Todd Weger
From:
Safety Harbor, FLAUSA
|
Posted 22 Jun 2007 12:24 pm |
|
Well, sort of -- let me explain:
I took the cheapo pickup out of an Artisan that I got from a friend who bought one, kept it a week, and decided steel just wasn't for him. I bought it from him cheap thinking I would make into something I could use for times when taking my good steels was too risky due to the location, who'd be drunk and messing with it, in case I needed an emergency canoe paddle, etc. Out of the box, it just sounded lame and week. With that crappy pickup, rosewood nut and very short 21" scale, it just don't git it.
I remembered that I had a DP181 DiMarzio 'dual blade' pickup in an old Strat that's never played anymore (long story), and decided to try swapping it for the crappy one. I wired it in standard series humbucking, since it's a 4 conductor p'up. While at it, I decided to switch the input jack with the tone knob, so that you plug it in on the treble side of the guitar. What I hadn't counted on there was that the hole sizes were different, and that the V and T knobs use a small hole next to it to kind of anchor the pot. In any case, I had to make the hole for jack bigger, and add the small hole for the new tone pot location.
It was kind of a pain, but DEFINITELY worth it. Even still with the 21" scale and rosewood nut, the improvement in tone was huge. It now has twice the output, and much more girth. I could almost (almost) use this on a gig, it was that big of an improvement.
Now, I'm going to replace the nut with a piece of angled aluminum, and after careful measuring, I believe I might even increase the scale to 22.5" It will require a new bridge, also of angled aluminum, as well as a new fret board, but that will be easy, as I have a template for that already. I'll drill holes to run the strings through the body, too.
Yeah, it's still nothing like my frypans or Stringmasters, but for less than about $100, it's actually a usable steel now, and if it gets lost or stolen, I won't cry about it. It would be great for flying, since who knows what those gorillas in baggage inspection might do to it.
If I can find a minute, I'll try to snap off a couple pics.
TJW
_________________
Todd James Weger --
1956 Fender Stringmaster T-8 (C6, E13, A6); 1960 Fender Stringmaster D-8 (C6, B11/A6); Custom-made 25" aluminum cast "fry pan" with vintage Ricky p'up (C6); 1938 Epiphone Electar (A6); 1953 Oahu Tonemaster; assorted ukuleles; upright bass |
|
Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
|
Posted 23 Jun 2007 11:26 pm
|
|
| I bought two of these when they first came out, put metal riser nuts over the wooden nut, changed the machine heads, and bolted the two together to make a two-neck model. They're not too bad for the price, but the manufactuers have used standard electric guitar hardware. The instruments would have been better as 8-strings. Yes, changing the pickups would improve the performance. Let's face it, a lap steel is a plank with a pickup. It's 99% pickup and amplification that creates the tone. |
|
