[Hcash]

I'm looking for some opinions and advice on a Nine string I might be building soon. I know the scale difference is allot but i think I could handle it...

Specs:


# of Strings: Nine

Multi-Scale:
9th- 30 F# (LOW)
8th- 29.43738 B
7th- 28.8748 E
6th- 28.31224 A
5th- 27.74972 D
4th- 27.18723 G
3rd- 26.62478 B
2nd- 26.06237 E
1st- 25.5 A (HIGH)

(Scale and fret placement thanks to FRETFIND )

Body Material: Maple.

Neck Material: 7 ply Rosewood and Purpleheart (if it isn’t too expensive.)
With two carbon fiber reinforcement rods.

Fret board: Ebony.

Neck Joint: Set-thru.

# of Frets: 27.

Nut Size and Material: 3 3/16” (81mm) Brass.

Pickup: Bridge only. ???

Bridge: 4” (102mm) -Making myself with Graph-tech saddles(13/32’’)

Controls: None.

String Spacing at Nut: 7mm with 4mm fretboard overhang.

String Spacing at Bridge: 9mm.


I'm guessing F#BEADGBEA would be 'standard' tunning for a nine but I was thinking about what EF#BEADGBE would sound like.(I think it would be E.)

Thanks.

[Shawn]

Welcome! Sounds like a killer project.

[Lucky Seven]

Whoooooooaaa!

[your_mum]

I think having a low E would be a bit over the top low, dya rekon it would cut through?

Anyway, sounds like a mighty fine project

[TomAwesome]

Sounds neat! The only thing is, I think it might be a bit of a waste of a string if it's only going to be a step below the string next to it. If you want to try E tuning, just drop the F# B E etc. tuning down a step. That or just drop the F#.

[Ishan]

E tuning is not a problem, many songs on Meshuggah's Nothing are tuned to E and it sounds fine to me

[yevetz]

and

When you will start to make this guitar....and you are the luthier ot someone else?

[Apophis]

Great project, but...
1. use more carbon and two trus-rods
2. use at least one kill switch if you don't want volume
3. with Graph-tech saddles you will have 10,5 mm spacing at the bridge, maybe I had some other saddles, but I'm curious

Great guitar, great project.

[Hcash]

Thanks. I was wrong about the string below the F#. I meant for it to be a fourth lower (C#???). I probably won't start the guitar until mid-September because I won't have the tools to do it. This will be my first attempt at making a guitar, although not my first time working with wood. I'm rebuilding a friends deck and she's paying me with power tools. I'm getting a band saw, table saw, table router, and a drill press. WOO!!! But I'll be going to Tech college in November so progress will be slow. I have to pics of the body and headstock here: MySpace

And about the saddles... Does anyone know where to get some saddles that were on that Zachary Eight string??? Because that would work better with the design since I'll be making my ownbridge...

Thanks

[loneguitarist]

Originally Posted by Hcash

...I'm guessing F#BEADGBEA would be 'standard' tunning for a nine but I was thinking about what EF#BEADGBE would sound like.(I think it would be E.)...

Which E do you mean? Since that F# is only a single tone above the low E of a bass guitar, then either the E you mean would only be 2 frets below the F# or it would be the octave below the E of a bass guitar - and you're getting down into Yves Carbonne's territory there

[midian]

...By the way, is a high A at 25.5" even possible without gary goodmans strings?

...Anyway, great project, sounds like a killer guitar

[Apophis]

^
It's impossible but some said it is. I never could reach A440Hz at 25,5" with any regular mass procuction strings.

[Hcash]

I really had no idea about tunning that high... On all my guitars I've always tunned down. So what scale would work in high A with a .009???

[midian]

...hm 23.5" i guess... and even then i would highly recommend a .008 for a high A at 440Hz

take a look at rusty cooleys conklin nine-string (which kicks ass btw ), it has fanned frets from low f# (25.5") to high A (23.5"), and it works pretty well.

...anyway, good luck! we need more ninestrings like that!

