The Steel Guitar Forum

I'm curious about the rack and barrel changer system. Some forumites have had good things to say about it, yet it was only in production for a few years. What's the low down on this changer?

Good... any string can be changed or lowered by any pedal, and copedents are limitless.

Bad... way too much extraneous metal underneath the guitar, barrel operation dependant upon little wire springs, and requiring constant attention to tuning.

Ugly... definitely, IMHO.

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Herb's Steel Guitar Pages
Texas Steel Guitar Association

Good idea, poor execution. Looks like it was made in high school metal shop.

Cracker Barrel changer system. I had 2 guitars with this changer, and they stayed in tune reasonably well. They were a bit on the noisy side, but then again so is a push pull. The biggest problem with these Sho Buds is the brass collars. In order to tune a change, there must be a little piece of the spring sticking out of the brass collar. This little piece of spring gets caught on the rack when tuning, allowing you to tune the change by making the barrell longer or shorter. If a rod got inadvertently turned while playing, and that little piece of spring got pushed into the collar, then you can no longer tune the change unless you go under the guitar and tune the collar by hand. The opposite could also be true, That piece of spring sticking out could cause a change to be too sharp or flat. I had these problems only a few times, so they are the exception, not the rule. The racks were made of steel and therefore rusted if the guitar spent its life in a damp location. Having said that, if a good deal came up, i would buy another one. They sound quite nice, and are usually made of really nice figured maple .

Become friends with a car body repair shop. The cross shafts that connect the pull rods to the pedals are made with multiple links that are welded together. These welded links periodically break off, and require new welds to fix them up. It happened several times over the years I played my Professional.

Thanks all. That's exactly the detail I wanted to know. Sounds like something that appeared to be a good idea at the time, but didn't quite work out that well in reality.

It semms like all they had to do to make it mechanically improved, was to put in crossrods and bell cranks like we have today and keep and improve the barrel tuners. I think they did this in some later Pro models.
Some perceived advantages.:
1. as herb says unlimited copedents.
2. less rods as all raises on one string uses just one pull rod. Same for lowers.
3.very easy pedal and knee lever action.
4. the fingers have one hole for raises and one hole for lowers, advantage, these fingers can be set for maximum leverage, no need to decide which hole to put the pull rod in. I have had a Sho-bud professional for about a stretch of 15 years and found it to suit me very well. I liked the tone too.However, it was pretty crowded underneath, and for me just got TOO Heavy......al

Man, heavy ain't even the word for it. Mine is horrendous!! Ricky Davis is going to borrow mine for a recording we're doing in my neck of the woods. Guess who's gonna carry it? Hint:not me!!!!

My 2 Sho-Buds both had the Cracker Barrel setup. It was my introduction to "the way things were" underneath which I liked at 1st because it was very easy to make changes. But once I got wind of other gtrs. pedal action, they went the way of the Edsel fast, for me anyway. The D-10 "Professional" I had was beautiful, 'twas a klunker to play, though.

Chris ha......well no problem...I can pick it up and carry it and toss it; cause I'm buff....ha...
This is one reason I work out....so I can play heavy good sounding guitars...and doesn't bother me in the least bit to carry it....cause I can and it don't hurt...cause I'm in great shape cause I choose to play great sounding steel guitars.....
....Oh and the Rack and Barrel can be a problem...if not set up properly....it can play/work just fine....if set up properly..just like anything....
Ricky

Ok Ricky...surfs up today on the left coast!!! Theyre saying El Nino is comin.
The invite still stands bro.
Maybe after we hit it hard, you can help me carry my birdcage Pro-Bud to the gig.


p.s. To be honest, I think I'm lookin' for a longer board and a lighter steel.

Well Rick; wish I could be there....
Oh and that's a sign of age my bro...when you want the longer board and a lighter steel...ha.
Give me the short stick....and "Your" Birdcage Bud.....and I'm good to go....
ha......Oops I think my Middle-age-crazy is talking again..ha
Oh well.....we all get older....but who else is 40 like me and dating a 24 year old Stripper??? anyone??
Ricky

DANG!!!!!! you da man!! If ya want a good chuckle, ask Ty about my "booby" experience at one of our gigs the other week.

<SMALL>Oh well.....we all get older....but who else is 40 like me and dating a 24 year old Stripper??? anyone?? </SMALL>

Man, those days are gone over at my house, I'd have to have a six pack of spray starch.

They were great guitars, and I'm sorry I ever sold mine. An excellent way to experiment with tunings-- just loosen it all, slide it out, and slide it on again with the barrels in a different place.
But, yes-- that little spring sticking out is critcal.
The first time I met Del Mullen he had built a guitar which had Barrels, but the loose turning problem was solved. I am sorry to see that he did not continue making this guitar.
Of all the guitars I regret not buying-- a baldwin/sho-bud with the racks and barrells and a crossover.
Grr...

JW

Thanks again to all, and especially you, Winnie. The R&B changer seems to me to have some real benefits and some flaws in execution.

Here's a new question:

If the rack and barrell system were updated to make it lighter, quieter, etc, would it then be better than a standard bell crank setup?

Unless you could figure a way to balance the pulls, I don't know if it could ever be made better than a modern bell crank system. And newer guitars have rendered "the ease of copedant change" advantage of a rack and barrel almost moot. A Zum, for example, is very easy to change around, and can also be balanced. Still, there is a special place in my heart for these old classics. To me they just have "the vibe"!

Oh but the tone.

Good and bad, but definitely not ugly.

Everytime I hear one of these Professionals,
I go crazy about the tone! Well, Ive seen both Rickys play theirs and they got the sound. I have my original Professional that I hadn't looked at or played for yrs. I took it out of the case Sat and was in awe of the beauty of this guitar! I put it in the case in "77"
when I stopped playing and hadn't seen it since! Talk about a closet classic! It looks like new, put on new strings and started playing it again. It has 8 x 2 and I have alot of extra parts to add mor knees but, after playing for 1/2 hr. I'm not sure you need to. Besides you'll be amazed at how well you learn the neck when you have to do what Jimmy did on "Steel and Strings" The best steel guitar album ever IMHO. I have 2 permanents and a fingertip I'm restoring and look forward to playing these at our MASGA jams to let some of our members with student guitars hear what can be done on the basis 3 x 2 set up. I got my digital camera working Rickey and will send those pics of that Super Pro Lloyd Green said was the most beautiful steel he'd ever seen! Skip<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by SKIP MERTZ on 12 November 2002 at 01:55 PM.]</p></FONT><FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by SKIP MERTZ on 12 November 2002 at 01:56 PM.]</p></FONT>

i have the 12 string rk+brl that del made in the early 60's. ww is right. he did get it right and i'm fortunate to be enjoying it today