Rescuing a Stringmaster Quad

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 25 Sep 2014 6:30 am

Went down to see a man about getting a case made so that'll be ready in a couple of weeks or so.

Hit my first real setback today - I decided to assemble the necks ready to put the hardware on and get it wired up.

Threaded the rods through and noticed that one of them didn't appear to be long enough. I thought I'd measured them so carefully and when I took them out again, yes, they were the same length.

Of course, I had stupidly made the assumption that they were supposed to be the same length but when I re-measured, discovered that the guitar is a couple of centimeters wider at the pickup end than at the tuner end! DOH!

So all these years, in my mind, the Stringmaster was a perfect oblong but it's not. So apart from that, I've learned (re-learned) never make assumptions and measure EVERYTHING.

And thanks Larry but I can't take any credit for the red paint job - that was done by a good friend of mine who runs a garage.

Larry Lenhart · Post by **Larry Lenhart** » 25 Sep 2014 4:31 pm

Thats ok, you can still take credit for the great color choice and all of the planning and other work. Great work

Bob Gibler · Post by **Bob Gibler** » 4 Oct 2014 12:04 pm

Jeff Mead wrote:Of course, I couldn't resist laying out the hardware to get an even better idea of how she'll look...

Now That is a Beautiful Stringmaster.. I like very much.

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 19 Oct 2014 2:35 am

Ok - so it's now finally finished, strung up, tuned and gigged.

Here it is with the shielding, ready for the final wiring and assembly.

I got Matt Gleeson at Monty's guitars to do the shielding, wiring and final assembly. He was reccomended by a friend who had got him to rewind a couple of pickups from his Custom triple. At the time, Matt had remarked that he had worked on this type of pickup before and it turned out that the one he had seen before was mine! - from my Dual Pro (the shop I had taken it to had sub-contracted the pickup repair to him). Anyway, he did a great job and also made a little control plate for the switches to hide the extra holes that we had drilled in the main plate.

I had taken in all 6 control plates I had (3 from my triple neck and the 3 I bought on this forum) so he could swap out any bad pickups if necessary. As it turns out, they were all good. He was so impressed with them that he asked me if he could hang on to the remaining two plates for a while so he could take some detailed measurements and make some himself. He's going to let me have the first two prototypes to test out and if it all goes well, there will be a source for Stringmaster pickups on this side of the pond. I'll report back on that.

So here is the finished instrument, all strung up and sounding great. In the past I have said that I prefer the trapezoid models ovr the Stringmaster but I take all that back now. Maybe it was just that I prefer the shorter scale and had only ever played medium scale Stringmasters but I love this one, although my Dual Pro and Custom triple will still get plenty of use (and I do still prefer the look of those models).

In the end, I decided that as I had gone for a custom colour, I might as well finish it of with my name on the front instead of a Fender logo as I'll probably never get the opportunity to personalise another one! It is actually a die cut vinyl sticker but it is so thin that everyone who saw it assumed it was painted on. If I get fed up with it, I can peel it off and replace it with a Fender decal.

And finally, here it is in action - last night in London.

John Limbach · Post by **John Limbach** » 19 Oct 2014 5:20 am

Congratulations Jeff!!

The last picture is the best and makes it all worthwhile.

Bob Gibler · Post by **Bob Gibler** » 19 Oct 2014 5:42 am

Jeff, I'm glad to see your Stringmaster back to work after the rebuild. Nice job. It looks very nice indeed.
The shielding put in place is a nice touch. I did the same thing on my Wright Quad to reduce or remove any cycle noise from the magnets. Enjoy It for many more years to come.

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 19 Oct 2014 6:59 am

Wow! Congrats, Jeff. Well done!

Tom Pettingill · Post by **Tom Pettingill** » 19 Oct 2014 8:13 am

Nice save Jeff, That turned out great!

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 19 Oct 2014 11:11 am

A great restoration. I notice that you don't seem to have a Fender logo on the front. Is that an intentional omission, what with your name being on it, or did you fail to find someone selling them? I was wondering how the gold logo would look against a red background. I think the moulded aluminium logo that Fender used, and still uses, on speakers, would look good.

John Billings · Post by **John Billings** » 19 Oct 2014 11:36 am

I have a couple of Fender logos. Got 'em from Coop.

