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1) Tip the neck and sight down the treble side and the bass side of the neck.

2) Adjust the truss rod(s) so that the flattest side of the neck has minimal relief. We want the bass side to have more relief but builders the vast majority of the time do not specifically shape their/our necks to have less relief on the treble side and more on the bass side.... Ideally I want minimal relief perhaps 0.002" or more on the treble side and more on the bass side. If the bass side has less relief which 50% of guitars do I set the bass side for minimal relief maybe 0.004". I can go less with someone who is not ham handed. Relief is very player dependent so hard specs are not prudent or useful but the concepts are in play. More relief for heavier hitters, less for folks with a lighter touch.

3) With the truss rod set and the instrument tuned to pitch, always adjust the rod tuned to pitch. Now we cut the nut slots.

4) With the instrument retuned to pitch, rod adjusted, slots cut now and only now am I interested in action at the 12th fret and I take this measurement in the playing position. Before taking the measurement at the 12th this is when I cut off the old strings and clean the instrument, tighten all things up, clean the electronics, adjust saddles to move properly for an UST whatever the thing needs and output jacks are nearly always loose so get in the habit of checking everyone on your bench. Once it's cleaned up I restring.

5) Using the saddle(s) or bridge depending on the instrument (electric or acoustic) set action at the specs I gave you in my toot for the instrument and player, specifically. Some common specs I use every day are Stratocaster with 10's 4/64th" high e 4.5/64th" low e. D-18 4/64th" high e 6/64th" low e with 12's 4.5/64th" and 6.5/64th" with 13's. Bass 5/64th" G 7/64th" E. Again there is variance here these can be starting points. Player attack, slack tuning, string gauges all can require some adjustments. Before anyone says I can go lower, me too I am giving folks generic information....

6) Retuning to pitch set the intonation (electric) or if making a new saddle measure the intonation error (acoustic) and record it so it can inform my break points on the new saddle I am going to craft.

7) Retune to pitch, truss rod adjusted, nut slots cut, action set, intonation dialed in now stretch the strings and make sure that you don't hear any "pinging" from a binding nut slot when you are tuning. If you do either use nut lube of scrape the slot sides with your files so the slots don't bind.

Done

Point being, once again this is with how I approach my set-ups a sequence that is both logical and productive. I never have to go back and recut a nut slot or redo the action because it was a function of something else. Intonation once set is good to go and will not change.

Rod, slots, action, intonation. Always measure action at the 12th. Make all adjustments with the exact strings the player will use. I cut the slots with the old strings that it came in with. Action and intonation are set with the new strings.

Questions?

Rod, slots, action, intonation. RSAI

Happy birthday!

My sequence is different from Hesh's...

I do the bridge height first - THEN cut the nut. I set the bridge height with the strings capoed at the 1st fret in case the nut isn't cut. You ask why I do the bridge first? Because years of working on cheap stuff have shown me this method works better in case of extreme lack of setup for new instruments where the action is high at both ends of the string. I should add that if you can't get the truss rod straight enough to begin with, you'll just be chasing your tail trying to setup the guitar and get it intonated.

Also - I measure string height at the last fret because I assume the player uses ALL the neck, not just up to the 12th. For acoustics, many folks will ask, "What about the fall away?". I hate fall away because the fingerboard should be all one plane - not two. So I plane out the hump on a raw fingerboard, and if it's fretted - I level them all to the same height if the hump isn't too bad. That is how I get 12 string acoustics to play as well as a stupid low setup on a Les Paul all the way to the last fret.

Also, I have been using the same 6" scale to set action for 40 plus years. I don't use that scale for anything else. My tool & die training emphasized consistency, so that scale is a "known value or quantity". I trust it.

_________________
"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Thanks Michael!!! 68 and still Loothin

Very cool and I was able to understand your sequence perfectly with your excellent description here Chris.

We are doing some of the same things anyway and what I do is just what I do and one method to get folks for lack of a method where they wish to go.

Both of us take the nut slots out of play when we set action at the saddle/bridge. Chris capos and I cut the slots first using the first three frets as references. Either method will permit the saddles/bridge to determine action height wherever you measure it.

Lots of shops have their/our own way of describing what we see so we can talk to each other in our shop. Sadly though there is no "Loothin language" that we all speak, yet....

Fall away is really the inverse of a ski ramp which is the last thing you want. When Leo RIP invented the bolt-on neck or at least was an early adopter of it the ski ramp was also invented. Much of the time the single most limiting factor action wise on a Fender style instrument with a bolt on neck is the rise in the frets from the 12th to the last. This is a ski ramp. bends and more may fret out on the high frets.

So we mill in fall away which really comes into play and has the greatest value with the bluegrass players like Billy Strings who have a heavy attack and really get the strings lashing out. Folks with a lighter touch don't need fall away. And no one needs a ski ramp which will require the action to be set often higher than desired to clear the high frets.

So on an electric a dead straight neck with no fall away is fine. The real goal is no ski ramp. A dead straight neck on an acoustic would work for my personal attack too but for folks competing with a banjo fall-way is the solution if they hit hard.

The only different between capoing and cutting the nut slots first is when Chris goes back to cut the nut slots after setting action AND if he does not cut them to have the same clearance over the next subsequent fret to the capoed fret his action measurement wherever he measures it will change by some percentage of the variance between the capoed fret and the clearance of the next fret.

How much of a difference is this? Mouse nuts It's inconsequential in my view.

I posted this because I had two PMs over the weekend asking me about the set-up toot and in both cases the real answer was my method has a sequence to it and is dependent on the sequence for excellent results. So I am driving home if you use my method as per my toot do it in order please or all bets are off. The entire point of the sequential method is when we address something it's now done and will not need to be revisited. This is how I work too. When I pick-up a #2 screw driver that tool hits every #2 screw of consequence on the instrument before it gets put back in its house.... Yeah yeah I know.....

So when we remember that nut slot depth, relief and action measured anywhere you wish are ALL functions of each other it's helpful to do things in an order that takes one variable after another out of play as we work. Hence my sequence and Chris's too we are both working toward isolating variables and then addressing them one at a time.

PS: My most used tool is my 6" engineer's scale too. Mine is a StewMac one that I put self stick 120 paper on the back of it to help hold it in place when I press down and am marking something. The Starrett ones are great too, easy to read for old eyes and I have these in my home shop.