The Steel Guitar Forum

I used to have one years ago. It was missing a lot of pedal rods and cabling, but it sounded good. You have to love those rhinestone fret markers too.

TTT
Just checking to see if there is any NEW interest or info for me on this. You folks have been great so far!
Thanks

Hi guys,
Duane, the pics posted earlier by Dave Simonis are indeed the guitar I bought from you a few years back, and that you posted above...it's been a while since I last visited the Forum and just saw this thread tonight. Bill, I completely rebuilt and recabled the C6 neck, and added four knees to the guitar, as well as rebuilding the control panel; unfortunately I couldn't reproduce the plastic casing on the latter so I fabricated a wood block with all new controls, keeping the original stuff since I can't stand to round-file that sort of thing.

I'll post a few pics of the rebuild in a day or two and would be happy to talk about your restoration work - it looks WAY more professionally done than mine which, while it works and plays reasonably well, needs to be redone someday with new parts for both necks. My biggest problem was finding pulleys that worked and didn't take up too much room underneath, and routing the cables was an interesting exercise since I used Emmons cross shafts and cranks for the knee levers. The pulleys listed earlier in this thread look ideal for this - I was unable to locate anything close to the Fender-type flat pulleys. With the addition of the knees I also ran out of grooves in the massive pulley at the headstock end, and had to subdivide the pulls with additional floating pulleys. The cabinet work on these is beautiful, and I'm pretty fond of the rhinestones also.

FWIW as a graphic designer and illustrator I think the small metal relief "Domland" logo was gorgeous, notwithstanding the other limitations of the guitar

Is that the same guitar?! Geeze... Hey, you want to sell it back to me? Hehe, just kidding. That's some great work on that baby. I'm glad it went to the right buyer. It makes for quite a before/after comparison, doesn't it? Too bad I didn't have the staying-power to have restored it to the glory it deserve...but alas, I didn't have the time, money, parts, know-how or patience at that time.

Nice work, John!

Thanks Duane...in terms of playability there's no comparison between this and my Pro-1, but you know that! This restoration was strictly for fun but I do thank you again for helping me get into a full-size PSG at a very reasonable price. As you can see there's a lot of slop with the new cabling, the pulleys are straight from Home Depot and the soldered fittings and crimps are MAJOR ugly. Those pics of the Clinesmith and Bill's work have me pumped to standardize the underside of mine and do it clean and right, now that I have another guitar to play.

The biggest issue with the sound of this guitar is on the changer end; the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd strings don't pull straight back from the rollers to the fingers but angle out slightly, causing a fair amount of buzz and loss of sustain...this is true on both necks and I'm at a loss as to why such a fundamental design/assembly error was overlooked? There's a similar mis-alignment on the lower couple of strings but the string gauge is apparently heavy enough to overcome the problem. I'll be curious to see if Bill's is built the same way - from what I can tell the changer might be different on his. When I tear it all down again I'll try some shims, repositioning and fine tuning on the rollers.

I'm having an idea...or two...about that guitar now, like what I'd do with it if it were still mine.

If one were to measure the distance between the through-holes in the fingers for strings 1 and 10, and compare that to the distance between rollers for those same strings, what difference do you think we'd be looking at? I would almost want to say that I'd look into maybe taking the fingers out, and seeing what it would take to get them all ground thinner to just the right amount, and then putting some spacer washers between the fingers and the changer axle mount...

I know that may seem like a lot of trouble, but if you planned this out right, you might be able to solve two problems with it... As you know, you have to keep quite a bit of lube between those fingers, as they are all together, but even then you have that fluid resistance because of those large surfaces sliding past each other...so, what if you had these fingers thinned even more than I previously suggested (we're talking micrometer-using work here) and you put a washer between each, which would be just the right thickness and have an inside diameter matching the diameter of the axle... I don't know if it would be worth it to space out a lower finger and its corresponding raise finger in this way, since they kind of move together, but...

I wonder how hard a project like that would be. One would have to be really careful in adding up the total desired width, but if it were possible, that might make that thing a whole new guitar.

Duane - great thoughts on the problem. I measured the offsets: the first and second (and 10th & 9th) strings divert to the outside about 1/16" in less than an inch of length, making a kink right where they enter the finger - amazing they don't break right there. The 3rd, 4th, 8th & 7th are "bent" progressively less toward the center, while 6 and 5 have a relatively straight shot in.

Your idea would work, but it may be less complicated to get a couple of new roller blocks machined with the slots spaced correctly to match the fingers. I disassembled, cleaned and re-lubricated the entire changer mechanism so it's working well now, but your solution might be the better fix in the long run to keep those large surfaces from constantly rubbing...it wouldn't take much in the way of contaminants to gum up the works.

John,
Thanks for the replies and pictures of your Domland! I'm sorry to be so late to reply here but work and home projects have kept me quite busy as of late. My Dom is still a work in progress, cleaning and lubing and doing some fine repair work on the deck and controls/cables. I want to rewire this baby as the current electronics appear to be wired in some strange fashion by some one who wasn't sure of what they were doing. If I could only find a schematic or something of the OEM setup to work from. As you stated the wood and metal work on these are wonderful, also the ornate "rhinestones" are a cool addition! I can't wait till it's all finished and playable again. I have a Maverick that I'm learning on and looks like my transition to the Domland won't be much of a chore as there are NO knee levers on the Dom so no learning curve for me there. I see you added knees to yours, do you recall if these came with any from the factory? I'd add some if only I knew where and how to adapt them properly.

