Kite Guitar: Difference between revisions

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To find the saddle compensation on a standard guitar, one compares the harmonic at the 12th fret with the fretted note at the 12th fret. For the Kite guitar, by a weird coincidence, one does the same! But the 12th fret now makes the 3rd harmonic, not the 2nd. Thus the two notes should be an 8ve apart, not a unison. To get a unison, when you fret the string, play the 2nd harmonic with your other hand. With your forefinger or middlefinger, touch the string midway between the 32nd and 33rd frets. Then stretch your hand and pluck with your thumb as close as you can get to the midpoint between your finger and the bridge. If this isn't feasible (e.g. with a bass guitar), you can capo the string at the 12th fret and use both hands to play the harmonic. And to be extremely precise, the fretted note should be 0.48¢ sharper than the harmonic. The 3rd harmonic is 701.96¢ and the 41-edo interval is 702.44¢.

A 6-string Kite guitar can be strung with a standard set of strings, but it's not ideal. The high strings will be somewhat slack, and the low strings will be somewhat tight. Microtonalist and luthier Tom WInspear can provide custom string sets at his website [https://www.winspearinstrumental.com/ www.winspearinstrumental.com]. He says this about string gauges: "Gauges can be scaled at the same ratios as frequency. A 41-edo downmajor 3rd is 2^(13/41) = 1.2458, thus from string to string the gauge changes by 24.58%. But you can't do that across the plain to wound transition. For an 8-string electric guitar with a downmajor 3rds tuning running from a low D up to vF, '''9.5 12 15 21 26 32 42 52''' (thousands of an inch, the last 3 strings are plain) would be similar to the standard 46~~-10~~ for EADGBE.You can use an 18 or 19 plain instead of the 21 wound if you prefer, but I would prefer 21w. To tune to different keys, increase the gauges by 5.95% for each 12-edo semitone of transposition. All this assumes a 25.5" scale. For a scale of S inches, multiply each gauge by 25.5/S and round off. For scales longer than 25.5", err on the side of heavier and round up, as longer scales do feel more flexible loaded with the same tension. Likewise, for scales less than 25.5", err on the side of lighter and round down. However, the plain strings should always be rounded slightly down, and should utilize .0005" increment plain strings where available. For a 27" scale, '''9 11 14 20 25 31 40 50''' is best (the 2nd string could be 11.5, if you can find it)."

A 6-string Kite guitar can be strung with a standard set of strings, but it's not ideal. The high strings will be somewhat slack, and the low strings will be somewhat tight. Microtonalist and luthier Tom WInspear can provide custom string sets at his website [https://www.winspearinstrumental.com/ www.winspearinstrumental.com]. He says this about string gauges: "Gauges can be scaled at the same ratios as frequency. A 41-edo downmajor 3rd is 2^(13/41) = 1.2458, thus from string to string the gauge changes by 24.58%. But you can't do that across the plain to wound transition. For an 8-string electric guitar with a downmajor 3rds tuning running from a low D up to vF, '''9.5 12 15 21 26 32 42 52''' (thousands of an inch, the last 3 strings are plain) would be similar to the standard 10-46 for EADGBE.You can use an 18 or 19 plain instead of the 21 wound if you prefer, but I would prefer 21w. To tune to different keys, increase the gauges by 5.95% for each 12-edo semitone of transposition, or 1.705% for each 41-edostep. All this assumes a 25.5" scale. For a scale of S inches, multiply each gauge by 25.5/S and round off. For scales longer than 25.5", err on the side of heavier and round up, as longer scales do feel more flexible loaded with the same tension. Likewise, for scales less than 25.5", err on the side of lighter and round down. However, the plain strings should always be rounded slightly down, and should utilize .0005" increment plain strings where available. For a 27" scale, '''9 11 14 20 25 31 40 50''' is best (the 2nd string could be 11.5, if you can find it)."

A string's tension can be calculated from its unit weight, length and pitch (frequency) by the formula T = (UW x (2 x L x F)<sup>2</sup>) / 386.4. For open strings, the length is the guitar's scale. The frequency in hertz of the Nth string of 8 strings is 440 * (2 ^ (-7/12 + (21 - 13*N) / 41)). For the Nth string of 6, it's 440 * (2 ^ (-7/12 + (8 - 13*N) / 41)). The unit weight is pounds per inch, and is a function of string gauge and string type (plain vs. wound, etc.). D'Addario has [https://www.daddario.com/globalassets/pdfs/accessories/tension_chart_13934.pdf published] their unit weights, thus the individual tensions can be calculated for a given set of strings. One can work backwards from this and select string gauges/types that give uniform tensions.

