Conference napalm::guitar

    
    Re: Fender double necks
    
    Although Fender never made them, Ibanez back in the seventies when
    they were still busy building replicas of Gibsons and Fenders built
    a Strat/Jazz Bass doubleneck.
    
    They had one used at Daddy's in Boston about a year ago and shortly
    thereafter I saw one (the same one?) for sale in the WantAdvertiser.
    
    I think the one you saw in GP was the one that belongs to Texas
    picker Evan Johns.  Don Felder of the Eagles had a similar axe built
    a few years back and luthier John Carruthers discussed the job in
    his GP column.  Interestingly, as you also mentioned, he pointed
    out that the cost of disassembling two collectible Fenders to build
    such a monster was not particularly cost-effective, but Felder had
    the bucks to burn.
    
    A little more practical was a Washburn double neck based on their
    Bantam Steinberger copies.  There was a 6/4 and a fretted/fretless
    bass version.  The good idea here was that since the instruments
    have super small bodies and no headstock, they were a *lot* lighter
    than conventional doublenecks. They may still make these.
    
    Back to inventions:
    
    About five years ago I bought this plastic thing called a Headkeeper
    at McDuff's for $1.50.  It's a plastic tray that has a round space
    to hold a drink, two cylindrical depressions to hold a bottleneck
    or whatever, and a square space to hold another drink, picks, etc.
    On the bottom is a flap that slides underneath the handle atop your
    amp, so the tray is secured to your amp and won't rattle off.  I've
    used mine for years and after many bar gigs I still have a clean
    amp top (no bottle rings).  So obvious I'm surprised it took so
    long for someone to make them.
    
    Reminds me of the story as to why Danelectro didn't patent tilt-adjust
    necks which Fender, Peavey and others later came out with.  In the
    words of Nat Daniel, the president, "It was so obvious, we didn't
    bother to patent it."
                                                       
    

    	Funny this topic should come up! Last month I had played a guys
    ES-345 SVT (REAL nice guitar BTW) but had noticed his strange look
    when I took off my belt before strapping it on. He asked why and I told
    him I was afraid to scratch the back. Closer examination revealed
    that no one who had ever played this guitar had ever worried about
    that! (More concerned about losing trousers during a show I guess!) ;^)
    We're talking nearly a hole in the back, and scratches. (Man, what
    a drag!)
    	After describing to my wife about maybe making a pad or something
    soft to cover the belt buckle, she come up with a prototype of
    "The Pillow" for your belt. It folds over your buckle, and secures
    to itself with Velcro. Looks pretty nice, and can be emroidered
    or silkscreened with your name or band logo...
    	If I can get some of the magazines to take a "New Products"
    promo ad with my address and phone number, we'll start making them
    in quantity if we get sufficient orders. Funny how these things
    happen...
    					Tom T.

    	A friend of mine works for a company that makes plastic injection
    molds. He builds molds for a living. He told me that if someone
    were to come up with an idea for a plastic product, he could
    build the mold himself, and have his model shop run off a couple
    thousand of these during a coffee break or changover. 
    
    	My wife (who works as a nurse) mentioned that someone should
    come up with a clip for I.V. lines made of plastic instead of the
    metal clips presently in use in the medical profession. Ron told
    my wife that someone already beat her to it, as he was in the process
    of building a mold for that exact application. Some coincidence !!
    If I could come up with an idea that could be made of plastic, I
    could have Ron do it up quick & dirty. Once you have a product that
    you can hold in your hands, it is fairly straight forward to have
    it patented. Once you hold the patents, you could always sell the
    idea for big bucks if you can find a company willing to invest.
    In the case of a plastic molded product, it would be pretty easy
    to start a marketing company if you already have the mold and a
    patent. You could job shop the actual injection molding, and have
    units cranked out by the thousands for pennys each. No law says
    the product has to be intended for the music industry, but that's
    my main area of interest.
    
    	Whenever you buy a plastic moulded product, you are not paying
    for the plastic, or processing, you are paying for the engineering
    costs, and the idea, because the units cost only pennies a piece
    to manufacure. An example that comes to mind is the Rack crate,
    which I have seen in several music stores for close to $50.oo.
    These resemble milk crates, which you can buy for 3-4 bucks. The
    markup on these rack crates must be in the order of $40.oo or 1000%.
    This is the kind of high profit product that makes paupers into
    millionaires overnight. 
                            
