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Post new topic B6/E9 universal 2nd string
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Author Topic:  B6/E9 universal 2nd string
Ian Rae


From:
Redditch, England
Post  Posted 11 Jul 2017 5:34 am    
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When I swapped to a uni (which as many of you know involved building one) I had to decide what to tune the 2nd string to. The choice seemed to be between D# lowering it to C# (probably automatically with the E lowers) to play B6, or C# and raising it to D#.

I went for the C#, partly because I like to play a lot of B6, and partly because Mike Perlowin (who doesn't) pointed out that the the C# sounds less painful if you hit it by mistake! So I lower the Es on RKR (which I think of as the "B6" lever because it also serves as P6) and on RKL I have an "E9" lever which raises 2 to D# and 9 to D. I've been living quite happily like this for some time.

But I keep coming across instances in both styles where a D is called for, and although I have a C#-D raise on a pedal, it's not very convenient. Apart from the E9 D#-D lower, on the B6 when you use P5&6 back a fret on the upper strings to get a V13, it's good to have the 2 note on the top string.

So I thought I'd try tuning the 2nd string to D, lowering it to C# with the Es, and raising it to D# as before on the other lever. (Instead of raising D# back to E with P6 I just release the Es, so in the 13th chord example above I would get the scale note.) To avoid a lot of work which might be wasted moving the crank to the ideal position, I knocked up a temporary "gizmo" of the kind used to hook up adjacent pulls to see if it would work across three strings. Turns out it did. It makes the E lowers heavier obviously, but only by the 50% you'd expect. So now I shall live this way for a while and report back. Here is a before-and-after.....




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Mike Perlowin


From:
Los Angeles CA
Post  Posted 11 Jul 2017 9:56 am    
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Ian said, I'm not really into the B6. Tuning the 2bd string to C# is more suited for what I'm trying to do.

I hate half stops, and don't have any on my guitars. this means I have to raise the string to D and D# on 2 separate knee levers. One of the reasons I have the infamous wrist lever, is to compensate for the need to use 2 knee levers instead of just one for the 2nd string.
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Ian Rae


From:
Redditch, England
Post  Posted 11 Jul 2017 11:04 am    
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I have to live with one half stop - it's on string 8 and is the price I pay for ditching pedal 6 - but I prefer not to have more. I was considering how to rig one on the 2nd string when I hit on the idea of tuning to the middle note.
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Ian Rae


From:
Redditch, England
Post  Posted 20 Jul 2017 12:42 pm    
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Well, a week has passed and I didn't like it. The E lowers were longer and stiffer, and the scale note for the 13th chord with P5&6 didn't happen often enough to make it worthwhile. And having the 2nd string tuned to D is totally counter-intuitive. I can handle D# going down (as on my D10) or C# going up, but starting in the middle was plain confusing.

So I've put it all back and gone for a half stop (on RKL). Because I don't have a full P6 and I raise the 4th string (equivalent to 2nd on the C6) by unlowering* the Es (RKR) then my right knee is available to get that scale note if I want it. For the E9 stuff I now have a reliable D which I will now learn to exploit.




[*not a word? It is now.]
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Charlie McDonald


From:
out of the blue
Post  Posted 21 Jul 2017 5:04 am    
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I think the D#/D/C# lower is the most effective half-stop in E9 because of the low string that governs it.
It seems possible to time in several ways to arrive at a good fit for the player. One of the most useful levers IMO.
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Ian Rae


From:
Redditch, England
Post  Posted 28 Jul 2017 8:39 am    
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Ok, so I didn't like that either, because although the ½-stop on string 2 worked fine in isolation, I couldn't time it with the B-D raise on string 9 without a lot of re-engineering. So I did this instead.



LKL is not an unusual place for E9 purposes, but I wasn't sure whether I'd be able to reach it when I'm on the B6 pedals. But the time I might need it will be with P5, so my knee's pointing that way anyway and it's quite doable.

Hopefully my last post on this!
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