E9 change

[Bob Moore]

Hi everyone how can I change a E9 to play as lap tuning until I solve a ankle problem with left foot. I wanted to sell my steel and get a double 8. My wife flat out said no. Keep it. Thanks Bob Moore

[Daniel McKee]

You can try putting non pedal strings on however your steel may have a set of gauged rollers that aren’t quite right for some non pedal string gauges.

[Jim Fiegen]

Lower you E's with a knee lever and play it as a B6.Watch out for the ninth string D, I change it to a C# with the E knee lever and it fits the B6 chord nicely.

[Jon Light (deceased)]

Lower you E's with a knee lever and play it as a B6.Watch out for the ninth string D, I change it to a C# with the E knee lever and it fits the B6 chord nicely.

Or, if you don't want to watch out for it, you could tune the D string up to D#, unison with the 8th string. And if you are in this for the long haul, just tune the E's down to D# and don't mess with levers.

Alternately, you could go for A6 by retuning strings 10, 6 & 5 to what the A & B pedals would do....tune the B's to C# and the G# to A. And if you again want to get the D string out of the way you could tune it down to C# and even remove the 10 string.

[Bob Moore]

Thanks everyone. I may try one of the ideas. Hopefully I can solve my ankle problem in a reasonablely short time. Bob M

[Andy DePaule]

A6th is a great option;

F#---G
D#---C# or D is interesting too.
G#---F#
E-----E
B-----C#
G#---A
F#---F#
E-----E
D----C#
B----A

I've use this before and it's nice.
On my PSG I already have 2nd and 9th strings in C# and raise them by knee lever.
Also my first pedal raises my 6th string to C# while lowering my 10th string to A.
That gives me a more or less A6th all across and is almost identical to my favorite lap steel.