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Topic: Fender D8 setup |
Eoin Russell
From:
New York, USA
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Posted 22 Mar 2015 12:52 pm |
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At what height or distance from the strings do people normally set their pickups? Mine are in the way of picking, so I just pick to the left, is that too close to the strings?
What about the nut height? Mine is flush with neck, all the way down.
Any other setup tips? |
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Stephen Cowell
From:
Round Rock, Texas, USA
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Posted 22 Mar 2015 2:23 pm
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You have to be aware that on Stringmasters (are we talking Stringmasters?) you can bring the pickups too close to the strings and damage the pickup former/base plate... the old guitars used surgical tubing as springs, and it gets old and goes solid... the main deal being, the cover does not cover the whole pickup, it lacks 1/8" of reaching to the former board, so cranking it all the way up will tend to warp the pickup base. I use 1/8" distance for my Stringmasters.
I was not aware that the nut (or the bridge for that matter) was adjustable for height... again, are we talking Stringmasters? For best sustain the rods should be solid against the body.
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Stephen Cowell
From:
Round Rock, Texas, USA
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Posted 22 Mar 2015 2:53 pm
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Other setup tips... you can keep the humbucking sound but choose one pickup over the other by backing down the pickup you don't want... for example, Carco Clave likes his bridge pickup, so he lowers the neck pickup all the way... still humbucking, but a more trebly bridge pickup sound. When you turn the 'blend' knob down you lose the humbucker effect, see below.
Sustain... there are four big screws (not near the edge, under the cover) behind the bridge that determine (to a large part) the response of the guitar. Over time these screws get loose... tightening them will increase sustain and improve the tone of the guitar. If they strip, pull them out and put toothpicks (EDIT: *no* glue!) in... when they're tight, the guitar is at its optimum and your high registers will sound better. EDIT: Do not tighten too much! Don't warp the top plate or you're defeating the purpose. You can also hot-rod a SM by putting in string-through-body retainers (like a Tele)... not a simple job, but will really bring out playing above the 12th fret, where normally SM's die badly.
Electrical Ground... Leo cheaped out on the Stringmaster grounds... there are wires just under the plates, held in place by the screw tension holding the plates in place. Over time these get loose... you can help your SM by soldering wires from one neck's plate to the other... use the back of a pot that already has a ground solder on it.
Gotcha's... be aware that there are two different lengths of leg pocket screws for the near bridge leg... especially with the T8 (has the thinnest neck), if you mix these screws up you can get a screw into the pickup pocket. You should find aluminum foil stuck in the pickup pockets... pasted down with corona dope... try not to disturb this, it's the shielding.
Pickups... the pickups are wound differently for neck/bridge... the bridge pickup is wound hotter since the string puts out less energy nearer the bridge, they're balanced this way. If you disassemble the guitar, just make sure that you keep track of the pickup's positions... they're RWRP (reverse-wound, reverse-polarity) too, which means you can lose the humbucking effect if you scramble the pickups between necks. OTOH, if you want a hotter neck pickup for a different sound, you can switch their positions... the fader only fades *out* the neck pickup, it's not a true balance control, so this is the way to get more neck in your sound.
Winding the strings... here's a post I did on winding strings onto Stringmasters... when I got my T8 some of the strings looked like they'd been on since '58, and I liked the way they were wrapped... so I do them all this way.
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This is the way I do it... you pass the string through, then make a right-angle bend 2" (5cm) past the post, then cut the string 1/3" (1cm) after the bend. Don't cut the wound strings before making the bend! Very important to keep the string wrap tight. Make the bend very sharp... you should use needle-nose pliers as well as cutters.
Then wind the string over the bend... run the short piece outside on the outside strings, and inside on the inside ones, see the picture. The wrap locks the string. You want the pull to be as straight as possible for a Fender guitar... and on some of my guitars I wind the two longest ones backward, for more break-over angle.
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Last edited by Stephen Cowell on 11 Aug 2023 6:27 pm; edited 3 times in total |
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Eoin Russell
From:
New York, USA
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Posted 22 Mar 2015 6:51 pm
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| Thank you for the great advice. Sorry if I confused the issue, I have a Deluxe 8, single neck. Not a Stringmaster, I believe. The sustain above the 12th fret is poor and the highest string is a little weak compared to the rest of the strings. |
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Stephen Cowell
From:
Round Rock, Texas, USA
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Posted 22 Mar 2015 7:06 pm
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Oh... when we say D8 we mean 'double-eight'... and a T8 is a triple. Your Deluxe 8 is an S8, for single. Don't start up the old 'is it a Stringmaster or not' debate... for our purposes here it's close enough... unless you have an earlier one with the trapezoid or 'boxcar' pickup.
Deluxes don't have the four screws... they have five smaller screws, farther from the bridge... so they will have weaker tone. The tone can be improved by tightening these screws... and the toothpick/Elmer's treatment can also help. Junior Brown's Guit-Steel has the hot-rod mod, where the strings run through the body... this is a great improvement for a Deluxe, since they die harder than the other Stringmasters. Most of the rest of the stuff is applicable too.
_________________
New FB Page: Lap Steel Licks And Stuff: https://www.facebook.com/groups/195394851800329 |
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Eoin Russell
From:
New York, USA
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Posted 23 Mar 2015 4:48 am
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| Got it. Thanks! |
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