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Topic: Cabinet drop |
Bo Borland
From:
South Jersey -
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Posted 28 Jun 2016 8:09 pm |
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| It's still a funny line and truer than most want to believe.. |
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Ian Rae
From:
Redditch, England
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Posted 29 Jun 2016 6:32 am
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Similar to Stravinsky's remark that harpists spend half their time tuning and the other half playing out of tune...
_________________
Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs |
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Donny Hinson
From:
Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.
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Posted 3 Jul 2016 7:31 am
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| Craig Baker wrote: |
Cabinet drop was invented after Leo stopped making those remarkable Fender 400s, 800s, 1000s & 2000s. Pure genius!
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Not really, some of the Gibson pedal steels made over a decade before the Fenders came along also had a lot of drop! I even played a Multiharp, once, whose cabinet sagged visibly in the center when you pushed two pedals at once.  Terrible guitar, but the player who owned it ("Litte Al" Dinkenberg) managed to do a pretty good job playing it. |
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Craig Baker
From:
Eatonton, Georgia, USA - R.I.P.
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Posted 3 Jul 2016 8:08 am
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Yes teacher.
Picky, picky, picky. . . That's our Donny.
_________________
"Make America Great Again". . . The Only Country With Dream After Its Name. |
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Steve Allison
From:
Eatonton,Ga. U.S.A.
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Posted 5 Jul 2016 5:57 pm
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Craig at my age I would be happy if my cabinet was all that dropped!  |
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Craig Baker
From:
Eatonton, Georgia, USA - R.I.P.
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Posted 5 Jul 2016 11:55 pm
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Hi neighbor. I understand completely.
Craig
_________________
"Make America Great Again". . . The Only Country With Dream After Its Name. |
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Erv Niehaus
From:
Litchfield, MN, USA
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Posted 6 Jul 2016 7:44 am
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Pedal steels suffer from the same affliction as old people.
It's called furniture disease.
Their chests drop into their drawers. |
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David Mason
From:
Cambridge, MD, USA
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Posted 6 Jul 2016 10:14 am
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| I was someehow lucky enough to get a Carter first, and for years I though everybody was lying about it, because the Carter wouldn't. Then I got "lucky" enough to try a few... ummm, great old "classic" guitars. It appears that the heavier they are, the worse it gets? Who woulda thunk it. |
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Lawrie Minson
From:
New South Wales, Australia
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Posted 18 Nov 2016 10:19 pm Choosing best leverage option can help
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I've spent quite a few months setting up my MSA Legend. I don't know if it's because it's a 12 string but it seems more susceptible to cab drop than my old 10 string. I'm now using lighter strings which has helped. You don't notice the problem so much playing live but I do a lot of sessions and it can become a critical issue.
The Legend is a beautifully put together instrument and sounds great. The action is a 4 raise 3 lower and I found if I used all the maximum leverage options first (most distance from axle)that also helped improve things as there was less pressure needed to bend the strings.
I'm also going to look into hooking up some compensating rods but haven't made it that far yet.
I don't use the open strings very much so tuning to a barred chord can also help. For me it's a game of compromise and a compensating exercise with bar vibrato. |
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Donny Hinson
From:
Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.
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Posted 19 Nov 2016 5:00 am
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| The harder you push on the pedal (after the pedal hits the stop), the more drop you will have. One player I knew was getting 7-9 cents drop, but when I played the same guitar, it was only 3 or 4, which is perfectly acceptable. |
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Greg Derksen
From:
Alberta, Canada
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Posted 19 Nov 2016 6:28 am
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I had an old sho bud single neck that had like 13 cents drop when I pushed a pedal,
That was a problem for sure,
I don't think it was all cabinet though, other stuff was going on, |
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Tom Quinn
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Posted 20 Nov 2016 10:06 am
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| Erv Niehaus wrote: |
| Some guitar players play all night without tuning and others tune all night without playing. |
Great, great observation!
_________________
I need an Emmons! |
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Erv Niehaus
From:
Litchfield, MN, USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 7:53 am
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Thanks, Tom!  |
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Ian Rae
From:
Redditch, England
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 10:12 am
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Cabinet drop for dummies: if you have a bunch of strings under tension, then whatever they are strung on is under compression. If you change the tension of one or more of them (e.g. by playing the guitar) the others will change. It doesn't matter unless you can hear it. What people can hear varies. The steels that suffer the least are the ones you can't lift very easily.
_________________
Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs |
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Erv Niehaus
From:
Litchfield, MN, USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 11:54 am
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| On a cabinet, I would say that the top of the cabinet is under compression and the bottom is under tension. |
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Henry Matthews
From:
Texarkana, Ark USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 1:27 pm
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Electronic tuners invented cabinet drop 
_________________
Henry Matthews
D-10 Magnum, 8 &5, dark rose color
D-10 1974 Emmons cut tail, fat back,rosewood, 8&5
Nashville 112 amp, Fishman Loudbox Performer amp, Hilton pedal, Goodrich pedal,BJS bar, Kyser picks, Live steel Strings. No effects, doodads or stomp boxes. |
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Georg Sørtun
From:
Mandal, Agder, Norway
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 1:42 pm
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| Henry Matthews wrote: |
| Electronic tuners invented cabinet drop |
Not to my ears |
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Henry Matthews
From:
Texarkana, Ark USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 2:07 pm
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Well Georg, I don't know whether to say congrats that you can hear 2 cents or to say I'm sorry. It takes about 3 plus before I can hear and that's in a quite room. 
