Working on the 1956 Dewey Kendrick PSG.

[Andy DePaule]

Been a long time in the works and will be a little longer yet while I'm setting up my garage workshop here.
Got this in 2017 so it was a slow start.

Working on that Dewey Kendrick. Maybe the only Dewey Kendrick ever made since I've never found anyone who has any idea who he was.

Anyway, when I got the steel it was in very rough shape unable to tune the pedals or the two very weird knee levers.
Photos of the slow progress below.

It does as they say, have great bones. The Birdseye Maple is to die for and the tone of the Fender Stringmaster pickups is wonderful.

I've gotten the end plates I made welded up and they still need to be drilled, sanded and polished.
Thats a load of work. Maybe I should just do it in Black paint or something???

Okay so here goes. The first three photos are the end plates I've made.
It had none before and the front legs were vertical making the steel unstable.
Now these plates have the legs all at a 12º angle.





I replaced the old Ricky pan keyheads with the new Klusons and new tuning machines also even though the old ones still worked.
Aquired some 8 string roller nuts and made the two new stainless steel fretboards to replace the silly Les Paul style inlays between actual guitar frets.
The bridge end of the front neck will be cut off and replaced with a Changer Block.
That neck will have a modern 3 up and 3 down changer.
The back neck does not have enough room under the steel for a modern changer so I will re-use the pull release fingers. Set it up kind of like the old Sho~Bud Permanent with rods instead of cables. Will decide that later... It will be tuned to A6th or maybe C6th.
No changes are even needed with a 6th tuning, but nice to have just a few.



This is the new stainless steel name plate I made for it. Had none before.



This was the underside mess it had. I ripped all of this out.
Those silly things for the legs to screw into I think they were from a 1950's couch the had those little legs???
It will now have cross shafts for 5 modern narrow pedals and 4 knee levers.
Bell cranks and just be simple and work well. Easy to change tunings.



I'd say you just gotta love those two knee levers, but I didn't.
Trashed them both.
The old wide pedals were kind of interesting, but now I can get 5 into the same space.
Front E9th neck will have 2 pedals with the E to F# on a knee lever.
Back neck will have three pedals and use one or two of the knee levers.
The front neck will use all 4 knee levers.



It will not be original, but I think improved. Hope it will be a fun steel.
When finished it will be about 20 pounds lighter and will function as we'd want.

[Dan Robinson]

Wow, Andy! Where do you find these treasures? Keep us posted on this rebuild.

[Larry Dering]

Andy, you are a gem. That looks great and with your magic I'm sure it will be better than new.

[Chris Lucker]

Andy, your vertical legs made the guitar unstable because you were installing the legs wrong.

The threaded sections of the legs are for screwing the legs into the floor, not the cabinet, therefore making the guitar solid as a rock.

[Chris Lucker]

Andy, what tells me that Kendrick made just the one guitar is how the knobs were made. Would you make knobs like that if you were making more than one guitar?
Cool knobs.

[John Haspert]

I couldn’t get a real good luck at the knobs, but the limited view appears to a style that was used on 1950’s and 60’s vintage tools made by the King-Seeley corporation and sold by Sears and Roebuck. Mostly of the one that I have seen were castings that were then chrome plated. This is only a guess on my part. Andy, when you get a chance, could you please post some pictures of the actual knobs. Thanks

[Chris Lucker]

John H, there is nothing standard about the knobs. Sides were grooved with a hacksaw blade and the dome shape looks like they were done without a follower template on a lathe or maybe even a belt sander or a file. I don't know why there is a plug in the end unless a fixture was made to mount the knob on a length of threaded rod or a bolt, locked at both ends by nuts or a nut and the head of the bolt, and turned between head and tailstocks on a metal lathe or even mounted in a drill press for hand shaping. That is my only explanation for the plug in the dome.
If I were to make these knobs, I would use a slitting saw mounted in the lathe and cut indexed slices around the knob. The dome I would shape using a follower and a Dumore Grinder so the dome would be repeatable.

Andy posted these photos sometime ago. These are the coolest knobs I have ever seen.







These are the coolest damn knobs I have ever seen.

[John Haspert]

Chris, thanks for the pix of the knobs. Those look to be truly one or pair of a kind. Not what i thought they were. Probably made just as you suggested.

[Marty Broussard]

Wow, this is a cool thread. Glad I found it.

[Chris Lucker]

Andy, what are you going to do for a pedal rack?

[Andy DePaule]

Hi Chris,
I have not been getting messages through the forum for over a year now so I didn't see your posts until today.
No the legs definitely were to screw into the guitar as the bottom of the legs have rubber feet and no threads.

You are right about the knobs being done with a hack saw. I think the brass rod in the center was to fill the hole left from drilling all the way through.
Whatever the reason, I like the look.
I agree they are great even if made kind of funky!
Here is a photo of how nice they cleaned up.



The fingers seem to be direct copies of Bigsby fingers without the finer details that PA always put into his work.
I will use all 8 for the back neck so that changing copedent will be easy on that neck.



Anyway it's coming along nicely. The Birdseye Maple is to die for.
The very best Birdseye is under the back neck's peghead and will not be seen I'm sorry to say.
For now I've set this project aside to do some of the other instruments I'm working on and finish off another can of Coors .