    
    							Mark Jacques
    

    
    	It's usually motivation, not resources, that allows someone
    else to "beat you to it"...That idea can be extended to a lot of
    areas, even playing out. I know it well ;')
    
    	In 1975, I discovered the f(t)*f(t-T) algorythm used in the
    Ibanez harmonics/delay processor. I was fooling around with a phase
    shifter and a ring modulator with a Whurletzer electric piano at
    the time. The "automatic" counterpoints sounded really neat. But,
    I never did anything with it...
    
    	In 1978, I was locking CD4046 phase lock loops onto my roomates
    fender rhodes and guitars, which culminated in a monotonic guitar
    synth where I could digitally shift the output pitch by any number
    of musical half steps up or down. About the time 360 systems came
    out with their analog synth driver box, which Garcia used on
    "Terrapin". I remember throwing out the stripped circuit cards a
    few years ago...
    
    	About the same time frame, I designed an built a solid state
    strobotuner for guitar. Took 8 9v batterys to run it, and, forget
    it if you accidently left it on. I saw soon after someone else
    derived the same with the exception that their LEDs are arranged
    linearly instead of in a circle. I still have the circuit card for
    this one somewhere...
    
    	Again in those same college daze, I successfully built, sold
    and traded :') some FM transmitters for electric guitar. I remember
    goofing on the neighborhood kids, by playing across the street and
    having the sound come out of a speaker in my window. "That's not
    you" they'd say..."Oh yeah" WAAANG!!!. Now Sampson puts DBX chips
    in their wireless systems...
    
    	I knew about compression, hysterisis, Band pass, clipping amplifiers -
    10 years ago - all standard on your current generation PEAVEY guitar
    amps. Ever see an *old* Carvin amp's guts? Talk about point to point 
    "spiderweb" circuits - they didnt even use a circuit card of any sort. Look
    at 'em now - they sell to and get endorsed by FZ!
    
    
    	SO, it's *Motivation* that gets an Idea or Invention anywhere.
    Without that it's all - what's the lyrics? Oh Yeah -
    
    	"Crumpled pages of Scribbled lines"
    
    	Joe Jas
    

    I've often thought about putting together a "generic" guitarists
    pedal board.  The basic idea is it would  have all those foot
    controller devices to control rack-mounted stuff that they charge 
    an arm and a leg for in one box.
    
    There are several variations on how each pedal works so I figured
    I'd do something like:
    
    	o Have several of each kind on the thing
    	o Have switches to select how each one works (so one switch
    	  could be made to control any effect)
    	o Have the switches provided separately so you can put the
          kinds you need in AS you need them.
    
    And of course, the single output cord of this would be something
    like a snake - none of this spider's web of cords to go bad or
    misroute.

    	db

    Years ago when I was living in Fitchburg I used to frequent an
    electronic repair shop called Function Electronics owned and
    operated by a guy named Jeff Simpson. I doubt he's in business
    today since he was never the most organized repairman around. At
    one time, he worked for Fitchburg Music, and later did repair work
    for them on a contractural basis. Anyway's he designed a system
    for a guy that was pretty impressive. The guy had an Anvil Rack
    case about 3 feet tall, loaded with rack mount effects on the front,
    and floor mount effects mounted to a flat panel on the rear of it.
    Jeff built him a snake, with a big stomp control box, but the guy
    didn't like the big cable, or the mechanical switches on the stomp
    box. Seein' as how this dudes ole man was a mortician, and had gobs
    of money to blow, he had Jeff design him a contoller, with a new
    floor control box. The floor controller was conected to the rack
    with s single low impedence cable, and worked off of a comparitor
    circuit. All the switches were soft touch with an LED indicator to
    show on/off. If you switched effect 1, it would send a voltage
    level down the single cable, the comparitor would decide which
    effect to switch on/off. Jeff designed printed circuit boards for
    both the floor stomp box, and the rack mount controller. This dude
    was so fussy, he made Jeff send the printed circuit boards to a
    plating shop and have them gold plated. From what I could see, the
    unit worked good, but it took Jeff forever to get this thing finished
    and give it back to the guy. It sat around his shop collecting dust
    for about 6 months before he finished it. I personally, would have
    settled for the big snake cable, and mechanical stomp boxes. I think
    they are less complicated, and less likely to break down.
    
    
    							Mark J.
    

    RE.6 This isn't related to this topic, but are you the Mark Jacques
    I jammed with at my apartment in Lowell (around 1981-1982). I thought
    I was introduced to you by a friend, Paul Ruest, around that time.
    I play piano/keyboards.
    
    Mike D'Iorio
    
    BTW This is a very interesting topic!