Stadler SD-10 Marlen

Jim Keller · From: Nevada, USA

I got this in 2008 and it sat in the case until I took a bunch of my vintage music stuff to a place here in Las Vegas called Cowtown Guitars. You can read the cowtown ripoff reviews online, they are now out of business. The bad reviews are all true. Anyway, when I got my stuff back from the shop vintage amp speakers and parts had been changed and parts were missing from guitars. Hopefully by seeing a couple pictures someone here can tell me if any of the leg lever bars are missing. The middle two pedals are a little stiff, I don't have the proper size allen wrench to clean the bar they turn on.

Also, it's for sale.

https://youtu.be/qvsMhPH6QOg

Tim Johnson · From: Cadiz, KY, USA

How much are you asking for the Marlen? Thanks

Jim Keller · From: Nevada, USA

Looking for about $1,500 + shipping. Thanks for asking. It's a pretty heavy unit with the case and all.

Jim Keller · From: Nevada, USA

I found the proper allen wrenches and cleaned the foot pedal bar. They all move freely and as they should now.

Tucker Jackson · From: Portland, Oregon, USA

Good news. It's highly unlikely that even a known 'thieving' guitar store scavenged a $10 rod off the bottom of the guitar given they usually don't know anything about steels, and those rods would only work on right-side knee levers on certain guitars because they are so short. It's not a rare or vintage part, just a cheap, vanilla steel rod.

Also, I don't see any tell-tale oil stains on either the bellcranks or at the changer-end for String 9 where rods may have once attached.

It's way more likely that one of two things is going on:

1) The prior owner removed one or both rods from the unused bellcranks to customize the setup to their liking.

As in, the RKR (Right Knee moving Right) lever often lowers the 9th string. It also provides the additional tension to create a half-stop for the 2nd string lower. HOWEVER, it's spongy and on some guitars, a poor solution. So a lot of people hate that. Some address that by just removing the rod, ditching the entire 9th string lower (and with it, ditch the 2nd string continuation on down to C#. They just have that lever lower 2 to "D" and that's it). That leaves an unused bellcrank lined up with String 9, as you show in the video.

Lowering both strings 2 and 9 to C# is common, but not crucial; for example, the Zum Stage One guitar doesn't have that change either.

2) That explains why RKR has an unused bellcrank, but it doesn't explain the one on RKL, which also (confusingly) looks to be in String 9 position. But I have a theory:

Looking at the photos and how the oil spray has turned the metal parts black on the left end of the guitar, it looks like the right-side knee levers were added later. As in, this was originally a 4x2 guitar, but some prior user sent it back to Leonard to add 2 more knee levers.

Those bellcranks are welded on the crossbar and can't be moved, right?

If that's true, it's likely that the prior owner ordered up a 2nd string lower on one lever (with no half-stop feature via a 9th string lower), and a 1st and 2nd string raise on the other. That's how your guitar is currently wired. Great. But Leonard's parts supply had a 'standard' crossrod with bellcranks welded in string position 2 and 9. That standard part could serve both of the changes the user wanted to add to their guitar... but it meant there would be extra unused bellcranks in the 9th string position, as you now have.

Bottom line: Everything is fine here. The guitar is playable and saleable as is. It looks to have a cool 0-pedal that lowers strings 5 and 6, in addition to a fairly standard copedent. One thing a prospective buyer should know is that strings 2 and 9 don't lower to C# (string 2 goes to D, with no continuation on down to C#. String 9 isn't lowered at all). But the bellcrank for string 9 is already there on RKR if they want to add those changes. They just need to buy a rod, attaching screw, and a nylon nut from Michael Yahl to wire up String 9, available here:
https://www.psgparts.com/Marlen_c4.htm

Jim Keller · From: Nevada, USA

Thank you for the information. I know nothing about steel guitars. It looks like everything has allen set screws. I took a few pictures of what I think you were asking about. I have this other lap guitar and I have no idea who made it. It's pretty heavy and I haven't taken off the back cover to read the pots. Thanks again for your help.

<center> Here is the other one.</center>

Tucker Jackson · From: Portland, Oregon, USA

Got it. Not welded. Thanks for checking, because I couldn't see the screws in the photos and it's different than mine.

Then that changes my 'standard part' theory to this: the prior owner originally had that RKL bellcrank moving some other string (like lowering string 6), but quickly removed the change (removed the rod) for some reason. Some don't like how long the throw is on a full-step lower, so it gets ditched. They also relocated the now-unused bellcrank to position 9 to get it out of the way of traffic. And the rod they had is long gone. A lot of speculation....

The important thing is that two unused bellcranks don't automatically indicate a problem. It's actually a good thing: they're hard-to-find extra parts the buyer can use to add a change that fits the way they play. Put it up for sale along with the caveat in my last post about no 9th-string lower. I have a Marlen from a later era and it's a nice guitar. Somebody is going to get a bargain.

You might want to post the lap steel photos over in the "Steel Without Pedals" section of the forum. Somebody there will be able to tell you what it is.

Jim Keller · From: Nevada, USA

Good deal. I appreciate your help and insight. I'll post the pictures of the other one in the without pedals section. The serial number on this Marlen looks like 3991378 so does that make it a 1978? I was worried about the availability of parts if any were missing, thanks for the parts info. Who ever ends up with this one will appreciate the information you provided too. Nothing beats being honest and forthright, especially as a seller. Thanks again, Jim

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