I don't think I'll ever get my money back out of this D-8 Dewey Kendrick, but it's really just for fun anyway.

Other projects I'm working on are kind of copies of of Bigsby & KayKraft guitars and a mandolin.
One neck is for a copy of the first Merle Travis guitar with a few of my ideas tossed in.

There will also be a matched pair, 30's KayKraft style bodies with 50's style Bigsby necks. I've seen a photo where he put a neck on a KayKraft mandolin for Nudie the western suit tailor.
My mandolin will be a 5 string with the low C and single strings.
TK Smith made the 3 pickup and a whammy Bar for the mandolin.
Just thought you'd be interested in this.
Best wishes,
Andy

[Andy DePaule]

Thanks to Larry, Marty, John and Chris for the kind comments.

[Andy DePaule]

Andy, what are you going to do for a pedal rack?

I'll be re-using the Birdseye Maple one that was on it. Using smaller pedals I'll get 5 in the same space where there were just 4 when I got it.

I won't re-finish the Dewey Kendrick because I like the aged look. It was with varnish and not lacquer so there is no checking at all.
That older varnish they did back then got a nice finish that seems to stand up very well over the years.

[Chris Lucker]

Andy, I was joking about the legs being screwed into the floor.

The brass finger on the far left is pretty close to a Bigsby shape, then they drift off target.

I imagine the finish is Xylonite.

[Andy DePaule]

Andy, I was joking about the legs being screwed into the floor.

The brass finger on the far left is pretty close to a Bigsby shape, then they drift off target.

I imagine the finish is Xylonite.

Never heard of Xylonite before. I'll have find out about it.
Any finish that holds up almost 70 years is worth knowing about.

Sorry I missed the joke. I must have lost my humor for a bit because of a bad tooth and the meds to keep the pain down to manageable levels, but lots of strange things have been tried in the past so nothing would surprise me.

[Chris Lucker]

Xylonite is what Bigsbys we’re finished with after late 1949. The finishes were even brushed on, perhaps by PA until 1950. Nitro finishes after 1952 are refins except two I can identify from 1954.
The Marv Erickson guitar — the one that had his name imbedded in the front apron for around fifty years, is an example. It now says Joaquin Murphey, funny. The name was misspelled on the front plaque when it was original. It is a refin, but any Bigsby collector knows it is a guitar with a rewritten history. Marv Erickson was for sale for a number of years, but like Speedy or Buddie, it was just a problem.
For example. Would you pay more for Buddie Emmons’ first Emmons guitar?
The market said NO, loud and clear.

[Andy DePaule]

For anyone wondering what's up the Dewey Kendrick project.
My quasi Bigsby project is something I'd like to get done first as well as some others.

The photos below show the three Bigsby style necks that will be a part of this.
The neck at the top in the first photo will go on the more or less copy of the Bigsby Merle Travis Guitar.




Paul Bigsby often put his guitar necks onto other guitars. I saw a photo of a KayKraft mandolin he put his neck on for Mr. Nudie, the tailor who made so many western style suits for the C&W stars of the day.

NOTE: Chris Lucker corrected me. The fellow I knew as Nudie actually was Mr Cohn.
Now I'm not sure where the Nudie name came from?

I had already used the KayKraft on some Mandolins I built in the 80's and 90's so decided to do a matched pair of acoustic/electric Guitar & Mandolin with those 30's style bodies and 40's style Bigsby necks.
The Mandolin willl be a 5 string with the low C like Tiny Moore's.
Here they are as a work in progress.

The Guitar.

The Mandolin.

[Andy DePaule]

Wow, Andy! Where do you find these treasures? Keep us posted on this rebuild.

Odd find for sure. I saw it in a local Eugene, Oregon music shop a few years ago.
Thought it would be too much work to fix up. About three years later thought I'd go have another look, but it had been sold to a fellow forumite in Los Angeles.
He worked on it and got frustrated so I bought it from him.
Sure is turning into a long slow project.
Not much chance I'll ever get my "Investment" in time and money back, but it's a fun project.

[Andy DePaule]

Xylonite is what Bigsbys we’re finished with after late 1949. The finishes were even brushed on, perhaps by PA until 1950. Nitro finishes after 1952 are refins except two I can identify from 1954.
The Marv Erickson guitar — the one that had his name imbedded in the front apron for around fifty years, is an example. It now says Joaquin Murphey, funny. The name was misspelled on the front plaque when it was original. It is a refin, but any Bigsby collector knows it is a guitar with a rewritten history. Marv Erickson was for sale for a number of years, but like Speedy or Buddie, it was just a problem.
For example. Would you pay more for Buddie Emmons’ first Emmons guitar?
The market said NO, loud and clear.

You would know more that me about the vintage market since I've never really been a collector. I just like fixing things I come across that look interesting.
Doubt I'll ever get the money and effort back that I've been putting into that Dewey Kendrick PSG. Still can't find any info about who he was?

Very surprised that as of the last posting nobody has bought the Skipper Monty Bigsby Quad. They were asking only 10 thousand at the last I saw and it's in perfect condition. A beautiful example of an original Bigsby from the 50's.
I was very tempted at that price, but it would be so heavy and with the present economy the way it is I'd rather keep my money in gold bars and coins for whatever is coming down the road.