GregP

The locking tuners definitely decrease the number of issues at the tuners themselves. The nut is the point of friction to worry about in the "locking tuners + locking bridge" idea. It'd never be quite the same as locking nut. But, this is just one dude's opinion, and not even a particularly experienced one at that.

My opinion, and it's not an experienced one, is that if you REALLY don't want to put a locking nut, you'll still get a benefit if you have the lowest possible friction on the nut as per your plan. So, it's not a completely "out there" idea, and you're certainly not the first person to ask that question. But that's as long as you understand that the Floyd system was designed and made to be used with a locking nut. There's more than just the "locking" aspect; it's the fact that the strings are all locked at the same spot and there is NO other real point of friction-- it's clamped at the nut, clamped at the bridge, nothing but equal-lenghted (more or less) string in between. The minute you use locking tuners instead of nut, even with a low friction graph-tech nut, you ARE introducing a point of friction. And there ARE varying amounts of 'excess' string past the nut en route to the tuners. The part of the picture I'm missing is this-- are you stuck using a Floyd? Or is that by choice? If it's not something you're 'stuck' with, why not just get one of the more reliable traditional trems? There's a third option-- get a Kahler-style locking mechanism, which goes on past the nut. Someone more knowledgable than me could give you more details about whether it's feasible (frankly, I don't know for sure) but I'd certainly research that option if I were you.

Neither T nor F. I predict in this thread.... tone voodoo conversations! Make a guitar with wood you prefer to use, with a style of neck attachment that works for you. Everything else is just an exercise in academic minutiae. Disclaimer: of course, common-sense and best practices still apply. I'm not implying that if you like rock maple, you should make an entire guitar out of it (though, it's been done!)... I'm just saying that within the scope of reasonable choices, you shouldn't get hung up in concocting a "perfect recipe". You can make a metal guitar with actives and a neck-through, and you can make it out of mahogany or alder with any number of neck-wood choices. I wouldn't spend much time worrying about it beyond that.

I'm basically of the same opinion, but only after a certain point is reached: namely, I think 7-string guitars are fine, but 8 is kinda pushing it; and I think 5 string basses are the new standard, 6-string are still reasonable, and anything beyond that is pushing it. It's not that the people who use them don't have their reasons. I'm sure they do. I just "don't get it." Between the two (since the subject has been broached), I actually enjoy Vai's music not just for the athleticism but also the composition and even the over-the-top processed tone...but I prefer Satriani who is ultimately more lyrical and whose tone I appreciate a bit more.

Hey Frank, Glad you stopped in. Every time I have guests over, I get to wow them by telling them that the "funny-looking guitar" in my guitar corner is a lap steel... the curious ones who want to know more details are regaled with the tale of how it all came together, no small thanks to you and the roller saddles + the other stuff you sent! The downside comes when I'm asked to demonstrate it and becomes clear how badly I suck. I never did work up the discipline to learn C6 properly. I bet it's a lot of fun being able to work for a company that's a major player in the world of guitar... hope you're enjoying it! If the P-Rails were a drop-in fit for P90s instead of humbuckers, it'd be a consideration for my Godin LG-90. Looking like it'll be a while before there's another guitar in my future, though. Greg

The buzz is that they look fugly but might prove versatile. Me, I don't mind the looks... I'm not a purist when it comes to that kind of thing. I love P90s, but I find my p90 guitar rather limiting. It does one job and does it really well. If this pickup does the p90 the best out of the 3 "modes" but adds versatility and unique sounds (the demo guitar didn't have them in parallel for example) then I'm for it. And hey... how many Frank Falbos can there be? Same Frank we know and love from here?

Are absoLUTELY positive that you're not just wearing through your top layers of skin to a black layer of skin below?

No problem. In any event, if you're relatively handy with a soldering gun, and the only stumbling block is the diagram itself, I say just make your own, and keep your wires labeled. Probably easier than hunting one down.

Just carefully map out the electronics as you remove them... draw your own diagram! That's assuming they're in as good "working" condition as you expect them to be. Also, you won't have to remove every single wire, just the ones that lead out of the cavity. The output jack leads are better removed at the jack itself; the pickup wires will have to be removed at the electronics cavity. If you keep meticulous care of everything, draw it up, and label the wires as you remove them (piece of tape and a little piece of paper work fine for me... no need to get fancy!) you shouldn't have much trouble re-wiring it when the painting part is done. My personal instinct would be to upgrade the guitar if I was already pulling it apart... as long as the neck (incl nut) and bridge are fine and the action is good, you can approach this as a whole revamp project! Get rid of the singles if 60Hz whine does you in, replacing them with single-sized humbuckers (stacked or rails or otherwise), and shield the electronics cavity with adhesive copper foil. But that's just me...

Chet Atkins rules. I also enjoyed his hokey-but-fun album with Mark Knopfler, "Neck and Neck"

Kewl! I completly had no idea what the hell was going on, but cool. Confirms my suspicion that vacuum tubes are esoteric weirdness.

Awesome work! Love lap steels.... I've been trying to learn, but it's not as easy as you would think! Dobro-style tunings are one thing (Open G, Open D, DADGAD or whatnot) but more lap-oriented tunings like C6 are a different kettle of fish.

