Which benders do you recommend?

[Doug Anderson]

Curious what two string benders do you like for lap steels.

I'm trying to find good value ones but fine paying more if they play better, are more durable, etc..

[Brad Bechtel]

On which lap steel will you be installing these benders? Usually I look for the guitar I have and see what others have installed on similar lap steels.

Personally I haven't gotten into using them the same way some others have.

[K Maul]

Certanos are high quality and can fit in a pretty small space.

[Tony Oresteen]

I have installed benders on two of my lap steels. I choose Certanos as others had used them and loved them. I searched the reviews and could not find any negatives except one: Price.


I bought a set of Certanos and installed them on my Champ. Story here:

viewtopic.php?t=402053&hilit=Champ


Even if space is tight you can add them.

bender 2.jpg

I bought another set of Certanos and put them on my Recording King lap steel. Perfect. The buying process is easy and they showed up from France quickly.


Remember what Leica said: "Quality remains long after price is forgotten". (yes I use Leicas with FILM!)

Get the Certanos. Highly recommended.

[Michael Kiese]

I purchased 2 Duesenberg Multibenders and put them on 2 different cheap steel guitars just so I could practice 2 different tunings with the multibender without having to shell out $3,000 for one Duesenberg. It ended up costing me like $800 total rather than $6,000 for 2 Duesenbergs.

The Duesenberg multibenders work very well. Just make sure you choose a steel with enough "real estate" behind the bridge to install them.

I like the Duesenberg multibender because you can easily change the palm benders to any string once it's installed.

[D Schubert]

Certano bender is very well. designed and built, stays in tune, returns to pitch. I found that palm/wrist benders were very difficult to use, maybe my inability to hold 'em down for any extended period of time. That's my weakness, not the fault of the bender.

[HowardR]

I have owned four guitars with benders....two had Certanos and two had Dusenbergs........I did not do any of the installations or make any changes to either of them so I can't provide any mechanical info on them.....

They are both very high quality and very well engineered bender lever units.....I personally feel that the Dudenberg is a little smoother in operation and a little easier with regard to playability......but I have no problem playing badly on either of them......

[Doug Anderson]

Has anyone checked out the Peters Benders? They are a bit cheaper.

https://petersinstruments.com/pages/hardware

[Martin Huch]

Don't forget: The Duesenberg Multibender is the ONLY palmbender, that can raise or LOWER a string. Simple example on an E major tuning: lower the third string a half step and get a FULL minor chord !

[Michael Kiese]

Don't forget: The Duesenberg Multibender is the ONLY palmbender, that can raise or LOWER a string. Simple example on an E major tuning: lower the third string a half step and get a FULL minor chord !

Aloha Martin!

Thanks for helping to design the Duesenberg Multibender! I really like the two I purchased.

I put both multibenders on cheaper steels in order to try out 2 different tunings and palm bender setups.

One steel is your tuning and palm bender setup. The other is Luke Cyrus Goetze’s tuning and palm bender setup.

I transcribed both Luke’s and Your tuning/setup by ear. I emailed Luke and he confirmed that I got his right.

Can you please confirm/verify if I have your setup correct?

I think this what you used in those old videos you put up on YouTube in your studio:

1 E —> F (raise)
2 B —> C# (raise)
3 G# —> A (raise)

4 E
5 B
6 E

[Martin Huch]

Hey Mike...this is absolutely correct !

[Michael Kiese]

Hey Mike...this is absolutely correct !

Nice! Thank you for the confirmation!

That E to F raise on the first string gives you a nice diminished chord. A very useful change.

Did you stick to this setup and tuning, or did you experiment with any others?

[Cappone dAngelo]

1 E —> F (raise)
2 B —> C# (raise)
3 G# —> A (raise)

4 E
5 B
6 E

Have you tried it with a half step lower on the 1st (E) string? That gives you an extra minor triad voicing and a dom7 (with the G# raise,’), and even if you’re not a wiz at ‘behind the bar’ bends the 1st string is IME relatively easy to bend up a half step (I use my ring finger).

[Michael Kiese]

1 E —> F (raise)
2 B —> C# (raise)
3 G# —> A (raise)

4 E
5 B
6 E

Have you tried it with a half step lower on the 1st (E) string? That gives you an extra minor triad voicing and a dom7 (with the G# raise,’), and even if you’re not a wiz at ‘behind the bar’ bends the 1st string is IME relatively easy to bend up a half step (I use my ring finger).

Hey Cappone,

Thanks for reaching out, and sharing your suggestion.

Yes, regarding the half step lower on the 1st string, that is similar to Luke Cyrus Goetze's current palm bender setup:

1 D —> C# (lower)
2 A —> B (raise)
3 F# —> G (raise)

4 D
5 B
6 G

The lowering of the first string gives you a nice B minor 9 chord with Luke's tuning. It's handy to have a relative minor chord in home position. But like you mentioned, in Open E, you can get a root position minor triad based on the 3rd string. Like you also mentioned, a dominant chord based upon the 2nd string as root is presented when depressing palm 1&3.

I have two cheap steels with Duesenberg multibenders on them so that I could practice 2 different tunings with 2 different palm bender setups.

I keep one in Luke Cyrus Goetze's tuning/setup, and one in Martin Huch's setup. Both tunings/setups are good.

I find Martin's tuning and setup very intuitive because it uses Open E and therefore is the same as standard slide guitar tuning. It's very "hit the ground running". The palm benders give you the quintessential AB pedal steel sound of going from I to IV. The 3rd bender gives you a nice diminished chord.

Martin's tuning/setup is very handy because it's intuitive to slide guitar players and therefore a gateway to get pedal steel sounds. I think that is what Martin intended, and it is very sound reasoning. I find it easy to pick Martin's setup back up if I haven't practiced it in a while, which is very nice.

Luke's tuning/setup offers a lot of possibilities, and it comes with added practice and thinking. There is a lot of payoff.

Both tuning/setups are good. There are no solutions, only tradeoffs.

I'm just glad that Duesenberg makes their Multibenders available for separate purchase. I wouldn't have purchased a Duesenberg steel just to try out the Multibender. Also like both you and Martin pointed out, each individual palm bender can either raise or lower the string, which is a very handy feature.

Now that I have a grasp on it, I'd be open to getting a Duesenberg someday. I like the built in capo feature, that's nice. Good for pop and country bands.

I'll stick to my Rickenbachers for Hawaiian music though. lol.