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Topic: Ever use an AUTO WRIST PIN for a bar?????? |
Ed Naylor
From:
portsmouth.ohio usa, R.I.P.
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Posted 3 Jul 2003 10:00 am |
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| Many years ago when I stated playing I didn't like the 'Flat" bar I had .As a teenager and not Rich I wanted something better to use.One day I was at the local Auto repair shop and I saw a Wrist pin and they gave it to me.Guess what- it worked. Has anyone else tried this????? ED Naylor Steel Guitar Works |
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Rick Collins
From:
Claremont , CA USA
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Posted 3 Jul 2003 11:11 am
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I tried this; but the next time I started my car the pistons with missing wrist-pins shot out through the bottom of my oil pan.
 ...just kidding that didn't really happen. The car ran O.K.; but the pistons kept swapping holes. I finally figured out that I really didn't need eight steel guitar bars.
I did not reinstall the wrist pins; they are really unnecessary. I found a better solution; I changed those darn rubber connecting-rods and put in steel ones.
Those GM people actually know nothing about a car. I would bet that neither the CEO nor any member of the board of directors plays a steel guitar either.
What do you think?
Rick
[This message was edited by Rick Collins on 03 July 2003 at 12:13 PM.] [This message was edited by Rick Collins on 03 July 2003 at 05:21 PM.] |
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Brad Bechtel
From:
San Francisco, CA
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Posted 3 Jul 2003 2:50 pm
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I've never used a wrist pin, but I have used a Sears Craftsman socket from a socket wrench set, a shot glass (one of those double shot shot glasses), and a plastic Bic lighter.
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Brad's Page of Steel
A web site devoted to acoustic & electric lap steel guitars
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Ron Randall
From:
Dallas, Texas, USA
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Posted 3 Jul 2003 8:42 pm
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Yes,
By golly I have. In Engineering school we polished a piston as part of an initiation.
I had a friend who worked on Jaguars, and I got an old piston from him. The wrist pin is darn near perfect in size and very smooth.
Still got it. 
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Stringmaster T8, Benoit 8, National Tricone, MSA U12
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Ray Montee
From:
Portland, Oregon (deceased)
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Posted 4 Jul 2003 7:49 am
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During the early 1940's, when I was just starting steel guitar, my hands were so little that I could barely hold that huge, heavy, flat bar.
A family friend one day brought over three different sized and weighted bars, he made from scrap stainless steel "bolts" that were used on aircraft carrier construction at a local shipyard. I still have them and they worked great for a kid. I was so small, my dad had to saw off the bottom 6 or 7 inches of the legs of one our kitchen chairs so that I could put my feet on the floor so as to keep the guitar from sliding off my lap.
Later, they tied a string around both ends of the guitar and slung it around my neck.
Recently, I acquired a popular styled metal folding chair, "youth size", and once again, I can place my feet on the floor like a grown up person does. My wife had made a couple of small size doilies, non-skid variety, that I placed beneath both ends of my slippery Bakelites. THey worked! |
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nick allen
From:
France
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Posted 7 Jul 2003 11:27 pm
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I recall reading somewhere that Bob Dunn used a wrist pin as a bar...
Nick |
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David Doggett
From:
Bawl'mer, MD (formerly of MS, Nawluns, Gnashville, Knocksville, Lost Angeles, Bahsten. and Philly)
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Posted 8 Jul 2003 6:15 am
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| I once took my Dobro to an informal jam and forgot my bar, so I pulled out my Swiss Army pocket knife and used it for a bar. Old blues players use to use the smooth handle of a table knife. I think Bob Dylan used one on one of his early recordings. Rural blues players also used pieces of bone, and of course the proverbial broken off bottle-neck. A wrist pin sounds better than all of these. |
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Tim Tweedale
From:
Vancouver, B.C., Canada
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Posted 8 Jul 2003 10:59 am
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Yikes. I remember a gig where I left behind the bag containing my slide, patchcords, capo, picks and pedals. It was like some horrible nightmare. We had to set up and go on in a big hurry, so the sound guy came up with some patchcords. I ended up using a pint glass to slide around. Trying to stay positive took a lot of effort that day! But after the first song, another musician who was there came up with a glass slide with which I finished the mercifully short set.
-Tim |
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Rick Dempster
From:
Preston, Victoria, Australia
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Posted 8 Jul 2003 11:36 pm
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Jimmie Tarlton of the pre-war white country blues duo, Darby and Tarlton, played with this handy engine part. So did I when I first started. For Spanish position slide playing, the corresponding small-end bush ain't half bad either; thick, heavy and bronze. It always strikes me as interesting the number of steel people who have a machine shop or motor industry background.
Joseph Kekuku is said to have made the first metal picks and bar in his Technical school machine shop, and I believe Billy Hew Len lost his hand in a machine shop accident too, though I might be wrong on that one.
Makes sense really. There is a real automotive quality to the sound of the steel, particularly in the work of the 'hot' players in the swing field. The early pedal players too, but with the addition of automatic transmission- kind of a 'dyna-flo' sound. |
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David L. Donald
From:
Koh Samui Island, Thailand
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Posted 9 Jul 2003 1:32 am
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I was on the Norwegian mailboat out of Stavanger in July 1996 on the way to Tromso the most northernly college town in the world ;
where the cute chicks hang out.
A day south of Tromso the boats filled up with some manic fishermen, back from the sea and looking for college girls.
It's an overnight trip, and they stay up all night and drink home brew vodka and Golden Cock cola from the last coffee cup of the night, after 1 am when the bar officially closes.
Well there was an old acoustic guitar with almost unplayable action but decent strings and I picked it up and played a few licks.
My coffee cup was never empty till 4 am.
I finally tuned it to some sort of E tuning and played for a 3 hours sing along in Norwegian and English
with a silver zippo lighter for a slide.
Worked great, and these guys were in hog heaven, but oh my head below decks at 5 am in a 4 foot swell!
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Jackie Anderson
From:
Scarborough, ME
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Posted 9 Jul 2003 5:59 am
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| Spark plug sockets, or (best for non-lap style slide) a deep socket that fits your finger; socket extensions; pipe "nipples;" and then, once you're out of the shop, lipstick tubes; mike stands (easier if you are "upright"); coffee cups; pens; the list goes on.... |
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Michael Frede
From:
Sonoita, AZ, USA
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Posted 13 Jul 2003 5:51 pm
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| I've found two of different weights for a big block Chevy that work fine! |
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R. L. Jones
From:
Lake Charles, Louisiana, USA
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Posted 13 Jul 2003 8:23 pm
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I`ve used many things for a bar , Use to use an Old Spice bottle ,, still have one
R. L.
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