Adjusting to a new copedent?

[Robby Harris]

Curious to hear about your experience getting used to a new-to-you copedent! Particularly those who kept the same pulls, but experimented with placement.

My S-10 has standard Emmons changes, but with less orthodox knee placement.

RKL lowers E to D#, RKR raises to F
LKL raises 1 to G#, 2 to E
LKR lowers 2 to D/C#, 9 to C#
LKV - B-Bb

I just started playing 2.5 years ago, but in this time I’ve spent many hours in my seat. I have a ton of muscle memory with this guitar. I like many things about this copedent. It feels intuitive to move my legs “outwards” to raise, and “inwards” to lower. It feels physically reflective of expanding or shrinking the intervalic range. Something also feels very comfortable about splitting the busy work between the left foot pedaling, and the right knee, particularly when lowering E’s quickly/frequently in passages. I acknowledge that it mostly feels that way because it’s what I’m used to…

Sometimes wonder if I’d ever set the knee levers to the most standardized placement for these reasons:
1) The F lever in conjunction with the A pedal certainly seems slick on the left side
2) Separating the 2nd string half stop from the pedaling foot makes sense
3) The primary reason I wonder if it’d be worth the trouble - future guitars I purchase will likely need to be setup for this quirkier copedent. I hope to one day attain a deeper understanding of the mechanics of this instrument…I have a basic understanding and have fixed a couple of things here and there…but in the near future I’d need to take it to a pro. I’m saving up for an all pull D-10 (Legrande). Further down the line, I’d love to own an ol’ Emmons P/P. I’m not sure I’d want to put one of those guitars through so many adjustments. If not for this, I don’t think I’d bother changing what I’m used to.

I once had to borrow a guitar for an out of state gig (didn’t want to fly with mine). This one was a starter, and the only two levers were both E’s on the left. I did not have a difficult time adjusting for this at the time. But, it was much earlier in my experience with PSG, it was downtempo music, and at this point in time I was mostly just using the floor pedals and E levers anyways…I have since become much more acquainted with all of the changes on my guitar!

Perhaps when the time comes for a new guitar, I’ll leave it how it is for a month or so then decide from there. I’d love to hear anyone’s thoughts on the matter, and your personal experience challenging all of the muscle memory you worked so hard to acquire!

[Doug Taylor]

My first steel was Emmons with the Es LKR and RKL When I got my Mullen it was set up Day with the both Es on the L

I decided to try it before trying to change it. Within a couple days it was feeling pretty natural and in a couple weeks I was fine with it.

So I had little to no trouble changing to a very different setup.

[Richard Sinkler]

My first PSG in the early 70s was a ZB Custom S10 5p/2k, Emmons setup. The "F" lever was on a pedal, the 2 knee levers (on the right knee), one lowered E's to D#, and the other lowered string 2 to D/C#, and maybe string 9 to C#. After about 6 months to a year, I decided to have 3 more levers installed. The tech who did the work was a "Day" player and convinced me to change from Emmons. The E strings levers were now on the left knee, and the 2nd/9th string lowers were on RKR. I had no problem switching and was comfortable probably in a couple of days. But the 6th string G# to F# change was on RKL. Over the 55 years of playing, I found that the 6th string lower is used A LOT with the E lowers. Pushing both the LKL and RKL was uncomfortable and sometimes made the guitar want to move ("walk") to the left.

Over my career, I have changed my LKV several times. It started out raising both F# strings to G. I tried changing it to lower the B strings to Bb, but never liked that change, so I changed it back.

I can still play an Emmons setup guitar flawlessly if the E changes are on the left knee. I used to sit in with a couple of friend's guitars that were Emmons setups, one with E changes on the left knee, and one with them split between the knees. I had a little difficulty with the guitar that had them split, but after a couple of songs I was good to go (also with practicing on it during the band's break, so maybe 25 or 30 minutes total).

I think even a complete changeover shouldn't take more that a few days (with good practice sessions) to get the changes implanted in your brain. Maybe a little more to alter your muscle memory.