesn’t have any twist at all and the truss rod works, anything else can be overcome by a skilled luthier. If the neck is twisted, you’ll never get there.

[sgcim]

I'm convinced that great action on an archtop is relative to what you're used to playing at the time. It's not easy to get a great sound and have 'perfect' intonation plus have great action. With a mass produced axe that has a stop tailpiece, a metal adjustable bridge, you might have great action and intonation, but you're not playing a real acoustic instrument. With a handmade axe with an ebony bridge, you're at the mercy of your instrument, your skill in setting up the things Tal 175 mentioned above, (or your repairman's taste), the strength of your left hand, the amount of time you've been practicing, your physiological/psychological state, your touch, and other things that might not be so easy to have under control
The three best archtops in terms of action I ever experienced were:
Jack Hotop's D'Angelico. I have a D'Angelico, and it was never as easy to play as Jack's D'A.
A bass player's L-5 that he let me borrow for a gig I played with him. First time I played it and I did a four hour gig with it. One of the fat bodied good ones.
A Beauregard MB. It compared favorably to every other boutique guitar in the store. I bought one for 7K, and it was a piece of shite. I sent it back. Then I tried out the other one in the store I mentioned, and it felt like a light toy. It's very subjective in my case.

[Danny W.]

I have all of my archtops set up with an action of .040" at the 12th fret. They are all great to play. I do setups myself, with the help of a toolbox full of tools from Stew-Mac.

Danny W.

[wintermoon]

A guitar's ease of playing also depends on the neck angle among other variables.
But there's a line between getting a guitar's best potential tone and playability that's affected by neck angle.

[pingu]

A guitar's ease of playing also depends on the neck angle among other variables.
But there's a line between getting a guitar's best potential tone and playability that's affected by neck angle.

whats the 'neck angle' ?
not heard of that ....

[pingu]

Best I ever played was an Ibanez JP in a shop
should have bought that guitar
but I was young and foolish .... aaaah

it was £1.6 K and beyond me at the time (still is probably)
never mind , move on

[wintermoon]

whats the 'neck angle' ?
not heard of that ....

The angle the neck is mounted to the body in relation to the soundboard of the guitar.

[mr. beaumont]

I don't think of super low action as a good thing. I want to be able to hit the motherfucker a bit if I want.

About 2mm at the 12th fret is fine for me. I measure with a pick.

[geogio]

I like a factory setup because that's the string height that allows the string to fully cycle unimpeded.

But... I usually lower my guitar strings however many 1000's the low E-string is.

Why? It makes lowering my actions much easier as it is after all a temporary ballpark setting, because any change in the weather or humidity levels is going to change the relief on the neck.

[Gabor]

Unfortunatelly "not buzzing" is not enough for me. When setting up, after reaching the no buzzing on every note, I raise more at least 0.1 or 0.2 mms. The tone improves unbelievable going to woody direction. (Btw no buzzing... but with what plectrum and what strong move?)

All my guitars practically plek-ked, thanks for my luthiers creative fret leveling method, I mean close to perfect, and specifically done for the string tension I use, still I end with approx 1.8-1.9 mm on high and 2-2.1 mm on low. I am happy with this, only few times dreaming about lower action guitars :-)

[Gabor]

I have all of my archtops set up with an action of .040" at the 12th fret. They are all great to play. I do setups myself, with the help of a toolbox full of tools from Stew-Mac.

Danny W.

Are you sure?, it is 1.02 mm. Even on a Les Paul the factory standard is 1.2 mm (20% higher) which is still extreme low.

[geogio]

Back in the 60s, when I was around 10 I had a chance to play my Uncle Joe's L5. I was a fledgling guitarist at the time but it was a big thrill to play that L5.

[rsclosson]

Howard Paul of Benedetto Guitars let me play his personal Benedetto. It was a gift from Jimmy Bruno. I was surprised that he used round wound strings. The action was astonishingly low and I could not find a dead spot anywhere on the neck! Also there was absolutely no relief. It was amazing to play and sounded fantastic!

[Marty Grass]

I have all of my archtops set up with an action of .040" at the 12th fret. They are all great to play. I do setups myself, with the help of a toolbox full of tools from Stew-Mac.

Danny W.

That's half the fun!

[BFrench]

that's easy since I've only played 1, next...

[Marty Grass]

I can't site one guitar. I do agree that if a guitar is built properly you can get the action you want.

I have one guitar that I got from a true virtuoso player that was set up for him someone in the Detroit area who is crazy good at low actions. Their are tiny solder drop on a couple of the TOM slots.