If you're going to use the built-in soundcard, you can use the mic input... Mickguard is right, you need a preamp and then go into the "line" input instead of the mic, but the mic input will at least sort of work... just with an impedance mismatch and mediocre sound. You need the mic input enabled. You also probably need a different driver than the one your soundcard came with, which is rarely a low-latency driver. If you're on Mac, you might be fine. If you're on Windows you'll probably need an ASIO driver, like "ASIO4ALL" (just Google) which will work with 90% of onboard soundcards and Soundblasters out there. Then in Amplitube, you'll probably need to tell it which input to use....!

Most plugins can be monitored in realtime these days. For realtime usage, it depends entirely on your audio interface and setup. You need low-latency (ASIO or CoreAudio) drivers to use a plug-in effectively in realtime. Luckily, even cheap AC'97 (the most common on-board sound-chip and also common in the original Soundblaster Live!) soundcards have ASIO options available through 3rd-party software like ASIO4ALL. To answer your question, though, people purchase them with the intention of playing in realtime, not just applying after the recording. I can't imagine recording a dry guitar track without at least SOME amp sound in realtime, even if you later decide to change the actual amp being used.

http://www.waves.com/Content.aspx?id=5847 You don't get quite as many amps as the full GTR3, but 10 amps is plenty for most of us. And at $140, certainly cheaper than the hardware+software package. I'm not busting out my credit card just yet, but it certainly presents a compelling alternative to some of the other available options.

If it's actually less than the thickness of a sheet of newspaper, I have no idea how you could have eyeballed that.

Drill the hole for the bridge insert, then with a smaller bit, drill a hole to the cavity... not from the cavity to the hole. If you can't get the right angle on it, you could alternatively go from the stop tailpiece if the opportunity for a better angle presents itself (and assuming you're using a stop tailpiece). Your nail idea misses what's actually happening with the bridge ground wire. The wire to the bridge doesn't take any current and 'dissipate it' into thin air. The bridge isn't actually the ground destination. What is happening with that wire is that you're adding the bridge to the ground path, which ultimately makes it to the ground lug of your output jack. The reason for grounding the bridge is so that when you touch the strings, you add your body to the "grounding material" and effectively turn your body into a shield. Without touching the strings, the 'bridge ground' isn't doing a heck of a lot. So with your nail idea, you'd have to be touching the nail, or nothing would be gained. If you were willing to keep in contact with that nail, I suppose it could work.

I dunno. Having every single combination possible isn't going to give you the rich variety of sounds you might think it will. I'm a bit more into minimal switches, so my temptation would be to have a global "cut coils" option and then a 3- or 5-way 4-pole (superswitch) to do the rest of the heavy lifting.

I think the original poster simply meant that they are "standard" passives with a preamp circuit, no? He already seems to have done this phase of the investigation. EMG's active circuitry is an integral part of their design. This makes it an "active" pickup. Saying that there are no active pickups because there are passive components (the coil) is like saying there's no such thing as a gas-powered car... after all, it is really just a passive cart (wheels and chassis), and we choose to add power in the form of an engine and other required components. We could take out the engine and either push it down a hill or strap it to some horses (another form of active technology). But I would argue that since the active components of either an EMG or an automobile are a part of the overall design and intended usage (and are included in the spec sheet), and since the manufacturer sells them built into the cover/chassis with the intention of the end-user using them with a power supply, then they are, in fact, not passive technology. Ergo, the term "active pickup" in EMG's case is not just marketing-speak, but is completely accurate. Greg

I couldn't say for sure, Rich. My suspicion is that when the string lenths become uneven (ie. no locking nut and a 6-in-line headstock) the redistribution of tension will differ. It is only a guess, but I would think that the locking nut (ie. strings are all effectively the same length, bridge intonation aside) would make relative changes of pitch a bit more consistent when using the trem.

For the locking mechanism to be truly effective, it needs to be at the nut. 2 reasons for this... 1 actual reason and 1 piece of BS that I'm about to make up on the spot. 1 - the nut is generally a source of friction. Even low-friction nuts are not "NO" friction. Where there is friction and downward pressure, there will be an opportunity for your string to go out of tune. There are other reasons for tuning to go off, but putting a locking nut in (instead of using locking tuners) takes one of those reasons out of the equation. 2 - (the made up on the spot one... take with a grain of salt as I might just be talking smack) By locking off at the nut, your divebombs will be more effective... less length of guitar string to redistribute the tension across means an arithmatic (or even exponential... I've never done the math) lowering of pitch per millimeter of divebombing action.

Which Korg keyboard are you using? Have you confirmed that its MIDI IN will be able to do what you need? Also, are you using a computer in your show as well? That would open up even more possibilities for footswitch options.

I was following the Speedloader for the same reason (a headless guitar idea), but the suppliers I was aware of (very few to begin with) dried up. And FR hasn't really been doing any push at all for the Speedloader. They had Brad Whitford from Aerosmith as an endorsee, and that's about it. Guitarists are by and large really danged conservative. Drives me nutz. (not on a personal level... guitarists I know and love are the same way... )

For those who haven't noticed yet-- he means the note is one TONE higher, not one octave. Just using incorrect terminology. Other than that... I think Mickguard has all the bases covered on this one.

Graph Tech saves resources by selling in bulk to one customer, instead of processing a million individual packages. They have to charge more to individual customers to make up for their extra cost in wages, etc. They probably don't mind StewMac selling on their behalf.