The Steel Guitar Forum

There is a post on Buy/Sell showing a picture of a Sho-Bud S12 Universal in stock at Al Brisco's shop. This is a gorgeous guitar and I have never seen a Sho Bud universal. Anyone know if this is my ignorance or are they very rare?

Hey Jim; I've seen a handful of them my friend....and you have a guy near you that plays one...his name is Brian Thomas.
Ricky

Hey Jim,
I had one in the late 70's when I was playing full time. It was a single wide 12 string which only had 3 & 4 on it when I got it but with a little time, money, and help from Blackie Taylor in two years or so I had it up to 8 on the floor & 6 knees. I also had an Emmons pickup in the thing. I sold it about a decade ago and it was the worst thing I ever did in my life as I still miss the sound I got with that guitar. A guy in LA named Ross Coan ordered a ShoBud U-12 from Blackie about 25 years or so ago which was a special order. It was a LDG model on a double frame but it was a 12 string and the finish was natural (blonde) and had the LDG logo on the front in black letters. Man I wanted that guitar so bad but Ross paid a fortune for it and I couldn't afford anything like that.........JH

------------------
Livin' in the Past and the Future with a 12 string Mooney Universal tuning.

I've been concidering that S12U at Al Broscos for a few weeks now. I currently own it's little brother. I have a nearly exact duplicate model in a 10 string, originally 3x1 E9th, now 3x2 B6th. They look like twins.
This was my first steel. I sold it around 1984 after getting an Emmons and re-aquired it about 3 years ago from the guy in Montana that I'd sold it too.
My concern is that 3x1(or 2) is one thing, but 7x4 is a pretty good load for that version of hardware. Al says it stays in tune though.
I really would like to buy that axe but I'd want to play it in person for a few hours.
Any cheap flights to Toronto?! <FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Pete Burak on 12 February 2003 at 09:16 AM.]</p></FONT>

Ask Al if you pay freight both ways, if he will give you a few days to try it out and either accept or refuse the guitar. That seems to be fairly common in these days of Internet commerce.

I owned a turquoise S-12 back in the early eighties on which I had Bob Lucier install 4 extra pedals and I used it for a couple of years. Could never feel at home with the universal E9-B6 thing, so I switched to a SuperPro.

FYI, someone with a Dallas area phone number is advertising a Sho-Bud S-12 with 7&5 and a pad for $1,200 with a case, seat, strings, and volume pedal on Carter's Buy and Sell page:
http://www.steelguitar.com/swapshop/swapshop.htm

I have an old Sho-Bud color brochure from 1972. There is an S12U shown that came in a standard blue lacquer color. Apparently very few were actually sold, but there are a few around.

------------------
Student of the Steel, and cheap instrument connoisseur: customized 1970 Sho-Bud Maverick, Fessy S12U, Emmons S12 E9 P/P, Nashville 400, Fender Squire, Peavey Transtube Supreme into JBL 15", 1968 Gibson J50, '60s Kay arch-top, 7-string Raybro, customized Korean Regal square-neck, roundneck Dobro 90C, 1938 Conn Chu Berry tenor sax, '50s Berg mouthpiece, Hamilton upright piano. You make it, I'll play it (more or less)

Jim,
I asked Al that question but he said he had enough other interested parties that he didn't want to send it off, also, it was a bit cost prohibitive and a border crossing paperwork hassle.

I called the guy in Dallas and I am 6th on the list of interested buyers, so I probably won't get that one.
Here is a pic of it (scroll down): http://www.concentric.net/~Rhinton/gigpics.htm

Thanks everyone for the input. I thought the universal idea came after Sho-Bud stopped production. I wonder if they are/were mechanically equal to the current models.

No, I think that Jeff Newman popularized it in the 70's. My '79 guitar had the SuperPro mechanism on it with triple raise, double lower. It did a good job of what it was supposed to do but I just never fully adapted to the universal setup.

I think you could take a 12st sho bud and make it into a universal if you worked the changer from under the guitar as well as the end plate.

Bob

back in 1972 or so, Bill Keith got a S-12 shobud. It was a "fingertip" model, and a real bear to keep in tune and to play. When you pushed the vertical knee, the whole guitar lifted up.
He sold it-- I don't know the details.

JW

I've had my eye on that Sho~Bud 12 string Universal that Al Brisco has for sale too.Beautiful birdseye maple.

<SMALL>I think you could take a 12st sho bud and make it into a universal if you worked the changer from under the guitar as well as the end plate.</SMALL>

Bob; I'm not following.....care to elaborate on how to do that??
Ricky

He's probably talking about creating triple raises by slaving to another raise rod on the same string and adjusting the 3rd raise from under the guitar like you do with half-stops on some guitars.I actually did that once on a very early MSA 12 string(serial # 0001)and rigged up Telecaster knobs to tune the extra raises from under the guitar - and it worked great.It takes a pedal steel mechanic to do it but it's not that hard to put together. -MJ-

Hey Ricky,
I don't know anything about the raise modifications but I do know how to get another lower from a single lower model. My old ShoBud S-12 had the double raise/single lower changer. A machinist friend of mine who rebuilt steels showed me how to do it. I didn't need the extra raises and I only pull the 4th string to F# like Mooney does with out the 5th going with it so I only needed two raises on my B (5th) string. I needed to lower my 8th string to Eb and D for the universal thing though. I also wanted to lower my 2nd string to D and C# on separate levers so I needed a double lower there. What you have to do is go to the end plate and which ever string you need to have the extra lower on, you have you cut a U shaped area out of the aluminum end plate just below the lowering hole of the changer finger you wish the double on which will reveal another flat piece of the changer for that string. You just drill a hole through it and put another rod with a nylon tuner through it and you have a second lower which is tuned at the endplate just like all the rest. I've never looked at the top part of the changer so I don't know if this can be done on a raise or not. The changer seems to rest on a ridge at the back of it so the lower part of it is a cool way to do this....Have a good 'un.

------------------
Livin' in the Past and the Future with a 12 string Mooney Universal tuning.

Ricky,
Bobbe Seymore showed me how to do it and its pretty much like what Michael posted.

Bob

Well that's interesting Michael; Jerry and Bob...

Ricky