New guitar - Hamer Eclipse

For a while I've been talking about learning how to play slide guitar (perhaps even lap steel), though slide guitar has always been a challenge since all of the guitars I've got are set up with obnoxiously low action. I decided, therefore, that it may be a good idea to pick up a relatively inexpensive guitar and set it up for 24x7 slide. While doing my daily poking around on e-bay, I found a relatively clean Hamer Eclipse on deal. The Eclipse is about as straightforward as it gets... solid mahogany body, fat mahogany neck, wraparound bridge, (2) Seymour Duncan minibuckers with volume + tone + 3-way switch... not a lot of sizzle, but an extremely solid American-made guitar for the money.

In addition to the standard "guitar readification" that all incoming guitars go through (e.g., setup, polishing, fretboard conditioning), the Hamer received a few special treatments: First, I installed a Golden Gate resonator guitar extension nut, which raised the action on the fretboard to ~1/4" (gasp!). Next, I restrung the guitar with a set of GHS acoustic slide strings, which are specially polished (ground wound?) to reduce slide noise and provide ridiculously high tension (16-56 gauge) across all strings. Finally, I picked up a real steel slide, a Shubb-Pearse SP3. The difference all these treatments make is considerable... the Eclipse is now officially a slide machine (and unofficially not good for much else!).

As always, here are a few pictures of the Eclipse:





Inspired so far by how much difference a small investment has made in my electric slide playing capability, I'm now thinking about buying a second Golden Gate extension nut and pack of GHS acoustic slide strings to install on my old Gibson Country Western acoustic so I can get my acoustic slide on without investing several hundred $$$ in a true resonator guitar.

--B