Before reaching for that truss-rod wrench...

Bob-Dubery

Check your strings carefully!

I've been bitten like this twice in the last couple of months. Hopefully I've learned the lesson now ?

Earlier this year my Morgan started buzzing. Only on the 6th string, and only in low positions. Capo it 2nd or higher and it was fine. I contemplated the need for a nut job (keep your remarks to yourself please) and also thought that maybe there was too much tension on the truss rod. Things didn't get better....

Then I noticed that there was a kink in the 6th string. Right over the first fret. Pennies dropped and I figured it all out... I'd slipped whilst putting the guitar down and it had fallen against a book case and bounced right off again. Clearly when it hit the shelf the string must have been pressed against the fret with some force and deformed as a result.

Change the string and presto!

Then more recently I had a buzz problem. Thought it was lack of humidity, and a wet sponge in the case did improve matters. But there's one song I love to play (Sandy Denny's "Who Knows Where The Time Goes?") and there's this big, fat 5th position A chord as I go into the chorus and that buzzed like crazy. Put on a capo and the buzz is still there - same chord, two frets up.

This time I can't figure out how it all happened, but last night when I changed strings I found that the 6th was kinked about an inch-and-a-half past the saddle (just before the sound hole). This, again, seems to have been the cause of the buzz.

I don't understand this as well either. Clearly in the first instance the kink was touching on the fret. But this one was nowhere near a fret. All I can guess is that somehow this kink changed the way the string moved when plucked.

AlanRatcliffe

All I can guess is that somehow this kink changed the way the string moved when plucked.

Exactly! Strings usually vibrate in an elliptical pattern and any kink or unevenness in the string throws this off which can cause string crashing into the frets (heard as fret buzz) or intonation problems. Strings are usually the first thing a luthier will check in any number of tuning/buzzing problems.