What you see here, in order, more or less is the 2" X 6" x 36" X .250" aluminum beam, the "5-string bass" pau ferro fingerboard from LMII, slotted by them to 25.5" because when I cut it off at the 1st fret, it's slotted to 24.07" from there, and I don't care about .07" playing steel - it actually does matter, but you're on yer ears at that point anyway. They're like $12, slotting is $9, it's dreary work & thankless work and it requires accuracy and tools I don't have, or have room, money or desire for. The wood under the old ShoBud 10-string peghead gets disappeared, and the aluminum head bolted directly to the aluminum beam! Zest-tone! The 1st little yellow flag is at the 24th fret slot, and the 2nd at the 29th fret slot. I'll saw it off somewhere twixt. Best switch pix for the rest:
The EMG Hz pickup is a dummy, as it's not wide enough to cover all ten strings (Hello, Roadhouse). The aluminum angle is probably also a dummy, all those scraps of various hardwood laying around are more likely to be sawed/sanded/beaten/hacked into some type of retaining bar for: the big piece of white delrin bar that will be the "starter bridge." From Day One
"In the beginning, there was... beam..."
it has occurred to me that an instrument made out of an aluminum beam with string termini in solid aluminum and solid brass just might have a zingy tone, and altering the bridge-bar material is one, simple, manual tone control. I have fat and skinny delrin, fat MDF nylon, fat and skinny acrylic plexiglass bars, all left over from my "non"-steel bar-making (for steel guitar) days, 3/4" brass pipe, steel, wood... I could even use a bar of something in a leather or rubber-lined cradle, etc. All that fingerboard wood gets disappeared too, so having a pickup with ears that can slide around from bridge to "neck" is another tone control. Last but not least is an 8-string Hipshot Trilogy bridge, which due to it's wide string spacing requiring a different pickup has been a main source of delay. As there are ten strings and the Hipshot only affects eight, I'll have to drill two holes for the other two - though there's hardly a reason NOT to leave it optional whether the non-Trilogy'd strings are at the top or bottom, as there's room to drill for both options. I am not too worried about "losing valuable tone aluminum" yet. I just came across a pix of John Paul Jones' (Zeppelin) Hugh Manson-built eight-string steel, with a six-string Trilogy and just that arrangement:
If it's good enough for him.... The actual hardest thing here beside tunings, playing music and that foolishness, is that I'm going to have to mount the Trilogy so that the strings pass over the bridge at an equitable angle. For reasons unclear to me, traditional steel guitars have the strings REALLY REALLY high off the body, maybe it's a leverage thing? I could just boost it all and use long bolts, but it would be svelte to cut a wood block at just the right angle to have two little ramps, so the trilogy is ass-high and fingers-low, so to speak. The "fingerboard" is actually completely non-structural, if you had a good enough ear you could do without... :icon_thumright: right.
I even have another ten-string MSA peghead (and another Shobud on the way!). I guess I collect certain oddities? If you look at the Hugh Manson, the bottom two strings are bass strings, and I also have a box full of bass tuners, don't ask. And - that little blue box is a Rolls mini-mixer, and - I have a crate full of various little computer speakers. For a LARGE amount of money, +$150, I can get a 6" x X 6" X 36" square aluminum TUBE, put the ten strings on top, a few or five bass strings down the side, maybe some more "sympathetic" strings on the inside, what the hell... So you take a feed from the bass pickup and another from the ten-string pickup into the mixer, the instrument out goes to the amp, but the LINE out goes to drive a a pair of the computer speakers, one mounted inside the North end of the tube and another inside the South end! and sealed in with... paper mache, or cardboard decorated with macaroni and sprayed gold. SOMEthing will, doubtless, appear as needed. The notes being played would be physically, LOUDLY, fed back inside the thing itself... yikes. If you couldn't raise at least a dicken or two with THAT, well, I never.