Conklin Cherished Challenges

[Hcash]

Thanks. Rusty is an amazing guitarist, but I'm not to big into Outworld. I wish I would have thought about the scale more before I drew out the full scale blueprint... Looks like I'll get to do that all over. But that's better than having a tuneless guitar that i spent allot of time and money into... I've come to really like playing my Ibanez Mike Mushok Baritone, which has a 28" scale. So I guess I'll go with a 27.5 - 23.5 scale. Only a half in off from what I'm use to... I sent the guy at Lundgren an E-mail about Nine string pickup prices but hotmail is "service temporarily unavailable" and I'm impatient. So does anyone know how much it will probably cost with me living in the US???

By the way I love this site. I was annoyed when all the yahoo searches I made brought me here before I joined. But I love it. Yall' are great!!!

[bostjan]

An A-440 will probably break at 25.5" if you look at it cross-eyed, but if you buy RPS strings, you can get an .009" to tune to A-440 at 25.5" and it won't break so long as you don't play it.

Tuning down to a low C# would be pretty gosh-darned low. You could use high-quality strings and tune to whatever high notes you want, though.

So why a nine string? Just wondering.

[Hcash]

I want it for the range mostly. And because I don't want to make a guitar that is mass produced. I know Conklin and Halo are doing Nines, but anyone couldn't just buy one in a store. And Eights are becoming less extreme. No offense to anyone...

[TomAwesome]

Originally Posted by midian

...By the way, is a high A at 25.5" even possible without gary goodmans strings?

It should be. I play half a step down, and the other day for kicks I tuned my high Eb up another fourth to Ab. Bends weren't very comfortable, but it worked. That was with a 10, so I'd imagine a 9 or 8 should work for A, though it still wouldn't be optimal.

[Hcash]

I found another thread about tunning to high A... http://www.sevenstring.org/forum/sev...gh-string.html
It's an old thread. It seems everyone forgot about it on 4/20/06...

But anyway... Does anyone have any better sudgestions for the wood. I play with allot of distortion and I love grind. (like the Deftones Adrenaline album) And I've been yahoo surfing and found a company that makes Titanium guitar parts. Does anyone have experience with these and/or know where I could buy a Titanium truss rod and reinforsement rods???

[Justin Bailey]

Originally Posted by Hcash

And about the saddles... Does anyone know where to get some saddles that were on that Zachary Eight string??? Because that would work better with the design since I'll be making my ownbridge...

Thanks

Those would be wilkinson trem saddles. Not sure what type of metal he uses for the base plate, sorry. I know blackmachine does the same thing but with a piece of ebony as the base 'plate'. Sorry I don't know about titanium rods.

here are some wilkinson saddles btw, these are of the graphtech string saver variety

Graph Tech String Saver Saddle Set for Wilkinson (PS-8200-00)

hope that helps a bit, this build sounds awesome!

Just get the gooodman string and go with low F# to high A.
If I where to get a guitar tuned to Low C" I think I would like more then 30".

[chris9]

Originally Posted by midian

...hm 23.5" i guess... and even then i would highly recommend a .008 for a high A at 440Hz

take a look at rusty cooleys conklin nine-string (which kicks ass btw ), it has fanned frets from low f# (25.5") to high A (23.5"), and it works pretty well.

...anyway, good luck! we need more ninestrings like that!

Conklin Cherished Challenges

sorry but that 9 is mine now!!!!!
and yeah it is awesome!!!!
The high A is hard to get the hang of at first but once ya get it oh the fun you can have!!! ha ha

[GiantBaba]

Originally Posted by chris9

sorry but that 9 is mine now!!!!!
and yeah it is awesome!!!!
The high A is hard to get the hang of at first but once ya get it oh the fun you can have!!! ha ha

I love that guitar, man. I go to the Conklin site all the time just to look at it. When I'm finally able to order my Conklin, it'll be pretty similar to yours.

[chris9]

i,m sure you will love it when you get one conklins are not cheep but they are awesome!!!! and the looks its gets when i take it out is worth the money alone!!!! ha ha

[Hcash]

Thanks for the saddle help.... I suppose the string spacing on those will be pretty close to the strat style ones, 10.5mm???