Newest project - Fender "Sneakycaster II" -

[Jim Sliff]

Well, after getting kind of used to my short-scale, 2-pickup (modified) 9+2 B6 400, I got this nice 1000 from Ed Bierly in a trade. I was selling my other 1000 to raise money for my daughter's horse purchase, so timing was good. I've had it for a while, and it was finally time to dig into it; it was set up with Sneaky's early copedent on the back neck - B6, no knees (and no 9th pedal on this one, which he never used anyway.). The front neck has a SS tuning Ed devised that works great with no pedals.

Well, over the last few days I fianlly did the knee lever installation; the knees were some "homegrown: parts given to me; brackets I made from some aluminum "L"-shaped stuff (my power tools consisting of a $40 Big Lots drill press, a Dremel tool amd a 4 1/2" grinder with cutoff blades.)

The extra cable is Home Depot 1/16 wire rope (which I've used for some time); wire rope clamps are just 79-cent pressure clamps; stops are 50-cent steel "L" brackets (and yes, they stop things just fine - you can't bend them with a cable. Several comments made in the past about how weak they would be on my old guitar were proven soundly wrong); turnbuckles are about a buck at the local hardware store; springs (to vary the tension of the pulls) are 75 cents a piece or so.

The changer loops that go on the ends of cables are the hardest to make - safety wire for the loops, copper tubing, and a propane torch for soldering. You DO have to be careful.

The stops to create double-raise and double-lowers are the "L" brackets and Shobud barrel tuners slipped over the cable. As long as you put it all together in order, it's really easy - ad I am NOT a fabricator, steel mechanic, industrial designer - Fred Shannon gets a lot of credit getting me started on the first guitar I did, telling me to not worry about it and just do itl He was right - it's very sinple, extremely precise and just about foolproof.

Heck, I even took an unused cable and hooked it up to the SS neck to raise one the the "unison" "E"'s to appease b0b . I might just hook up a couple more as well...just need to decide which ones. BTW, I'd post the B6 copedent, but I always manage to foul it up - it's listed on the forum as Sneaky's B6.

So far,so good - nice smooth action and it sounds tremendous - with Sneaky's old 1 1/4" military-process tone bar it has a huge, fat, round tone. Enough treble for the more "normal" steel stuff I don't play much, and superb bite, punch and sustain for "edgier" rock and bluesy tones.

Pics follow:

[Jim Sliff]

Bump - just because I like the pictures. And man, is it playing nicely.

[Colin Mclean]

Nice work, Jim. I like the finish on that one, too. How about some pics of the top side?

BTW is that a metronome clamped to the front there?

[John Poston]

Nice work!

I'd love to see a close up of the changer loop at the end of the cable. What is safety wire anyway? Also, how is the copper tubing then attached to the cable? Looks like you did a great job on this.

[Jim Sliff]

Ok some pics...sort of "staged" to explain it more clearly.

As far as making loop ends - what I called "safety wire" is 16 gage galvanized steel wire - a buddy put up an HDTV over-the-air antenna and I got the wire idea from what he used to steady the post. You simply bend a piece of it over a small screwdriver or something to use as a "mandrel", then tweak it with pliers to get it fairly straight - stick it in a piece of copper tubing with a little outward pressure to keep it in place and solder it. You need a LOT of heat, a LOT of solder and quick hands.

Same thing with the "wire rope" at the other end. The soldering is tricky, and was not done where you see it, obviously - a bad place to use a propane torch, which is needed to get things hot enough (also lots of flux and heavy solder). If I get lucky they look almost identical to originals...but it's hard to get that lucky!

I've made a bunch of these loops and never had one come apart. Seems like the only weak solder point on there is at the turnbuckle (Fender inserted cable in a hole like with the copper tube, but with the turnbuckles there's not enough contact area in my view), so I use a loop of wire and clamp system - tested the assembly by hanging my Pro Reverb from one (just a few inches off the ground) for about 8 hours...that was good enough for me.

Pics show the various tools; the typical wire insertion (with solder just to show the size - and the wire loop would just be inserted the same way); and one of the top.

The little clip-on dingus is an "Intelli" tuner. Neat little chromatic that picks up vibration from the body. I got it from Jim Palenscar - I was using Intellitouch tuners on 6-string (same idea) but this is more sensitive to steel vibration. Works great on the Fenders and my GFI.

Only one topside photo - because it's just bone stock...for now....

[James Morehead]

Where there's a will, there's a way,right Jim?? Cool project!!

[Tim Whitlock]

Nice looking rig Jim! Can you please divulge your source for the changer springs you use and what type (guage, tension, part#, whatever) they are? It looks like you have kept the stock springs on strings 3,6,7 & 8. I'm wanting to fine tune the pedal action on my 1000. Thanks!

[Jim Sliff]

Tim - I'll see what I can find out. NO stock springs work perfectly - I have to trim each one a couple loops at a time to get a balance between tension and return. But I can likely let you know what to start with and how to make them work.