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Henry Matthews
D-10 Magnum, 8 &5, dark rose color
D-10 1974 Emmons cut tail, fat back,rosewood, 8&5
Nashville 112 amp, Fishman Loudbox Performer amp, Hilton pedal, Goodrich pedal,BJS bar, Kyser picks, Live steel Strings. No effects, doodads or stomp boxes. |
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Ian Rae
From:
Redditch, England
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 2:32 pm
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I said for dummies, Erv, not you. Georg and Henry are not really arguing - they're agreeing that it only matters if you can hear it.
_________________
Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs |
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Erv Niehaus
From:
Litchfield, MN, USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 2:36 pm
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Ian,
Bless your heart! |
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Georg Sørtun
From:
Mandal, Agder, Norway
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 3:00 pm
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| Ian Rae wrote: |
| Georg and Henry are not really arguing - they're agreeing that it only matters if you can hear it. |
That's right, and as I rarely ever use electronic tuners, I have no choice but to rely on what my ears tell me.
And, for the record: how much cabinet drop or other detuning I may hear when others play their gear, rarely ever bothers me.
For me playing my own gear, it mainly depends on degree of detuning and for how long I have to endure playing a weak instrument, how much it bothers me. Nothing much a sledge-hammer won't fix...
What does sometimes bother me, is comments suggesting that one "must keep the bar straight and balanced across the strings". Offsetting, angling and pushing the bar into the strings by ear as one finds necessary to make chords sound in tune, do in my opinion work a whole lot better ... may have played too much non-pedal back in time |
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Henry Matthews
From:
Texarkana, Ark USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 6:09 pm
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You so right about the bar Georg, my friend that passed several years back had the worst bar technique if you just watched his bar. It would be slanted and pushing strings halfway down to fret board but he never ever sounded out of tune.
i just think that most people didn't worry about cabinet drop until the electronic tuners hit the market then all the sudden it was something you could see. I'm sure a lot of people can hear it just like the over tones coming from the keyhead that some hear but my ears left me several years back, lol.
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Henry Matthews
D-10 Magnum, 8 &5, dark rose color
D-10 1974 Emmons cut tail, fat back,rosewood, 8&5
Nashville 112 amp, Fishman Loudbox Performer amp, Hilton pedal, Goodrich pedal,BJS bar, Kyser picks, Live steel Strings. No effects, doodads or stomp boxes. |
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Dana Blodgett
From:
California, USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2016 9:58 pm
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I operate under the premise of "it's close enough for country"
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Dana Blodgett
From Los Osos,Ca.
'74 ShoBud 6140 3+4, Martins HD28,D-12-28, D-15,'65 Gibson LG-1, '77 Gibson Les Paul special dbl cut p-90's, Les Paul Special p-100's,Les paul Special Hybrid(maple top) hbkr's,'68 Fender Strat reissue, Fender Squire Jazz bass,Epi mandolin,Epi Wilshire '66 reissue, Kamaka Concert uke, 70's Kamaka Soprano Uke, Fender Super amp, Ampeg ba112 bass amp,60's harmony banjo,'00 Gibson SG Supreme |
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Ian Rae
From:
Redditch, England
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Posted 22 Nov 2016 2:23 am
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| Georg Sørtun wrote: |
| What does sometimes bother me, is comments suggesting that one "must keep the bar straight and balanced across the strings". Offsetting, angling and pushing the bar into the strings by ear as one finds necessary to make chords sound in tune, do in my opinion work a whole lot better ... |
Of course one must be able to hold the bar straight and even to have basic control, but I'm sure that all good players do what Georg describes and make constant adjustments just as on any non-percussion instrument.
If these kinds of tweaks are of the same order of magnitude as the detuning caused by cabinet drop, then it's all in a day's work. Only if the drop is bad enough to defeat your natural musicianship is it a problem.
_________________
Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs |
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Georg Sørtun
From:
Mandal, Agder, Norway
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Posted 22 Nov 2016 3:31 am
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| Ian Rae wrote: |
| If these kinds of tweaks are of the same order of magnitude as the detuning caused by cabinet drop, then it's all in a day's work. Only if the drop is bad enough to defeat your natural musicianship is it a problem. |
Right.
And, if players put away their electronic tuners once they have gotten it roughly right across the strings and tuned a base-note (on one string) in open tuning, and tune all other strings to that base-string by ear with the bar in the second to seventh fret area, most PSGs can be tuned to sound good for most chords up the neck almost regardless of the amount of body-drop and/or the chosen tuning (JI, ET, or whatever in between).
FWIW: I routinely fine-tune my 'E9', or 'extended E w/chromatics', tuned PSGs to a tuning-fork in "A" (440Hz) = 3d string with B-pedal down in open. All else is tuned to sound right with reference to that base-string up the neck, and I make sure I can tune out any unwanted deviations on-the-fly with the bar, by operating, and if necessary fine-tune, all pedals/levers with the bar on the strings.
Most chords are played with the bar on the strings anyway, so if one or more strings sound slightly off for some chords in open tuning because of body-drop or my chosen tuning, it isn't such a big deal in practice.
The above makes for excellent "ear and bar-handling" training, and I don't use an electronic tuner for anything but to check the resulting open tuning on rare occasions. I cannot remember the last time I actually tuned to an electronic tuner ... might have been back in -88 or so, but back then I preferred a frequency counter because of its superior precision. |
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