Is this a dumb idea? Selling a Quad neck to a T8 owner

[Alex Cattaneo]

So, as many of you know, I’ve acquired a beaten up Stringmaster Quad.

I finally decided, after changing my mind about 15 times, to make it a triple, because the guitar was refinished, incomplete and had no case when I got it. Also, a triple makes more sense for me as a player.

What to do with the orphan neck and Quad hardware is what this post is about.

My first thought is to put it up for sale, but only for T8 owners. Meaning, if there is someone out there who wants to upgrade from a T8 to a Quad, that would be a way to help maintain the Quad population and allow someone to make the leap to a full Quad. Certain hardware pieces could be traded.

The Quad neck is currently without any paint or finish. So the buyer would have to have it color-matched to his current guitar and reconnect all the electronics. And there is still no Quad case (they are not cheap). I’m not even sure it would be worth it, which is why I’m wondering if it’s a good idea at all.

On the other hand, trading a full triple for a full quad wouldn’t necessarily be any easier: just the cost of shipping both guitars could be prohibitive.

The other option is to keep the orphan neck and make it a single, or put it aside, and there would always be a possibility to revert to a Quad eventually. Just to be clear, I wouldn’t want to sell it for parts or for someone to use it as an orphan single neck. I’ll keep it for myself if it comes to that.

[Bill Sinclair]

Whichever you decide, keep in mind that it's the thickest, front neck you'll be removing to make it a correct T8. I think I'd make it into an orphan single neck myself with the intention of only selling the T8 and S8 together when the time came. That way, you'd also have spare parts for your T8 if needed.

[Erv Niehaus]

Some years ago I bought some Stringmaster parts off the internet.
The fellow I bought them from said: "I have the neck if you want that".
I said "Sure".
When I got all the pieces, I decided to make a single neck Stringmaster.
I got some legs for it and it turned out great.
Erv

[David Knutson]

My thought, for what it's worth, would be to keep the fourth neck. You never know when you might decide a quad is the thing for you, or you could do what Erv did and have a nice single. I'm thinking about how many times we read on this forum, ". . . and now I wish I'd never sold it." Beware sellers remorse.

[Jack Hanson]

I would advise to take it apart if that's how you want to play it, but not sell the pieces separately -- keep them all together for posterity.

[Ian Rae]

I have no clue about any of this but what Jack says feels spiritually correct.

[Bill McCloskey]

I can think of zero practical use for a Quad. I've owned one or two and I sold them soon after. It was a novelty when it was first made and too heavy, and unwieldy to be practical for stage work, and bulky and heavy at home. I haven't heard of anyone dying to reconstruct a quad from a musical standpoint. Collectors aren't going to be interested in a stripped guitar. Do what you want with it.

[Daniel Flanigan]

I would strongly advise against selling the neck you remove, to me it seems just plain wrong to permanently separate necks that have been together for 70 years or so. Obviously, it's your guitar, so you can do what you want, but I would really suggest that you keep the fourth neck around so you have the option to restore the guitar to her original configuration. Just because a guitar is stripped and therefore doesn't interest 'collectors', doesn't mean that the guitar doesn't still have historical value, and isn't worth keeping as original as possible.

[Allan Revich]

Once you sell something it no longer belongs to you and you have no control over what becomes of it once it’s sold. So I’d forget about trying to put a condition on the sale.

My suggestion is to either keep it as a quad, or make it into a triple and a single, keeping both for your own use. When the time comes to sell, you can decide whether or not to restore it to its original quad format at that time.

Of course what I’ve said to you, applies to me too, meaning that you are free to do whatever you want with my opinion—including disregarding it.

[David M Brown]

Set it up as a triple and keep the 4th neck so it could be restored to a quad.

[Tony Oresteen]

First of all, what scale is it?

I have a pile of Stringmaster necks that I have been working on and it is not an easy project. I'd bag up the neck and parts and KEEP it. You may need it next year and I guarantee that if you do, you will not be able to find it.

[Dave Mudgett]

If this was an original, unmolested Quad Stringmaster, I'd recommend keeping it as-is. I had one for several years, and when it came time to move it on, I sold it to a forum member friend for far less than I could have gotten had I made it into a pair of D8s or a T8 and an S8. In fact, I lost money on it. But I really didn't want to destroy an original example. But seriously - from a practical playing point of view, almost nobody wants a Quad. They are almost entirely of collector interest only. I took mine out a few times to play, but it is really heavy, large, and unwieldy. They are definitely worth more broken up, and probably even more than that purely as parts. Again, I didn't do that to a nice original example, but I paid the price for integrity.

In the case of a beat up, refinished Quad with missing parts and no case, I would have made a different decision. I would have split it up into two D8s, or even a D8 (back two necks to include the bari neck in the D8 ) and a pair of S8s. Not only would I realize more money, but it would make available two or three nice, vintage console steels in the format that, IMO, FAR more people would find useful.

As Bill M. says - I suggest you simply do whatever you want with the guitar. If you want to keep an extra neck and parts around, that's fine. But if you'd rather sell or trade the neck to someone who would play it as an S8, I think that is a very reasonable choice. That would probably make two people happy.

BTW - I'm the guy who wound up with Erv's long-scale Stringmaster orphan single-neck project. It's a great guitar that I used as my primary console for several years, and is now in the hands of another forum member who also loves it. I moved it on only because I got rid of everything except a Clinesmith cast aluminum long-scale S8 lap steel and a Clinesmith D10 Joaquin style console. The Clinesmiths are simply the sound I had in my head, and once I got them, I couldn't justify anything else. But that long-scale S8 Stringmaster project is a great guitar. I really think more than two necks is a much harder sell these days.

[Doug Beaumier]

...from a practical playing point of view, almost nobody wants a Quad. They are almost entirely of collector interest only. I took mine out a few times to play, but it is really heavy, large, and unwieldy.

I agree. I've owned two quads in years past. I took one of them out on a couple of gigs and it was heavy and took up a lot real estate on stage. And as cool as a quad looks, the fans, the audience pay little attention to the steel guitar. Most of them think we're playing a keyboard. And I think some of them can't even tell which sound is being played by which musician.

[Mike Harris]

"And I think some of them can't even tell which sound is being played by which musician."

There are, indeed, such people. They are called "cameramen" or "directors."

[Alex Cattaneo]

Thanks to everyone who chimed in! Here’s another question related to this project: is neck #4 too thick for a single neck guitar? I think we all agree neck 1 is too thin. Which one do you feel is just right for an S8?

[Bill McCloskey]

might be a topic for a new thread. and in the Builders area.

[Shea Stevenson]

I can’t imagine doing anything like that to a Fender that old but maybe with laps it’s different idk… just thinking about using a dremel to drop a HB in an old strat or worse Tele makes me sweat…

I also can’t imagine a use for a 4 necked guitar personally though either. I’d prefer to have separate instruments but I guess if you just really love *that* sound then…. There a video of some famous steel guy playing one on a show when he was young and it’s gotta section I always smile at where the host leans over when he’s playing to tell him to look up more because right after he starts beaming at the camera with a big ole grin hahahaha… idk why but I get a kick out of that.

[Bill Sinclair]

Alex,
No problem that I know of using either the thickest or thinnest as a single. Here's a picture of a single that I made from the thin neck of a quad husk I bought some years back. As I stated earlier though, to have the correct thickness necks for a T8, you'll need to separate the thickest (front) neck.

[Tom Keller]

If it were me I wouldn't do it.