The Steel Guitar Forum

I bought my first pedal steel last year, an early 70s MSA Classic. It's a D10 with eight pedals and three levers. It had a weird setup when I got it, but luckily I live quite near John Davis, who is one of the very few people in the UK who can service steel guitars. He did a ton of work on it and it now plays nicely, but there's one thing that is puzzling me.

John recommended a Day setup, which is what he uses, and I get along fine with that. The A, B and C pedals have the standard changes. LKL drops the Es a half tone and LKR raises them a half tone, which seems normal.

However, the RKR lever is set up to do two things. It drops the second (D#) string a whole tone, with a half-stop in the middle, which is normal. But it also drops the sixth string a semitone from G# to G, and that's the bit that I am struggling with. There are some nice moves that use this change but it means that I need to mute that string if I ever want to play a seventh chord, which seems kind of limiting.

So: is that a perfectly normal change that I just need to learn to deal with? Or is there a better option? I think maybe the idea is that the sixth string drop should only happen after the half-stop, but in practice it seems to start kicking in a little before.

I've never heard of a 6th string half-tone drop being on the same lever as the 2nd drop.

Dropping the 6th a half is not unheard of -- some smaller contingency of steel players have that change. But I agree with your assessment: it doesn't work well on the lever that also lowers the 2nd string.

In the short term, you can just uncsrew the tuning nut on that change to temporarily deactivate it.

Long term, I would switch it to the more common lowering of the 9th string to C#, which kicks in after the half-stop. That's very likely how it left the MSA factory back in the day.

Hi Sam,

The G# lower on that lever creates a harmonic conflict...Its a great change but not on that lever. The 2nd string lower is meant to work with the G# and A note underneath it. That's impossible with the G# lowering on the lever.

Paul Franklin

I won't comment on the use or the practicality of that change but if you are using a plain 6th string, it should be fairly easy to adjust it so that the change does not start until after the half-stop on 2. Might still be simple enough with a wound string too. Bottom line -- you want maximum leverage -- hook up the rod on 6 to the hole or slot furthest from the cross shaft and then dial back the nylon tuner. I believe those are round cross shafts? Some adjustments to the angle of the bellcrank could be part of the tweak.
Lowering the 6th string can end up at odds with changes on the 1st or 2nd strings. That's a common dilemma.

......edited to add that you should listen to the people who just commented before me.........

Just move the change over to the 9th string. Add another knee lever if you want to.

Tommy White has, or had, a raise to G on the 7th string with the lever that lowers 2 and 9. I think at one time it was a good way to stiffen the half stop on 2. I raise 7 to G and G# on that lever. On an all pull like an EMCI extra rods on 7 and 9 enable you to tune the half way points precisely.

Thanks all,

I think that when this lockdown is over I will take the MSA back to John and have him change it to the 9th string instead. I still have a ton to learn about the standard changes before I can think about introducing unusual ones!

As others have suggested, lowering 2 and 9 together is pretty much a standard change. Moving that pull rod from 6 to 9 is something you could try yourself while you have the time - I don't know MSAs but it should be simple enough.

If you were to add another lever, then lowering 6 a whole step would be useful.

Isn't a half stop feel created by adding a 2nd change that kicks in half way through the first change? Backing out the string 6 change without adding a new change would eliminate the half stop feel.

I had an MSA with the 7th string F#-G change a long time ago, I think it was the factory setup, and noting there are only 3 levers I think the intent was you get the dom7 pedals up D#-D and the pedals down Dom7 G in the lower octave on the same lever with the assumption you wouldn't want both notes in the same situation.

With only 3 levers I think the string 7 change makes more sense that string 6 G#-G, as per what Paul Franklin posted above.

You could add the D-C# pull to string 7 F#-G thats what some call the Z lever (search Bobbe Seymore Z lever), creating as A9 on the lower strings.

The Z lever adds an F#-G# change on the 7th string along with Eb-D and D-C#.