Personal requests for custom made lap steel guitars.

The best thing about making instruments on order, instead of serial production is to be able to adapt somebody’s personal needs. At the moment I finish a few lap steel guitars. Two Slide King models need different details.

One Slide King had a special request to make somehow a palmrest above the bridge.
As a reference the customer mentioned the ‘ashtray’ of a telecaster or the bridgecover of a stratocaster. A bridgecover is always something you hate or you like. For me I don’t like it, as I like to be able to do palm muting. But for the customer it is a must. He doesn’t like palm muting. There you go.

The palm rest is made from ebony, like the other parts of the Slide King lap steel. The rest can be simply bold on the bridge, or taken off, for those who do like palm muting…

The feel is a bit like a strat cover, it works.

A second Slide King needed a visual addition on the side. Some vintage lap steel guitars or pedal steels have a brand plate on the side, so it is visual for the audience when playing the instrument.

As a request it is of course very nice, and I feel very flattered that a customer wants to show my brand to his audience. Not only the brand needed to be visible, also the name of his wife should be there. Lucky for me only three letters.

The side of the Slide King lap steel guitar will look like this when finished:

 

Lollar “Royal T” & “J-Street” pickups now in stock!

To complete Fern’s full stock of Telecaster pickups, I added the new “Royal T” neck pickup and the new “J-Street” bridge pickup.

The “Royal T” is basically a strat-style neck pickup dimensioned to fit in a standard telecaster neck routing. For some people, including me, the standard telecaster neck pickup is not working great. I like to fit in P90’s, Wide Range humbuckers, Charlie Christian pickups, or what so over in the neck… This pickup is plug-and-play.  No routing required. It looks cool too!

Jason Lollar about the “Royal-T” neck pickup:

We love Teles. But every once in a while even the most die-hard Tele-philes want to channel their inner Jimi. Don’t feel bad. We don’t blame you. We are here to help. You don’t need to carve up your pickguard. You don’t need to hack up your guitar. You just need some “Royal T”…

Our newest neck pickup for Telecasters! We’ve had many requests for a Tele neck pickup that really sounds like a Strat. Done! Combining a custom nickel pickup cover (we designed and had made in the US), a special selection of magnet type and length, and coil wire that would typically be used on a Strat pickup (42 gauge heavy build), the results are a deeper, clearer, glassier and punchier tone. Stratty! Think “Blonde meets Blackface”… Vintage style cloth covered lead wires, Alnico 5 magnets.

Available in the webshop: http://www.fernsguitars.nl/shop/shop_nl.php?item=1016&cat=15&pg=0&nr=308

The “J-Street” is a hot bridge pickup with an output to match a P90 or humbucker type of neck pickup. Not a vintage Telecaster sound, but still Telecaster-like!

Jason Lollar about the “J-Street”:

 Long part of the Lollar “secret menu”, the J Street is now online! A hotter, fatter version of our popular Special T, the J adds more low end and upper midrange, with a top end that leans more towards the P90 and humbucker world. It pairs really nicely with our Regal humbucker, or any fatter, hotter neck pickup. Flat pole design with graded Alnico 5 magnets. Vintage style cloth covered lead wire. Wax potted.

Available in the webshop: http://www.fernsguitars.nl/en/webshop/webshop.php?cat=157