My New-Build Fender D10 2000/Stringmaster Hybrid

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 7 Sep 2015 4:19 pm

http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/vhttp:// ... highlight=
In the above thread, I discussed the parts left over from a flood-damaged, irreparable 2000. I've now started on the project.

Comparing the relative sizes of a 2000 and a Stringmaster, it was obvious that it wasn't just a matter of fitting the 2000 hardware to Stringmaster bodies. The 2000 is an inch wider per neck, and several inches longer. So I set about designing a body, based on Stringmaster dimensions, but cspable of taking the 2000 hardware, and this is my full-sized cardboard mock-up of what it will look like.

By the way, if anyone is thinking of building any sort of steel guitar, I would advocate working out all the dimensions on paper and then building a cardboard mock-up. That way you learn before you start cutting, and it's a lot cheaper to find out your errors in cardboard than after you made cuts in expensive woods.

I just made one mock-up, of course, as both necks will be identical. As you can see, the finished instrument will be considerably smaller and lighter than the result I would have gotten from just building a second 2000 neck to replace the rotten one, and bolting it to the old neck. Besides, without the mechanisms, the cords and pulleys, I don't need all that extra space.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 7 Sep 2015 5:18 pm

I did some image manipulation using a combination of Microsoft Paint and PhotoImpression, to get some idea of what the finished instrument will look like, by duplicating the cardboard mock-up to show two necks.

Ignore the colour scheme. The cardboard is white on one side and brown on the other, so I've turned the top one upside-down so that it stands out when sandwiched against the bottom one.

By the way, examination of stripped-down Stringmaster bodies suggests that, on some Stringmasters, Fender cut each neck out of two pieces of wood laminated together, which is what I intend to do. (I don't trust routers. I've seen too many results of what people can do to themselves when they've slipped with them.

)

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 8 Sep 2015 12:26 am

I just noticed - the Fender logo on the tuning pans is upside down compared to the way they usually are (i.e. reading the right way up to the player).

Was the original instrument a left hander?

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 8 Sep 2015 10:57 am

It's something that I noticed and was wondering about. On the cardboard mock-up, the moulded nametag label is just placed there, so I could turn it around, but the engraved "Fender" on the tuning pan is orientated to be viewed by the player. I'll have to compare it to other 2000s. It's a question that hasn't come up before.

As someone whose main expertise is in old acoustic instruments, such as lutes, citterns, etc., I'm used to questions regarding builders' labels and signatures, so I'm out of my field when it comes to factory-produced stampings, which could be moved from instrument to instrument. When I build instruments I always glue my builder's label inside and sign it personally, adding the date. I would never screw in a mass-produced metal tag. It's a shame that Fender and Sho-Bud didn't follow the luthiery tradition and sign and date every instrument that they sold. Yes, they stamped numbers into the cast iron frames, but it's not the same, nor as good, as the traditional method which has been followed for centuries.

Stephen Cowell · Post by **Stephen Cowell** » 8 Sep 2015 11:32 am

Alan Brookes wrote:... the engraved "Fender" on the tuning pan is orientated to be viewed by the player. I'll have to compare it to other 2000s. It's a question that hasn't come up before.

Exactly opposite of what I'm seeing.

Keith Glendinning · Post by **Keith Glendinning** » 8 Sep 2015 11:59 am

Hi Alan,
It seems that the Fender logo on the tuners faces the audience, not the player.
I hope this picture shows it OK.
Keith.

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 8 Sep 2015 2:38 pm

That's interesting - so the logos 10 string tuner pans are the opposite way round to the 8 stringers.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 8 Sep 2015 4:33 pm

It certainly seems that way. Maybe someone with a knowledge of the Fender factory will come in with an explanation.

Hal Braun · Post by **Hal Braun** » 9 Sep 2015 8:11 am

Left handed guitar?

by the way, the build looks like it is going to be very cool! wish I had a boatload of old parts, I would be trying the very same thing!

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 30 Sep 2015 2:33 pm

It's been a few weeks since my last post on this subject. I'm not procrastinating; I always spend a lot more time designing instruments than building them. It's the old addage of "measure three times, cut once."
That's why I always believe in making a full-sized mock-up in cardboard first.

Cutting the wood is actually the biggest part of the job, and when I got ready to cut I realised that I don't have enough of the right-sized wood in the right materials to continue with the design as-is. Well, being retired and on a very strict budget I'm looking at alternative designs. I have a body which was originally intended for a pedal steel, but, as there are no holes cut into it yet for the tuners, pickups, etc., it could be used for any number of different projects. I was originally thinking of using it to build an octave-course console steel, similar to the ones I built for Basil Henriques and Bishop Ronnie Hall. These are some ideas. What do you think?

Stephen Gambrell · Post by **Stephen Gambrell** » 30 Sep 2015 11:24 pm

Is that a big crack, where the changer goes, in the back neck?

Bill Hatcher · Post by **Bill Hatcher** » 1 Oct 2015 7:32 am

Never mind the guitar.....nice train turntable!!

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 1 Oct 2015 9:26 am

Stephen Gambrell wrote:Is that a big crack, where the changer goes, in the back neck?

