The Steel Guitar Forum

Is it easy to build a left handed steel with the components you use to make a RH PSG? ie. Is it just a matter of building it the other way round?

I know someone who is buying a LH PSG and its a question for him really?

David

You can play sitting in front of a mirror and acheive the same thing.

I'm left handed, can't even write my name with my right hand, but I play several instruments, all right handed. You have to use both hands to play, so it's a learning process either way. If this guy has not already started playing, he should at least try the right handed way. I know doesnt't answer your question, but it's just a thought.

I'm not a builder, but it seems to me the only parts that would have to be made specially would be the end plates. Everything else seems as though it would work either way.

I'm left handed, but play spanish , bass and steel right handed. Never had a problem. It's all in the mind.

Brint Hannay wrote:I'm not a builder, but it seems to me the only parts that would have to be made specially would be the end plates. Everything else seems as though it would work either way.

Body, front and rear rails, changer scissors and Pedal bar really need to be made in reverse (to name a few parts).

Why not learn to play as all the other lefties did over the years, myself included, or maybe you're looking for an easy way out, with a crank on the side, like a Hurdy-Gurdy! Jay Y.

I hope you are seeing the replys to this thread David Chapman. Especilly Ricks reply. You have been playing R/Handed for a while now, why change?

David

BMI makes any of their guitars as lefty for $150 extra

Playing a string instrument requires dexterity with both hands. A right-handed guitarist is performing a lot of intricate work with his left-hand. Logically, it makes sense for a left-handed person to use the same instruments as a right-handed person. No-one ever dreams of building a left-handed piano, harp or vibraphone, for instance, nor a left-handed typewriter.

There's no reason to believe that the right hand is better suited to picking strings, and the left hand to fingering them. It's all a matter of what you're used to.

For those who start young, there's probably little "programming" to overcome. But for those who start after adolescence, the favored hand has far more dexterity due to the "programming" it's received. With a steel guitar, most of the dexterity required resides in the picking hand, so it's easy to see why a player would want to use their most "skilled" hand for picking.

For all the "rightys" that can't understand why a left handed person would want a left-handed instrument, start doing all your writing with your left hand, and then give me a holler when your penmanship with that hand equals your right.

David Hartley wrote:Is it easy to build a left handed steel with the components you use to make a RH PSG? ie. Is it just a matter of building it the other way round?

As John said, there's more than a few parts that must me made differently. Most builders use tooling, drilling and assembly fixtures that allows them to make parts more economically and accurately. These would have to be remade or redesigned in order to make "reversed" parts. In the case of a builder that used CNC machines, new programs would have to be written to make those parts.

Donny Hinson wrote:For those who start young, there's probably little "programming" to overcome. But for those who start after adolescence, the favored hand has far more dexterity due to the "programming" it's received...For all the "rightys" that can't understand why a left handed person would want a left-handed instrument, start doing all your writing with your left hand...

You're right (if you'll forgive the pun ). It's all a matter of what you've been programmed to do. But writing is not a good comparison to playing the guitar. European writing is designed to flow from left to right, which makes the pen position more awkward for a left-hander. I'm right handed, but I can write with my left hand if I write as a mirror image.

I'm now raising my right hand as a left handed person who plays right handed.

p.s. On "Spanish" 6 string, I've always considered it an advantage to do it that way.

I think the biggest problem with a left handed guitar is I know of nobody who makes left handed guitar strings. The ball ends would have to be put on the other end of the string or you wouldn't be able to hook them to the changer.
The pedals would be setup Jimmie Day where the volume pedal should be and the knee levers would be on the front of the guitar and you couldn't find anybody who'd want to write the tab for that baby.
If your left handed just take up Tuba and blow on the wrong end of it.

With a steel when youre talking left handed you may not necessarily have to be talking left footed. In other words the pedals and levers might still be comfortable set up like a right handed guitar only the top of the guitar is reversed in direction..? Considering the relative simplicity of the parts under a steel it doesn't look like it should be much more than an 'inconvienience' for someone setup to build steels to fabricate whatever parts that have to be made mirror image, but what is inconvienient when you are getting your sale price for it? Just a thought..(i tried googling but couldn't find a pic so i'm not sure about this) aren't the gas and brake pedals in Brirish cars setup the same as in U.S. cars? U dont have to answer that i'll look.

