Fay Reid
From:
Orono, Ontario, Canada
|
Posted 13 Oct 2007 4:32 pm |
|
For one reason or another you don't have or don't want a pack-a-seat. You instead carry a folding chair that you purchased at Canadian Tire for $10 or less. Of course a commercially produced chair is too low to be comfortable at your machine. One of these makes you feel as if you're playing from the underside of the guitar. All you have to do is build it up to your preferred height.
Rmove the screws that hold the seat to the metal framing and the upholstery from the seat. This also gives you an opportunity to add as much padding to the seat as desired before reattaching the upholsery.
My seat height is about 19 1/4" from the floor. My height is approximately 5' 7" bare footed. This height would probably fit most players regardless of height since a taller player's ebows would hang a little lower from the shoulders than a shorter player's. Forearms parallel with the floor is probably comfortable for most. (Keep in mind that you don't need any physical handicaps when playing this machine; the mental ones are enough to contend with.) Your job is building up the front and back areas under the seat to keep it level at the desired height.
Determine the adjustments to be made and, working with plywood, cut out narrow arches (say, 1 1/4" in width and a few inches long) of the material for each of the four corners of the chair to fit the metal tubing. This is a skeleton construction. You could add whole-sheet thickness of the plywood that would add a lot of extra unwanted weight to your project. This is fine if you play only at home, but for those on the road, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure for the aging back. (Yes, I read the recent article on "Bad Backs" and I sympathise! Read my article on the "Lghtweight Steel Guitar Case". I have since included photos and a plan diagram if you missed it.) Screwnail the seat to these arches of wood, replace the upholstery along with any desired padding, and screwnail the chair to the arches with the original screws. Build up of the wooden arches may include some gluing for added strength. And...
Into my suitcase I put...10 metre extension cord, pair of moccasins (for playing), two 30' xlr cords, music stand, extra volume pedal (MSA potted just in case), patch cord analyser, 3-way electrical outlet, string crank, wire cutters, 4 extra sets of strings, patch cords, spare patch cords, Bosstone, buffer amp that I made, RV-5 digital reverb with 9v adapter, Peterson strobe tuner, pick pouch, screwdriver, 9v battery, amplifier fuse, with extra guitar parts (tuners, brass bellcrank connecting pins, changer springs), tone bar, picks, tuning wrench,and Allen keys in four individual, colour-coded, plastic, Old Spice deodorant stick tubes from years gone by. Gluing about a 3/8" thickness of uphostery foam to the inner surface keeps the tone bar from rattling around inside its Old Spice case. I prefer the suitcase and folding chair to a pack-a-seat since they're less awkward to carry considering what is transported. In one trip, I carry suitcase, chair, pedal bar and leg pouch, and volume pedal. That leaves one more trip for the guitar body and amplifier.
The Hilton volume pedal fits snuggly into another Styrofoam case that I made very similar to the case in the "Lightweight Steel Guitar Case" article. (I prefer Styrofoam since it's easy to cut, mould, and glue.) Unfortunately, this volume pedal requires an adaptor which sooner or later will have a problem with its cord because of constant bending back and forth. To reduce this, coil the cord and secure with some bag ties as short as is practical and, then, eliminate the unnecessary bending of the cord when removing and replacing the volume pedal from and to its case. Bring the inexpensive and easily replaced extension to the adaptor instead of the other way around. My extension services the Hilton, the RV-5, and the Session 400.
Fay |
|