Yes, it was stored in a humid basement and split. I can close it up by gluing and clamping, or just fill the gap. Either way, it won't be noticed when the instrument is finished.

Bill Hatcher wrote:Never mind the guitar.....nice train turntable!!

Thanks. Building model railways has been one of my main hobbies all my life. I miss the days when all the trains were steam.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 3 Oct 2015 2:48 pm

I managed to find some wood, so I decided to continue with my original concept, which will be 100% Fender, rather than end up with something that's a mixture of Fender and Sho-Bud.
Today I cut out some of the body parts. That's actually the biggest part of the job. From here on it should be pretty straightforward. I tested out the pickups and they work okay. That was one of my main concerns, knowing their history of having been stored in a damp basement for many years.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 4 Oct 2015 2:50 pm

Today I fabricated another layer for the back neck, built up of two pieces of aero-ply sandwiched together, cut our the apertures for the tuners and the pickups with a piercing saw and brace-and-bit, and here's how it looks so far.

Here I'm laminating the two pieces of aeroply together. I use a lot of aeroply, especially in modelling. It's a plywood made of very hard woods with small particles, and is very strong. Adding this to the back neck brings it up to the correct height.
Fender used to prefabricate necks in four different thicknesses, and then bolt them together, depending on how many necks they wanted on the instrument. I chose to build the body of both necks as one whole, but that necessitated raising the back neck, hence the extra layer.

Hal Braun · Post by **Hal Braun** » 5 Oct 2015 6:34 am

I am liking it so far (the Shobud body would have been neat too, but this appears truer to the "roots")

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 10 Oct 2015 1:37 pm

Progress so far. I lowered the centre section between the necks, as per the Stringmaster design. All the wood is still rough-sawn at this stage. It will look a lot better once it's all been sanded down and painted.

I'm toying with whether to include the Fender 2000 electrical panel. It looks okay, but the only place to insert it is between the necks, and I'm thinking that it would get in the way of the right hand when picking on the far neck.
I still cannot find the original Fender bridge covers. I've turned the place upside-down looking for them. It's the only thing that could hold up the project indefinitely.

Stephen Cowell · Post by **Stephen Cowell** » 10 Oct 2015 8:14 pm

I wouldn't use the original bridges... then you'd have room for the controls where they belong, I love the long knurled knobs. String-through with rods a la Remington! Then it would more resemble a Stringmaster instead of a neutered 2000. Just IMO.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 11 Oct 2015 11:06 am

The bridges of the 2000 are part of the mechanism, so I shall have to fabricate new ones. The only way to fit that control panel after the bridge would be sideways, and it's too long. Since its only function is to act as separate volume and tone controls for the two pickups, and switch them on or off, they're not really necessary. When I build lap steels from scratch I never build volume or tone controls into the instruments, as I've always thought that that's better done at the amplifier, and any additional condensors and potentiometers just deaden the tone a little. When I build instruments with more than one pickup per neck I usually include double-pole-double-throw switches so that the pickups can be thrown into or out of phase, but in this instance I'll just leave the two pickups permanently live. My only thought of using the original control panel was for appearances.
I'm also wondering if it's worth putting leg sockets on the underneath of the guitar. I rarely use the legs on lap or console steels. I either rest them on top of pedal steels or on a table. If I ever needed to play them in public I would probably use a keyboard stand, or choose one the steels that I have legs for.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 5 Apr 2016 7:13 pm

Here's where I am so far with the project. The several months delay has been because I've been working on other projects. The body is pretty well completed and painted. The area around where the new bridge will be installed, so that the strings pass through the body and are anchored at the back, still needs some clean up. I decided not to put volume and tone controls on it, as these can be controlled on the amplifier.
I originally intended to paint it avocado, a colour which I've used in the past and been happy with, but I didn't have enough paint in stock, so the colour that I used is actually closer to the original Fender colour used on Stringmasters.
What do you think of the colour? Any suggestions?
Now that it's had about six coats of paint and a couple of coats of undercoat I can change the colour with very little additional paint needed.

Tom Pettingill · Post by **Tom Pettingill** » 7 Apr 2016 6:22 am

Cool project Alan

What do you think of the colour? Any suggestions?

I don't dislike the color you have on there now, but for some odd reason, a deep and rich red popped into my mind.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 14 Apr 2016 1:01 pm

Tom Pettingill wrote:...I don't dislike the color you have on there now, but for some odd reason, a deep and rich red popped into my mind.

I thought of that, too, and I even thought of dark blue, but they remind me too much of Fender 2000s and not Stringmasters. In the event I decided to go with the colour I originally used, which is very close to the colour that Fender regularly used on Stringmasters.
I've now started refitting the hardware, so it's too late to change....

Will Houston · Post by **Will Houston** » 14 Apr 2016 2:03 pm

Well done lad!!

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 11 Jul 2016 5:03 pm

http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopi ... 37#2534937

Almost finished. Now all I need to do is buy some better screws and fabricate some bridge covers. I always intended to use the original Fender ones, but I've turned the place upside-down several times over and I have no idea where they went to.