Well off to family things and Turkey Day, you all take care and have a wonderful holiday!
Bill

Hi all once again!
Just wondering if anyone has any information on how to wire up my Domland correctly or any schematics or diagrams that might be helpful in getting this beast pumping out sound again? It was rewired very badly by someone and would like to put it back as close to stock as possible. OR do a custom rewire that is more modern but looks stock. Any and all help is always appreciated.
Bill

Hi Bill,
Glad to hear you're progressing on the project - other things do tend to get in the way. I had to look at the original as-shipped pics to remember that mine did have two knees when I received it from Duane; they raised and lowered 4 & 8 I think, but one may have had the 2nd string lower instead. I used a standard Humbucker scheme when I rewired the pickups, since the controls were kind of a mess also and needed replacing. This may or may not be the best scheme and I'll look into how other twin coil psgs are wired at some point...a couple of the settings are fine for a les paul but pretty useless (at least for me)on a psg. A switch option into an on-board effects section or something else might be interesting. Let me know if you need any other detail pics for comparison purposes, including the original plastic control panel/knobs. Happy Holidays!

John,
ANYTHING you have would be of GREAT VALUE to me at this point. I've been looking at diagrams on the web about std. guitar pickup wiring and how I might adapt my setup accordingly. My Dom has 2 single coils per neck separated from each other (check the pics). I've thought of wiring them in reverse phase to cancel any hum issues like a humbucker, also wired like a Tele and add a 3 way per neck with a master 3 way for neck switching, also considered the use of pickup on off switches and a volume/tone control per neck...... the options are endless and mind boggling!

Soooo, any help you can send my way would be appreciated. I'd like to even stay stock but rewire it better. It also has a battery clip and wiring going into the control box it has now but haven't ventured figuring out how it was setup yet. Like I said it is a poor wiring job and a cluster *#@$ that someone made as it came to me.

bump for John to reply to:

hey Bill...sounds like the battery circuit might be for the LEDs; I've heard of other Doms having these but not mine, so I'm no help. I used standard Emmons kits with the square bars and 14-hole pullers to install all four knees, and home-brewed the lever paddles and linkage, which is rodded to a wire loop at each changer. Not pretty (except the nice Emmons stuff), but it works. The levers were alum rough blanks from some source on ebay. Let me know if you need any close-up stuff of the underneath or other details; sounds like you've got wiring diagrams for pickup arrangements already, and there's lots of different versions online. I did notice that mine probably had a number of levers installed at one time before Duane or I got ahold of it, judging by the number of empty woodscrew holes...looks like a woodpecker lived up in there

Hey John,
Well the "funky" led setup was removed as it surley wasn't a stock part of the guitar. It was also powered by a wallwart strapped to the underside so I'm still puzzled by the battery holder and wires going into the vol/tone block on top. Haven't removed it as of yet as I was looking for something close to stock to use as a guide before disassembly there. Might just have to go for broke and venture in uncharted waters and see what it looks like in there huh.

Any picks of how yours is setup in the control department would be greatly appreciated. Also maybe a shot or two of how you did your levers would be great as well. Again thanks soooo much for any and all you do for me!

Bill,
Heres a link to exactly the wiring rig I used, although you'll see the site has schematics for almost any arrangement you can think of, along with the switches, pots & everything else if you need 'em. I think I isolated one lead from each coil per pickup to separate the inputs from the two necks, since there were enough lugs on the selector switch already installed mid-body on the guitar. Other than using the volume and tone pot values, I didn't even try to decipher how the original wiring worked, but still have the intact harness that I can check for you. I'll try and grab some pics this weekend.

J

John,
Not seeing the link you spoke of, did you forget to add it?

yep - I'm an airhead...

http://www.guitarelectronics.com/produc ... nload-Free

Bill,

not sure if you noticed this single neck Domland for sale on EBAY right now...another one for the archives!

http://cgi.ebay.com/1960s-Domland-Stere ... 35af8fee50




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interesting...this is the first S10 I've seen. Different controls once again also. This would make a great starter body for someone's project guitar.

The Daland Steel Guitar was mentioned earlier in this thread. Jussi, I have the DALAND that Don Davis has been pictured playing.

Don Davis, Hank Garland ( DA and LAND) joined Shot Jackson in making a few DALAND CUSTOM STEEL GUITARS. They advertised at least once in the Pickin' and Singin' News. Don Davis sent a copy of his August 1954 newspaper ad and a photo of the DALAND in use on the Ozark Jubilee.

Set up next to a Bigsby, the DALAND appears to have recast Bigsby endplates and keyheads.

It is a Sho-Bud before Sho-Bud.

Chris Lucker

Here's what Domland evolved into. The changer mechanism was revised and it became a rod operated undercarriage. Even though this has an "Edwards" name-plate on the front it was made by Willy Domland and sold or distributed through Don Edwards. They were partners in the Steel Guitar manufacturing business. There were very few of this vintage made. It was the last of the Domlands. A very good instrument at that time. It still plays and sounds good.

Kind of revitalizing this thread. I found a Domland Stereo D-10 in a local shop for $1k, been sitting there since August. Seems to have all the parts - rod pull, 8 pedals, 3 levers... probably just needs some lube and adjusting.

Any word on how the tone/playability is on these? I'm thinking it might be a "steel" (drumroll) for the price. Planning on purchasing it on Friday, but would appreciate some second opinions.

Tim - looks like that could be a real sweet piece...good luck!