What happened to solid body 12 strings?

[kranz]

I wonder why no one else has jumped on the Rickenbacker way of stringing a 12’er.
They put the heavy octave of the pair “on top”.
It does lend an authority to the attack, IMO.
I’ve been tempted to try it, albeit with another cheaper, less idiosyncratic guitar than a Ricky.
I like 12 string electrics, but like wah pedals and ring modulators, a little goes a long way.
Rickys do it best, but at a grown-up price.

Quite a number of years ago I bought a '68 Rickenbacker 360/12 at a guitar show. The original owner had replaced the nut and reversed the courses and strung it traditional style. I thought it might be interesting to leave it that way. But in the end I was disappointed and was not impressed. Soon after I got a blank nut from the factory and had a luthier return it to its original glory. I think I still have the previous nut.

 

[archtop_fjk]

Here is my circa 2000 Dearmond S-73 12 string. I made some mods including a making new bone nut and adding the beautiful ABM 12 string tune-o-magic bridge. It now intonates nicely up the neck. The main issue it has is some neck heaviness but a fat strap helps. By the way, I prefer having the octave strings on top - plenty of jangle to be had!

 

[arlum]

I've owned a lot of 12 strings but never a solid body version. I'd have loved a Ricky 660 / 12 but, ever since Rickenbacker released the Tom Petty 660 / 12, their price went through the roof. My own personal stupid reason for not owning 12 string versions of Strats or SG's or whatever solid bodies was I always felt the required overly large head stock sporting twelve tuners six to a side looked disproportionate to the body size of the electric guitar. Only Rickenbacker with their method of placing tuning keys split between the side and rear of the head stock allowed for a 12 string solid body with a normal sized head stock that looked balanced when compared to the look of the 6 string version of the same electric guitars.

 

[swarfrat]

I decided to keep it. As soon as i started to put strings of known provenance, I discovered the ferrules are not press fit. The freely fall out of the body when you take the strings off.

 

[spartan warrior]

Beautiful. What pickups are those?

Thanks for the compliment

The pickups are generic mini-humbuckers that I bought many years ago.
There is nothing on them to identify them and, based on the fact that I don't remember paying very much for them, I assume they originate from the far east.

I chose to use them because
a) From what I can tell they appear to have blades rather than pole pieces which helps with the wider than usual string spread of a 12 string.
b) I already had them in my parts drawer so they were essentially "free" and, because this was my first attempt at a 12 string, I was reluctant to spend too much on it, in case it didn't work very well.
c) With their chrome covers and mounting rings they look so good against the translucent blue finish.

Unfortunately, whilst they were sold as mini-humbuckers, they aren't exactly the same size as the more industry standard Gibson/Epiphone ones. Mine measure 71 mm x 32 mm whereas Gibson minis measure 66 mm x 28 mm.
Full size humbuckers are 70 mm x 38 mm, which means that mine fall somewhere between a true mini-humbucker and a full size one.
This will be a problem should I ever choose to swap them out as I will either need to do some routing to fit larger pickups or make some special mounting rings for mini-humbuckers to prevent the existing cavities showing.
Their DC resistance is around the 7k Ohms so they are not too hot, but neither are they what I would call the sweetest sounding pickups in the world. On the plus side, they don't seem to be microphonic.
I'm happy to live with them for the moment, the novelty of the 12 string jangle makes up for any performance shortfall that the pickups might have.

 

[Teletubbie]

I was disappointed with the lack of solid body 12 strings available to buy, to address this problem I built my own.
I've always loved the shape of the Ric 480 but could never justify the price that they go for, so I scratched two itches at once by making a 12 string in the shape of a 480.
The body is 35 mm thick Sapele, chambered everywhere apart from a 100 mm wide central spine running between the neck & bridge.
The front is 5 mm thick Ash, giving a total thickness of 40 mm (just over 1 9/16 inches).
The neck is maple and is glued into the body. The headstock is scarf jointed with a back angle of 9 degrees. The head is faced in Ash to match the body front.
The fretboard is rosewood with pearloid block markers and medium jumbo frets.
White binding on body, neck & head.
It uses the Gotoh 12 string bridge, which is a beautifully made item.
The tuners are Fender style 6 in-a line types, one right handed set and one left handed, and I managed to come up with a head design and layout that gives almost perfectly straight string pull.
The huge Ric "cresting wave" upper horn means that even though the body is quite light after all the chambering (3.45 kg or 7lb 9.5oz total guitar weight) there is no neck dive, despite having all that metal on the head!

