Fatty-My 7 string baritone hollowbody

[ATDVSBL]

Check out my new Heatley custom guitar, Her name is Fatty:
http://www.heatleyguitars.com/Shadshollowbody.htm

Here are the specs:
Carved, Quilted maple top and back
3" thick mahogony body
Ebony fingerboard
26 3/4" scale
2 1/8" neck width at nut
3 piece mahogony/flame maple neck, w carbon fiber reinforcements
Flame maple binding around neck and headstock
Baker piezo bridge and preamp
Custom 7 string pickups
Custom case because she is so Fat.

Color: Fire! Scott Heatley did a great job making the quilt stand out and look like it is on fire.

My primary purpose for ordering a custom, handbuilt guitar is because of the neck. I like the wide neck and string spacing on my classical, but there are not many production 7 string necks this wide and flat. I searched all the custom builders I could find on the net, and Scott Heatley kept returning to the top of the list for workmanship, flexability, and cost. I called him up and explained how I wanted the neck, and he said no problem. Almost a year later and it is finished. It will be sent out on Monday.

There has been a lot of talk about the lack of high end 7 string guitars, and I totally agree. There are not a lot of high end 7's being made right now, especially hollowbodies. I know Jim Soloway is working on a cool new design, I certainly hope more players/builders follow suit.

Now I just have to wait for the FedEx gods to bring it from Canada with love ...there seems to be a lot of great craftsmanship coming from Canada these days

What do you guys think? I know, its not exactly a mainstream guitar, but I think it came out looking pretty sweet.

[revsharp777]

In a word....WOW!
Nice work indeed. I especially LOVE that color & quilt top combo!

[Drew]

That's just beautiful, man... And with all that maple and the extended scale, I'd imagine the tone's gonna be right up there too- really clear and defined.

I feel like a better person today for having seen those pics. Thanks.

-D

[Gresh]

Man oh man, what a pretty instrument. Love the quilt and the craftmanship looks amazing. The heel joint work is great. Love the neck construction, maple in the center...nice touch. I don't even want to know what that cost. That's an instrument you pass down through the generations. Some day your great great great grandson/daughter will think you must have been a pretty cool cat.

[Jim Soloway]

I was looking at those photos yesterday over at the PRS forum. It's just wonderful. I've been just consistently blown away with Scott's work recently and this may be his best looking piece yet. It just seem slike he's refined everything about his basic design to the point where it's now as close to perfect as he's going to get it. Congratulations on a wonderful instrument.

I'm curious how you're planning to tune it and what strings you;re going to use?

[ATDVSBL]

I'm starting out with .011's, then I will experiment to see what I like best on this guitar. As far as tunings go, mostly Low A, but I will play around with different chord voicings with low B also. Fixed bridge is key for switching back and forth between tunings.

jim, do you have any string suggestions?

[Jim Soloway]

With that scale length, assuming standard tuning on the 6 basic strings, then 11's are probably as heavy as you can go. I tried 12's on my 7421XL (27 inch scale) when I first got it and it was close to unplayable. It also felt like it was putting a huge amount of tension on the neck.

Since I go for a very dark jazz type sound, I use flat wounds. I've been using Thomastik Infelds since they first came to the US about 10 years ago and they are easily the best strings I've ever played. Unfortunately, they don't produce an appropriate string for a low A. They made a few prototypes and I was one of the testers. They were fantastic, but for reasons I never understood, they were never released, so I currently use a D'Adarrio nickel round wound 72 and it does the job adequately. As heavy as that sounds, it's actually considered a bit light among the jazz 7 stringers. 80 seems to be the standard, but then most of the other players are also using 25 or 25.5 inch scale lengths. If you're really going to try the B tuning, you may want to go a little lower, something in the range of a 65.

If you can't find heavy weight strings for the low A/B, go to juststrings.com and check the single string listings. They have everything.

[Wound]

BEAUTIFUL!
Congrats!

Kim

[ns9]

Hi! WOW! Very nice
You mentioned custom pick-ups; who made them? I am currently trying to find someone to do a custom 7 string single-coil stacked 4-wire (for tap) for the neck position in a custom being built. Nikki

[ATDVSBL]

Scott has not told me who makes the pickups, your best bet would be to email him and let him disclose whatever info he wants to

[guitarkatana]

That is one damn beautiful guitar!

[Entropy]

Love that quilt and the inlay.

The workmanship looks stellar!

[Harry_D]

Uhmmmm, I want that one BAD!

Congrats!

Harry.

[mecca777]

That's a work of art. I agree with Gresh; that's the kind of instrument that becomes an heirloom. The finish, quilt and inlay are all magnificent, you lucky lucky man. I poked around on that website and had a look at some of the other guitars on there; Mr Heatley is building some masterpieces, and no mistake.

[Sevenstringer]

Dare I ask the cost of such an amazing instrument??