The easiest way to tune your steel is to buy an electronic tuner at your music store.  Electronic tuners can get fancy and expensive, but an inexpensive one is all you need to tune your instrument.  Be sure that the tuner you buy has a needle guage that clearly indicates when you are in tune.  It's also good if the tuner shows "cents".  (A cent is a measure of how close you are to the note).

If you don't have an electronic tuner, you can still get your instrument in tune using your ear, but this approach takes practice.  First, you will need a tuning fork (or piano or something else) to get one of your strings in tune.  Then, you will tune all the other strings relative to that one.

The rule is that whatever tuning you're using has a root note (for example in the C6th tuning, the root note is C).  The rest of the strings are either part of the C triad (C, E and G) or one of color notes that make up the tuning (like A, the 6th in a C6 chord).  So I tune the root note to C and tune the rest of the notes to the root, as follows.

• G Tune to C note
• E Tune to C note
• C Tune to tuning fork
• A Tune to E note
• G tune to C note
• E Tune to C note
• C Tune to higher C note
• A Tune to E note

Tuning two notes together by ear is a practice in listening to the vibrations between the two. The vibrations are called beats or Wha Wha, as I like to call them.  As two strings come closer in pitch, the "wha wha" becomes slower.  When the two strings are equal in pitch, the wha wha goes away entirely.

It is easier to hear the vibrations and to get rid of the vibrations between notes when the notes are the same pitch. So I have a chiming method that puts the notes at the same pitch to tune them together and tune out the vibrations between the two notes.

Tune the high C note using a tuning fork. Then play that C note open and chime the lower C note on the 12 fret to match it.  To chime a note, barely touch your finger to the string and pick the string.  You will hear a ringing sound, or chime.

Continue as follows:

• Chime the high G on 12th fret and chime high C on 7th fret to match.
• Play high G open and chime lower G on 12th fret to match.
• Tune high E by chiming at 7th fret and lower G at 9th fret to match.
• Play high E open and chime lower E at 12th fret to match.
• Chime high E at 12th fret and high A at 7th fret to match and tune the A note.
• Play high A open and chime lower A at 12th fret to match and tune.

Listen for the vibrations (wha wah) between the notes your tuning and hear them come together slowly until there are no vibrations between the notes and then they are in tune together.