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 19 Oct 2014 11:51 am

Alan Brookes wrote:A great restoration. I notice that you don't seem to have a Fender logo on the front. Is that an intentional omission, what with your name being on it, or did you fail to find someone selling them

I managed to find a couple and actually sent one to Basil who needed it for one of his guitars but in the end I decided that putting my name on it was the way to go and I'm really pleased with it. Doesn't do any harm to advertise after all and "if it was good enough for Leon..."

I already put my name on my Dual Pro that came to me without a Fender logo and actually got some session work as a direct result of that - one person contacted me after seeing me playing somewhere and someone else saw a picture of me on the web and tracked me down through Facebook to offer me a gig.

Although it looks like paint, it is actually a die cut vinyl decal so I can always peel it off and put a Fender logo on if I change my mind at any point.

John Limbach · Post by **John Limbach** » 19 Oct 2014 12:50 pm

Jeff:

Is the shielding cooper foil? It's at least thirty years past time to replace the 1955 Reynold's Wrap aluminum foil in my D8's cavities.

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 29 Oct 2014 5:16 am

Just to finish off this thread - here's the final piece of the puzzle.

I picked up the case today - I thought red was the most appropriate colour to get...

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 26 May 2017 10:38 am

I hadn't realised that this post was such a long time ago. But well worth another read, all the way through.

Any news on the Quad, Jeff, or is it just being played to destruction constantly?

One of the good things about the restoration is that any wear and tear and battle scars from now on will be your own.

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 26 May 2017 11:05 am

Alan Brookes wrote:I hadn't realised that this post was such a long time ago. But well worth another read, all the way through.

Any news on the Quad, Jeff, or is it just being played to destruction constantly?

One of the good things about the restoration is that any wear and tear and battle scars from now on will be your own.

Hi Alan,

Yes, it is definitely still being played - maybe not as much as I would like to though, but I use it whenever it is appropriate. I still probably use my Dual Professional the most for recording and live work and I have started to do a few more pedal steel gigs too but if I'm on a gig that is pretty much all non-pedal steel then it's the quad for sure. It's got a couple of little scars but I try to treat it well. I sometimes use a gig bag for it though as the flight case is a little on the large size.

David Knutson · Post by **David Knutson** » 26 May 2017 11:26 am

This was my favourite restoration thread ever on the forum. Nice to read it again, and glad that quad is still a go-to for you. What ever became of the T-8?

Jeff Mead · Post by **Jeff Mead** » 26 May 2017 11:58 am

David Knutson wrote:This was my favourite restoration thread ever on the forum. Nice to read it again, and glad that quad is still a go-to for you. What ever became of the T-8?

It's all a bit complicated, so please bear with me.

Well, as I mentioned in the thread, I had to steal the hardware from one neck for the quad - in fact, I ended up mixing up all the parts I had and used the best bits for the quad.

I ended up one neck's worth of hardware short and only managed to find a tuner pan, 4 tuners, a nut and a control plate.

I was waiting to get the rest of the bits I needed to restore it properly before getting rid of it and was talking to a couple of friends. One was really interested in the bodies of the triple but, as he didn't want to have a mis-mash of parts, decided to go with re-issue Klusons and making the rest of the hardware himself (I think he's planning on making the strings through body, Tele style and using plastic control plates).

The other friend wanted to do a fairly authentic restoration of a double - so he had the hardware for the 2 necks.

I got in contact with someone here on the forum who I knew had a few Stringmaster bodies and bought 3 of them - two for my friend and one for me which I made into a single neck orphan using the odd bits I had found. I am going to be assisting my buddy with making the other 2 necks into a double-neck.

So that T-8 has ended up as part of a quad, part of a single neck, will be part of a double and will also be the basis of a non-standard "Stringmaster style" triple neck.

I will post threads on the other 2 instruments in due course. The thread for my orphan neck is here:

http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopi ... 8a0a98a864

Although this is an example of a complete, working instrument being broken up for parts but I also think this is one example where it was for the "greater good" - there will now be at least 3 people playing it, or parts of it at least and I certainly didn't make a huge profit on it.

David Knutson · Post by **David Knutson** » 26 May 2017 2:39 pm

Ya, "all a bit complicated" pretty much covers it. Can't say you're not a creative bunch over there in the UK. I'm no purist, but I do love vintage instruments. That said, if my math is correct, I'd say you are adding significantly to the number of playable steels out there and that can't be a bad thing. Good on ya.

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 26 May 2017 4:52 pm

FYI: there's a Stringmaster quad Case on eBay now. It's not mine, I'm just pointing it out in case anyone here is interested. ----> http://www.ebay.com/itm/1950s-Fender-Qu ... 2205700360