The Steel Guitar Forum

Hi Steelers,

Hope your well.
This topic/question has probably already been asked before but I do find this website pretty outdated and hard to use no disrespect intended to Bob, so just thought easier to create my own post.
I am in the process of looking into buying a lighter weight single neck E9 for travelling to gigs such as GFI’s S10expo or ultra and just had a question regarding what knee lever copendent you all recommend.
I have a background in jazz, however for pedal steel I am more interested in playing country rock/indie and folk styles, with this in mind I am putting effort into learning sacred and traditional country approaches in parallel to be a well rounded player. I’m in my 30’s and want to be a long term preserver of the machine.
GFI knee lever copendent I have attached. I don’t have any experience with the RKL manipulating strings 1/2/6 and am not sure if that can be placed on LKR as I am used to RKL lowering my E’s and most likely will keep to that. I have seen in some study material RKL raising F# strings to G also so not sure what is best??
I have 5 knee levers on my rebuilt ZB at present but generally only use LKL (E raise)/RKL (E lower) and occasionally RKR (D’s half lowers). GFI can put 5 pedals on their custom builds but I was thinking to start with 4 to simplify my development with the instrument. Any thoughts would be appreciated on that RKL gfi stock copedent and if it’s worth keeping over the F# raise, or if just sticking with E raises/E lowers/D lowers/B half step lower levers is sufficient for my interests?
Thanks so much guys/girls.
Really appreciate the input as don’t know many players near where I live who can help with technical matters.

Whatever you decide to do copedent-wise, if you go for the GFI you'll discover it's an easy guitar to work on and if you need parts the customer service is great.

Cheers Ian, yeah they are helpful so far

I have GFI Ultra 3 pedals 4 levers with copedant listed above. That RKL yields some nice changes especially lowering string 6 - combined with LKR ( lowered 4,8 strings ) it offers an instant 5 chord - just squeeze the two knees together. I wish I had a vertical lever to lower strings 5 and 10 - that was not standard on the Ultra

Thanks David,

I managed to find some old posts back in early 2000’s on this topic.
Appreciate your time mate.
Dan

As David mentioned, the 6th string lower to F# along with the E lowers gives you a 5 chord, B in the open position. I use this combo often. Release the lever and press the B pedal and you get a nice transition from the major chord to a 7th by raising the fifth tone of the chord to a flatted 7th. It is pretty much necessary to have these levers on opposite knees to use them together.

I had the string 1,2 and 6 changes on RKL at first. I am a Day player and my E lowers are on Lkl. Using the 2 left moving levers at the same time was really uncomfortable, so I moved the 1,2 and 6 changes to RKR. I just have to spread my legs.

Richard Sinkler wrote:As David mentioned, the 6th string lower to F# along with the E lowers gives you a 5 chord, B in the open position. I use this combo often. Release the lever and press the B pedal and you get a nice transition from the major chord to a 7th by raising the fifth tone of the chord to a flatted 7th. It is pretty much necessary to have these levers on opposite knees to use them together.

I’m not sure it’s helpful but sharing my experience. I have the 6th string lower on LKV and the E’s lower on LKR, and have gotten decent at nailing both by raising my left leg while simultaneously lowering the E’s to land on the 5 chord in a pedals up position. The transition you mention with the B pedal is pretty easy to do like this, IMO. Not sure if that’s weird or normal, but just wanted to mention it. This leaves RKL for the 1, 2 and 7 string raise.

My copedent, heavily inspired by Travis Toy’s setup:


And Travis’ copedent for reference:

Ben... I tried the 6th lower on my vertical on several guitars, but with the E lowers on LKL, it wasn't an easy task to hit it with the vertical and be able to individually activate/deactivate each while holding in the other. May be different if the E lowers were on LKR.

I guess "necessary" was the wrong word.

Richard Sinkler wrote:Ben... I tried the 6th lower on my vertical on several guitars, but with the E lowers on LKL, it wasn't an easy task to hit it with the vertical and be able to individually activate/deactivate each while holding in the other. May be different if the E lowers were on LKR.

I guess "necessary" was the wrong word.

Richard, I can see where hitting LKL and LKV would be tough to get, as LKR seems to lay better for the combo with LKV. I’ve heard it said, and I agree, that our favorite instrument is a series of compromises.