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 To find the saddle compensation on a standard guitar, one compares the harmonic at the 12th fret with the fretted note at the 12th fret. For the Kite guitar, by a weird coincidence, one does the same! But the 12th fret now makes the 3rd harmonic, not the 2nd. Thus the two notes should be an 8ve apart, not a unison. To get a unison, when you fret the string, play the 2nd harmonic with your other hand. With your forefinger or middlefinger, touch the string midway between the 32nd and 33rd frets. Then stretch your hand and pluck with your thumb as close as you can get to the midpoint between your finger and the bridge. If this isn't feasible (e.g. with a bass guitar), you can capo the string at the 12th fret and use both hands to play the harmonic. And to be extremely precise, the fretted note should be 0.48¢ sharper than the harmonic. The 3rd harmonic is 701.96¢ and the 41-edo interval is 702.44¢.
-A 6-string Kite guitar can be strung with a standard set of strings, but it's not ideal. The high strings will be somewhat slack, and the low strings will be somewhat tight. Microtonalist and luthier Tom WInspear can provide custom string sets at his website [https://www.winspearinstrumental.com/ www.winspearinstrumental.com]. He says this about string gauges: "Gauges can be scaled at the same ratios as frequency. A 41-edo downmajor 3rd is 2^(13/41) = 1.2458, thus from string to string the gauge changes by 24.58%. But you can't do that across the plain to wound transition. For an 8-string electric guitar with a downmajor 3rds tuning running from a low D up to vF, '''9.5 12 15 21 26 32 42 52''' (thousands of an inch, the last 3 strings are plain) would be similar to the standard 46-10 for EADGBE.You can use an 18 or 19 plain instead of the 21 wound if you prefer, but I would prefer 21w. To tune to different keys, increase the gauges by 5.95% for each 12-edo semitone of transposition. All this assumes a 25.5" scale. For a scale of S inches, multiply each gauge by 25.5/S and round off. For scales longer than 25.5", err on the side of heavier and round up, as longer scales do feel more flexible loaded with the same tension. Likewise, for scales less than 25.5", err on the side of lighter and round down. However, the plain strings should always be rounded slightly down, and should utilize .0005" increment plain strings where available. For a 27" scale, '''9 11 14 20 25 31 40 50''' is best (the 2nd string could be 11.5, if you can find it)."
+A 6-string Kite guitar can be strung with a standard set of strings, but it's not ideal. The high strings will be somewhat slack, and the low strings will be somewhat tight. Microtonalist and luthier Tom WInspear can provide custom string sets at his website [https://www.winspearinstrumental.com/ www.winspearinstrumental.com]. He says this about string gauges: "Gauges can be scaled at the same ratios as frequency. A 41-edo downmajor 3rd is 2^(13/41) = 1.2458, thus from string to string the gauge changes by 24.58%. But you can't do that across the plain to wound transition. For an 8-string electric guitar with a downmajor 3rds tuning running from a low D up to vF, '''9.5 12 15 21 26 32 42 52''' (thousands of an inch, the last 3 strings are plain) would be similar to the standard 10-46 for EADGBE.You can use an 18 or 19 plain instead of the 21 wound if you prefer, but I would prefer 21w. To tune to different keys, increase the gauges by 5.95% for each 12-edo semitone of transposition, or 1.705% for each 41-edostep. All this assumes a 25.5" scale. For a scale of S inches, multiply each gauge by 25.5/S and round off. For scales longer than 25.5", err on the side of heavier and round up, as longer scales do feel more flexible loaded with the same tension. Likewise, for scales less than 25.5", err on the side of lighter and round down. However, the plain strings should always be rounded slightly down, and should utilize .0005" increment plain strings where available. For a 27" scale, '''9 11 14 20 25 31 40 50''' is best (the 2nd string could be 11.5, if you can find it)."
 A string's tension can be calculated from its unit weight, length and pitch (frequency) by the formula T =  (UW  x (2 x L x F)<sup>2</sup>) / 386.4. For open strings, the length is the guitar's scale. The frequency in hertz of the Nth string of 8 strings is 440 * (2 ^ (-7/12 + (21 - 13*N) / 41)). For the Nth string of 6, it's 440 * (2 ^ (-7/12 + (8 - 13*N) / 41)). The unit weight is pounds per inch, and is a function of string gauge and string type (plain vs. wound, etc.). D'Addario has [https://www.daddario.com/globalassets/pdfs/accessories/tension_chart_13934.pdf published] their unit weights, thus the individual tensions can be calculated for a given set of strings. One can work backwards from this and select string gauges/types that give uniform tensions.