Apparently I'm building a Lap Steel

[ashcatlt]

Ever since I saw the Wine Crate Steel the idea's been growing on me, and I find myself at a point where it's just plain going to have to happen soon.

Because I'm me, I'm going to do it all wonky and weird.

One idea I have is to use a "Tune-O-Matic" saddle in place of the nut. Seems this would avoid the annoyance of having to precision file the nut, and allow (possibly) far more accurate intonation adjustments.

I've got some tuning pegs that I pulled off my LP a while back, which had ought to work on this end.

The other end, I'm thinking, will have a roller version of the Tune-O-Matic saddle and a tremolo tailpiece. Not quite the same thing as a pedal steel, but...

Then, I'm looking at one, maybe two of the GFS "Retrotron" HBs and a sustainer driver. I'm a little worried here. It's kind of like that guy that told the waiter there was a fly in his soup: "The rest will be wanting one too!" None of my guitars have room for a sustainer, since it precludes both neck and (generally) middle pickups. I'm willing to jam one into this thing, though.

So, I could take these parts and slap something together. Why am I bothering you folks with this?

The question I've got is re: the structural integrity of the wood. When I think about a lap steel, I think about something not much bigger than a 2.5 foot section of 2 x 4. When I think about a 2.5 foot section of a 2 x 4, I think that I could put my knee in the middle, grab it by both ends, and bend it up toward me. Well, okay, maybe I couldn't, but a number of my friends probably could. I'm pretty sure that the tension of a set of strings definitely could.

I'm not going to use the soft pine normally used for 2 x 4 studs for this, but I still wonder. I can get my hands on some different kinds of wood. Will something like a hard maple be able to withstand this tension? Will I need to laminate something together? Do these things normally include some form of truss rod or metal reinforcement?

This project is months - if not years - from realization at this point. Any comments are appreciated, but right now I'm mostly wondering what I need to do for the body.

[newey]

I have one of these:



Which I haven't yet learned to play, because it has a habit of busting strings, I think it needs some nut work. It's been more or less sitting in a corner awaiting a restringing.

This was cheap, so I'm guessing it wasn't made from any sort of high-quality wood. Although I doubt it's pine. I suspect it's a laminated piece of some sort. And manifestly, it hasn't yet broken in half, so for what that's worth, I'd say you should look to laminate something.

A chunk of butcher block from a countertop would probably fill the bill. Reuse, recycle and all that.

The wine crate version will get a good deal of its strength from the box nature of its design- even though the box is open on one side. Using a slab, the dynamics are different.

I don't know what use it would be to have adjustment at both the bridge and nut ends of the string. Either there's enough adjustment or there's not. Adding another set of adjustments at the other end just adds more variables, as well as more screws to fiddle with and perhaps strip.

Nuts on steel guitars can be pretty much anything, since the string is not being fretted. The one on my Rogue is what appears to be nothing more than a piece of polystyrene with slots but in it. Again, however, I'm looking to replace that.

Also notice that the Rogue has a uniform thickness all the way through the head. This necessitates the use of that style of tuners. Fitting surplus LP tuners may present a depth problem.

[cynical1]

First off, let me preface this by saying that I've never built or worked on a lap-steel guitar. I just have one little point to toss out, for what it's worth...

As I understand it, a lap-steel nut and bridge are designed to be dead flat. A Tune-o-Matic bridge will generally have a 12" radius.

I don't know how, or if this will effect the playability. I do know that some Les Paul's have a 9"-10" radius, and re-fitting a new Tune-o-Matic with the standard 12" radius can make it a tad tricky to set string height.

Just throwing that out...as it would seem to be easier to work the nut into compliance versus using the tune-o-matic...

Happy Trails

Cynical One

[newey]

This guy has instructions on building one.
www.buildyourguitar.com/resources/lapsteel/

He uses an LP Junior bridge, which is a non-roller compensated bridge, but which also has a 12" radius. He states he filed the slots down so that all strings are level with that bridge.

He also has instructions for a nut.

[ashcatlt]

That radius thing is something that had completely not occurred to me. Not to say I didn't believe you, but I did pull out my LP and a straight edge...

So then there's the question of how big a deal this is actually going to be. I've only ever messed with a lap steel once. It was after bar closing at some random dude's house. Didn't have a bar, so I used my pocket knife. I have played some slide, and always found that the low action was a bigger problem than the fretboard radius. Seems like the weight of a proper slide bar might just take care of this problem.

I guess it would be easy enough to try it as is. If it really sucks, I could always file the thing down. At least, I could file down the "nut" end. Seems this might not work so well on the roller bridge. Which leads to the question: Do I really need the roller saddles on the vibrato end? I figure it will be a lot nicer on the strings, and probably help with the whole returning to proper tuning thing, but... On the other hand, maybe having a flat "nut" with a radiused bridge would be close enough.(?)

I have a feeling that link is going to come in real handy. It's already pretty much alleviated my initial concern re: choice of wood. I can get a 2 x 4 x 32 chunk of hard maple for free. In fact, I could probably get some real nice bird's eye or tiger stripe stuff if I really wanted. Don't need anything that fancy, though, since it pretty much has to end up black.

I do wonder why he bothered with a separate piece of wood for the "fretboard". I guess it's just an aesthetic thing. Not sure what I want to do here yet, but it's still a ways down the road.

[sumgai]

ash,

On a darkened stage, light-colored lines (or even chromed fretwire) will stand out against a dark fretboard much more than the reverse color scheme. Makes playing smoky clubs a bit easier.



sumgai