It's not always about being Left Handed

I would like to tell this little story.
In 2006 at the ISGC, I was with Charlie Stepp owner of Derby Steel Guitar.
A man, about 30 to 40 years old, and his wife came in the Derby room and ask about a Left Handed Steel.

When I saw his right hand, I new why he Needed a Left Hand Steel. He had been In a bad accident
some years before. He said he had been playing steel almost all of his life. He could work the bar with his right hand but that for sure was all. (he had little to no fingers)

Charlie told him to give him a call when we all got home because he had built one once before and he had a list of what was needed and he would explain what all it would take, and he said he would. His wife said money wasn't a problem, he needs Steel Guitar back in his life.
I was feeling so sad for this young man

After they left, Charlie started tell me what needed to be done. I was really surprised at what all had to be made in reverse,

John is right when he said
John Fabian

Body, front and rear rails, changer scissors and Pedal bar really need to be made in reverse (to name a few parts).

Danny

Stuart
No problem with the left-handed strings. Just turn'em around and they'll prob'ly work.

Here's an interesting corrolary, though, for those of y'all who are fishermen.

Using a right-handed baitcasting rod/reel combo, the rod is cast with the right hand, then the rod/reel is moved to the left hand and the reel is cranked with the right.

On a spinning rod/reel combo, the rod is cast in the right hand, kept in the right hand, and the reel is cranked with the left hand.

Just a convention, is all, but interesting in a non-interesting kinda way.

I must have missed somthing

Are we talking about a Pedal Steel Guitar

Oh! I bet that was a joke

I was talking to Chuck Back last night. He's building a left-handed model right now, and is himself left-handed (though he plays right-handed). Chuck said that building this left-handed steel is driving him crazy! He can't work on it for more than an hour or two at a time because he gets all confused.

Think about it. A builder has to see the guitar from all all angles - front, back and upside-down, with and without the pedals attached. On the left-handed model, the front looks like the back of right-handed guitar. Flip it over and you better get it right, or you'll be putting C6th changes on the e9th neck.

... or you could just have the operation...

b0b wrote:I was talking to Chuck Back last night. ... Chuck said that building this left-handed steel is driving him crazy! He can't work on it for more than an hour or two at a time because he gets all confused.

Bud used to say the same thing about the 7 left-handed MSA's he built. He also said you don't see any left-handed pianos. (Actually, there is one I've read about that was built for a wealthy, left-handed Japanese piano enthusiast)

Note that Lloyd Green and Curly Chalker are/were left-handed but play/played right-handed. Also, you will have a better selection of steels from which to chose if you learn to play right-handed.
We typically recommend Roy Thomas of Pedalmaster if you just have to have a left-handed steel

Well, Chuck doesn't have far to go, if he isn't there all~ready

I just happen to think Lynn Owsley is Left Handed
Dan

I've been around music stores all my life. It seems as though the folks most interested in left handed instruments are over protective parents who are afraid that their "special" child is going to be miss-treated some how by being forced to play a "right-handed" instrument. Most always, these parents do not play themselves, and no amount of examples of "great lefties who play right handed",or "have you seen any left handed Tubas or pianos?" and similar discussions, will make them any less sceptical of you.
I'm afraid that by offering left handed strings, they would think that I was just making fun of them.
What the heck. Stuart, that is funny, and I don't care who you are! I'll think I'll use it next time anyway. I know lots of lefties who play lefty, and still have a sense of humor.

Tommi Grasso in Sydney Australia plays a LH Emmons Le Grande III so I guess Emmons can do one if your really desperate ..... the biggest issue would be trying to sell it if you wanted to upgrade in a few years!

I struck a problem at a gig the other night with my amp ....I took the cover off to discover that it was facing the wrong way ...I had to go all the way home to get my other amp, which fortunately faces the other way