I chose to set the neck further into the body than the real 480 for 3 reasons -

1. Less neck sticking out reduces any chance of neck dive.
2. More neck in the body helps the glued joint withstand the extra tension of 12 strings.
3. Playing up at the dusty end of a 12 string is not likey to be something that occurs very often, if at all.

I'm very satisfied with the result and it gives me that 12 string jangle every time I play it.

Stunning work.
There's nothing about the looks that I don't love.

 

[mad dog]

Here's one I can highly recommend. Not many around. Solid instrument, great sounding pickups.

Sold - DeArmond S73-12

Good condition with Gator HSC, $825 shipped to lower 48. Original bridge replaced with a Duesenberg (allowing individual string intonation) otherwise original. Photos

letstalkguild.com

 

[swarfrat]

Still got work to do but important stuff first:
Tort Reform. Cause Black and tort is awesome.
I couldn't decide on pickup covers and was sorta planning on lil killers, but dang. I had no idea white covers on tort looked so nice.

Anyway, its not completely vanity over function. Strings were off, so I changed the guard. Setup proceeds tomorrow. Nut is actually about right, but lots of filing on the saddles to get the courses aligned.

 

[swarfrat]

I could shim the octave saddlets, but I'd need longer screws they need to come up so much.

 

[msalama]

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[msalama]

What happened to solid body 12 strings?

​

They went out of fashion, but they'll return. Because It's all cyclical, isn't it?

 

[LOSTVENTURE]

I wonder why no one else has jumped on the Rickenbacker way of stringing a 12’er.
They put the heavy octave of the pair “on top”.
It does lend an authority to the attack, IMO.
I’ve been tempted to try it, albeit with another cheaper, less idiosyncratic guitar than a Ricky.
I like 12 string electrics, but like wah pedals and ring modulators, a little goes a long way.
Rickys do it best, but at a grown-up price.

If you ever changed the strings on a Ric 12, you would understand the "hate" factor.

 

[Lucius Paisley]

Can't say I'm not tempted.

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/311562671399?epid=676872072

 

[swarfrat]

Speaking of changing strings. This appears to be a poor kockoff of Gotoh bridge. Same 6 thru/6straight scheme (and same carrier saddle intonation system). It can be a real pitb to get the octaves threaded OVER the saddle. What i figured out is just stick the ball end of the other string in front of the hole. Thread it through, pull the ball up, and voila. The octave string is now safely above the saddle instead of attempting to snake its way underneath.

 

[brookdalebill]

If you ever changed the strings on a Ric 12, you would understand the "hate" factor.

Indeed I have!
The headstock design is brilliant, and efficient, but also makes string changing a colossal PITA.

 

[swarfrat]

I really don't get clean humbuckers in general, but especially not on 12 strings. Strat 2/4 are like tailor made for 12's - thats a big part of why I wanted a strat.

Once again I get there is variety, but single coils have pretty much disappeared from current 12 string offering entirely.

 

[swarfrat]

Theres almost half a millimeter between the drones (same string gauge). I was considering shimming or filing but decided to just buy an actual (or purportedly actual) Gotoh bridge, as I decided it was a lot of work on crappy knockoff bridge.

I found three different part numbers for the Gotoh 12-string bridges, GTC12, a PGTC-12 (which may be the same part), and a SB-5108-10. I couldn't articulate the difference in it and the GTC12, and it was twice the price. I'm guessing an older version perhaps.

I also chased the nut to round the slot bottoms and get the string tops at the same height at that end. Two strings were sitaring, and was able to fix that without going too deep.

Since I'm now waiting on a new bridge, I'm going to hold off action and intonation. I'm clearly a glutton for punishment given the 12-string obsession, but even I have my limits. Doing it twice is like four setups.

 

[cyclopean]

Both agile and Eastwood seem to have 12 string models available pretty often. It’s never something I’m specifically looking for but i could have sworn I’ve seen them.

 

[cyclopean]

12 String Guitars

See why guitarists around the world choose our vintage replica guitars that play, sound, and look better than the classics they pay tribute to such as Airline, Teisco and Mosrite.

eastwoodguitars.com

 

[swarfrat]

Yeah, thats essentially warmoth range, and i could get a strat.