Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi all,

I am not a builder but I need some luthier advice.

Would there be a problem buying a standard 12 string guitar and then taking off the low end octave strings (E,A,D) and playing it as a 9 string? I'd like to do this without re-slotting the nut. Also, would leaving the 3 tuners without strings, would I get buzzing or rattling from them?

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks.

You'd probably need to re-slot the nut unless you are happy with relatively light gauge E, A and D strings.

If the tuners rattle, Blutac is your friend.

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Bob Connor
Geelong, Australia

Bob,

what is bluetac?

It's that stuff that you stick posters to the wall with.

I'm not sure what you call it in the States.

It's similar to plasticine but I'm pretty sure you guys have a different name for that too.

Hopefully someone will be along soon with a translation.

This is what wikipedia says it is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blu-tack

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Bob Connor
Geelong, Australia

if the tuners rattle.... take them off That's what I did with mine... it's ugly, but at least you don't get confused on wich tuner to go for with your strings haha

Other than that, I don't think there would be any problem as long as you're not going for a great tone... If you take out the bottom octaves, your going to get a lot less tension therefore less volume and definition I believe (I'm no pro with all these facts, but that's what I understood.... ) as for the nut slots... it might feel weird with the string spacing, but there is no problem with leaving it as is. You WILL have to get a proper setup for the instrument afterwards though, to adjust neck relief and maybe more... but that's easy to do if you read about it! plenty of information available here and alsewhere on the net for that.

hope it helps!

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Olivier Gauthier
Montreal, QC

Some of the old blues players played 12 strings with only 6 strings, they wanted a wider neck than what was available at that time. Josh White's Guild was custom built for him with a 12 string neck, he had huge hands. One of the past board members of Michigan Fingerstyle Guitar society has that guitar.

Fred

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Fred Tellier
http://www.fetellierguitars.com
Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/FE-Tellier-Guitars/163451547003866

One the spacing will fill some what awkward. You will have a nut width about 5/32” wider than needed but yes you can do it. I would recommend having a new nut made so spacing intervals were consistent between the center of single course strings and center of the spacing of the double course strings