Aside from this article, after working in music stores for a quite a while, recently-sold guitars and basses would come back with some variation of the 'I can't get this thing to stay in tune' rant. 95% of the time they were strung incorrectly.
Open the case, and sure enough, there were the 'gee, I never cut the ends off, I LIKE those loops, it SOUNDS better'. Really unfortunate when this is done on a bass, it looks like a combination of a Warn winch and spagetti on a fork, minus the marinara. Had a favorite, wound 3-on-a-side keys to the OUTSIDE of the posts and wound backwards: He didn't like turning the keys the 'other' direction. But he didn't bring it in 'till the high E sawed the balance of the the nut to the outside off. . . . .
For basses, puh-leeze cut your strings roughly two peg spaces past the post you're fixing to string up (maybe a bit more for G's and C's). Stick the end thru the hole, make one loop over it, and wind the balance down the shaft to the face of the head: If you got it just right, the last wrap will come off the bottom of the shaft right above the face of the peghead. Repeat for as many strings as your axe has. You never want string-wraps around the post laying on top of each other, it should look like nice straight rows. Alembics and other basses with pitch-down pegheads ensure downforce on the nut, but for parallel-to-the-fingerboard pegheads like Fenders, this is really important for E's and G's which aren't always fitted with string trees like the A and D.
Tune UP to rough pitch. Hook a finger under each string where the neck meets the body, and pull up/away from the fingerboard, the bass should begin to rise off the table a bit. You should feel a little give or slipping sensation inside the string. It's stretching RIGHT NOW instead of on the gig later.
ReTune UP to pitch. Done. In the old days with crummier tuners, I'd tune by the harmonic at the twelfth fret. These days, they all read even Open B, so I tune by neck pickup (he's right about that) to the open strings, and on just-installed strings I go across twice after the stretching exercise. You may see just the least bit of creep after this, but if everything is mechanically solid, it won't be much, if any.
And just like a piano tuner, ALWAYS tune UP: This 'sets' the keys against tension; tune down, it may slip past where you needed to be.
I've used this for bass forever.
Another thing: Lots of guys somehow take it as an affront to their ego in feeling they need to use a tuner, as if 'Real Men Tune by Ear'. Well believe me, IF you could, you'd be booked for the next year with a list of Steinways and Bosendorfers. Grow Up. Some guys really can hear it, but most can't. Invest in a good tuner, remember, that -50 or +50 you see is 1/2 of a 1/2 step, so we're really splitting hairs pitch-wise. My ears aren't that fine.
J o e y