Certainly one of the absolutely best built guitars I've ever had is one that may not be what others like in decorative design but is a masterpiece.

[lawson-stone]

A guitar's action is a matter of how well it's set up, how level the frets are, how the nut is filed, truss rod, saddle height etc. Any guitar can be set up to have a very low action unless there is something structurally wrong with it.

In general shorter scale length guitars would have lower action due the reduced string length and for those who do big string bends, flatter radius means lower action before the string chokes.

Do you mean best set up out of the factory?

The difference in scale length is fairly minor it seems to me, 0.75"--is that actually enough to have the dramatic effects you describe?

[Tal_175]

The difference in scale length is fairly minor it seems to me, 0.75"--is that actually enough to have the dramatic effects you describe?

I'm not sure about the "dramatic effects" but I think I meant shorter scale guitars would tolerate lower action before buzzing. Is that not true in your experience? The difference also is not always 0.75'' if we are talking about guitars in general, my Byrdland is 23.5'' my Tele and Strat are 25.5''.

[mr. beaumont]

I'm not sure about the "dramatic effects" but I think I meant shorter scale guitars would tolerate lower action before buzzing. Is that not true in your experience? The difference also is not always 0.75'' if we are talking about guitars in general, my Byrdland is 23.5'' my Tele and Strat are 25.5''.

I would think the opposite would be true...longer scale should be more tension, so the same gage string compared would have a smaller elliptical vibration pattern, meaning less chance of buzzing against a fret.

My action is quite low on my tele, about 1.5mm, and it is buzz free.

[Tal_175]

I would think the opposite would be true...longer scale should be more tension, so the same gage string compared would have a smaller elliptical vibration pattern, meaning less chance of buzzing against a fret.

My action is quite low on my tele, about 1.5mm, and it is buzz free.

It's true that longer scale would have higher tension but also wider displacement in the middle while vibrating due to the increased length.

I set up my Gibson scale and Fender scale guitars to have about the same action. My experience is with the same action, Gibson scale is more forgiving for heavy picking. Fender scale guitars buzz more easily when I dig in. Which is fine because this acts as a twang barrier for me. Low buzzing threshold makes me pick softer on Fenders and be twang-free as I pretty much only play jazz on any guitar in the last 5 years or so.

[ThatRhythmMan]

That’s interesting. Longer scale guitars have a clear advantage in not buzzing when down tuning. That can be overcome somewhat by using a heavier gauge string and thereby higher tension on the shorter scale guitar. I don’t understand all of the details that go into that. Maybe the tension is the most important factor in not buzzing.

[Stringswinger]

It's true that longer scale would have higher tension but also wider displacement in the middle due to the increased length.

I set up my Gibson scale and Fender scale guitars to have about the same action. My experience is with the same action, Gibson scale is more forgiving for heavy picking. Fender scale guitars buzz more easily when I dig in. Which is fine because this acts as a twang barrier for me. Low buzzing threshold makes me pick softer on Fenders and be twang-free as I pretty much only play jazz on any guitar in the last 5 years or so.

My experience is similar. My Strat has the same action as my Les Paul and both have 10 gauge DR Pure Blues strings installed. I can dig in a bit harder on the 24.75 inch scale Lester than I can on the 25.5 inch scale Strat without buzzing. Perhaps the fact that the Gibby has a 12 inch radius while the Fender has a 9.5 inch radius explains things.

[John A.]

It's true that longer scale would have higher tension but also wider displacement in the middle while vibrating due to the increased length.

I set up my Gibson scale and Fender scale guitars to have about the same action. My experience is with the same action, Gibson scale is more forgiving for heavy picking. Fender scale guitars buzz more easily when I dig in. Which is fine because this acts as a twang barrier for me. Low buzzing threshold makes me pick softer on Fenders and be twang-free as I pretty much only play jazz on any guitar in the last 5 years or so.

Can you really get a true all-else-equal comparison that isolates just scale length differences between two archtops? There are an awful lot of variables in play that affect how much a guitar will be perceived as buzzing. I would think you'd have to test this on many guitars that are built and set-up as similarly as possible, and actually measure buzz (as well as subjectively note it) to really say one scale length buzzes more than the other. Otherwise, you're really just saying "this guitar buzzes more than that one," which may be true, but not all that informative.

Anyway, I set up my guitars with different scale lengths differently in order to get them feeling subjectively best for how I use them (trading off buzz to a degree), which is definitely not ceteris parabus (25.5" strat, 25.5" GJ, 24.75"semi-hollow, 24.84" archtop, and 24.55" archtop). The two 25.5"'s buzz more, but I doubt that's because of the scale length.

John