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Tommy Castro was our first endorser for Strobel Guitars in 2009. We started out to make the best “travel” guitars, with “travel” in quotes. The goal was to create a great playing, good sounding guitar that would be easy for traveling. Tommy received an early Custom Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Guitar, in the days before we introduced the Rambler® Classic. Our relationship with Tommy was helped along by our good friend Darlene Lopez, Artist Relations manager.
 Custom Ramblers 2009 |
 Tommy picked the RubyBurst |
 Wailing with Terry Hanck |
We recently caught up with Tommy at the Funky Biscuit to show him our new Rambler® STROBELCASTER™ Professional Electric Travel Guitar. Here are a few words he had to say…
During his performance, Tommy played some songs with the new STROBELCASTER™ Professional Electric Travel Guitar. The first video is a Blues Jam showcasing the great sounds Tommy gets from his guitar. This STROBELCASTER™ is outfitted with Zexcoil pickups from Scott Lawing, and they sound fantastic! The second video is Tommy and the Pain Killers playing “Nasty Habits”, where he is joined by Blues great, Matt Schofield. Pictures below courtesy of Jay Skolnick, resident photographer at the Funky Biscuit.
 Rocking with STROBELCASTER Plus |
 Tommy with new STROBELCASTER |
 Tommy gets inspired |
Tommy normally plays a Black Rambler® STROBELCASTER™ Standard travel guitar with a slight modification. He wanted a Black guitar with a Rosewood fret board. Our “Blackie” model normally comes with a Maple fretboard. No problem to trade necks with our interchangeable detachable neck design. We swapped out the Maple fret board neck for one of our STROBELCASTER™ Rosewood necks. He takes her out on the road, and has sends us videos jammin’ in the van while travelling to gigs. Other pro players endorsing our STROBELCASTER™ travel guitars are Elliott Randall and Jeff Pevar – more about them in a future article.
 Black SC Standard |
 SC in Computer Bag |
 STROBELCASTER in White |
 STRAT Jack on White SC |
Tommy’s Story…
Over the course of his four-decade career, Castro has played thousands of shows to thousands of fans, packing dance floors, always leaving them screaming for more. He has released 14 albums filled with original blues, soul and West Coast rock, each one standing alone. Hailing from the San Francisco area, Castro, along with his band, The Painkillers (currently featuring bassist Randy McDonald, keyboardist Michael Emerson and drummer Bowen Brown), play music that is guaranteed to fire up fans and leave critics searching for new words of praise. Billboard says the band plays “irresistible contemporary blues-rock” with “street-level grit and soul.” Now, with Method To My Madness, the group turns the intensity up another notch.
Born in San Jose, California in 1955, Tommy Castro first picked up a guitar at age 10. He fell under the spell of Eric Clapton, Elvin Bishop, Mike Bloomfield and other blues rock players. As he got older, Castro discovered the blues guitar work of Muddy Waters, B.B. King, Freddie King, Buddy Guy, Elmore James and the deep-rooted soul of singers like Ray Charles, Wilson Pickett and James Brown. By his 20s he was playing in a variety of San Francisco-area blues and soul bands.
Castro formed The Painkillers in 2012, creating a lean, mean four-piece lineup. Fueled by Tommy’s voice and guitar plus bass, drums and keyboards, the band released “The Devil You Know” in 2014, winning over hordes of new fans. Castro stripped his music down to its raw essence with the band hammering their point home on the bandstand. Jambands says, “Tommy Castro And The Painkillers are a crackling, stripped-down band with plenty of grit and a rocking soul.” We couldn’t agree more…
It has been a pleasure working with Tommy over the years, his input was instrumental in the design of the new Rambler® STROBELCASTER™ Travel Guitar, helping us create one of the best “travel” guitars on the market. We put the quotes around “travel” because the Rambler portable guitar is much more than your typical travel guitar. Big Sound from a Small Guitar!! Check out more of Tommy’s videos on the Strobel Guitars YouTube Channel…
Strobel Guitars Custom Shop has created a new model in our Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Guitar portfolio. We are often asked by our jazz playing customers if we could create a hollow version of our Rambler® Custom travel guitar. I started thinking about this seriously after meeting with Tony DiCaprio in New York City about 2 years ago. Tony owns a Rambler Classic Travel Guitar and is a prolific jazz player, teacher and author. He played guitar with Elvis Presley’s band in Las Vegas (you can hear a fan yell out on Elvis’s Las Vegas recordings – “play it Tony”!). We thought the new Hollowbody Rambler® Portable Guitar should keep the same shape and detachable neck attributes as the Rambler® Custom travel guitar. Maybe use a Mahogany body with a Maple top and bottom – similar to a Gibson ES-175…
We started with a nice Mahogany body blank glued to a Flamey Maple top and used the same body outline as our Custom Rambler® Electric Travel Guitar. We made a new template with a ¼” smaller outline as a guide to route out the body. This created thin Mahogany rims for the sides of the portable guitar. The pickup route needed be as close to the neck as possible to create that ES-175 sound. We made sure to leave wood for mounting the bridge attaching the neck. The back is another piece of Flamey Maple about ¼” think and shaped to match the body outline. Now we had to figure out how to make the f-holes…
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| Rims with bridge / neck blocks | Routed body and back | Hollowbody top view |
The small dimensions of the body require that we design custom f-holes. Many thanks to Pat O’Donnell of Resurrection Guitars for his help with the design and location of the f-holes. Pat made a template for us, so we can replicate the design for future customers that would like a Custom Rambler® RS-175 Hollowbody Travel Guitar.
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| RS-175 f-hole template | Pat routing the first f-hole | Flip over the template |
After all the routing is complete, we start the long process of sanding and sealing the body. Our inspiration for the design and finish of the Strobel Rambler® Hollowbody Travel Guitar was a 1956 Gibson ES-175. After many hours of sanding and several clear coats of nitrocellulose lacquer we are ready for the color coats. We used the “PRS” process to make apparent bindings for the edges of the top and bottom by painting a base coat of Vintage Amber on the whole body, then taped off the “bindings”. The next color coat was a light Tobacco Sunburst, followed by a darker Tobacco Sunburst.
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| Vintage Amber front view | Back after first color coats | Side view with “bindings” |
After taping, we spray on the vintage tobacco sunburst finish…
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| Taped and ready to paint | RS-175 Tobacco Sunburst | Side view – tape removed |
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| Finished RS-175 Travel Guitar | Les Paul side jack | Back of Rambler Hollowbody |
The RS-175 sounds excellent unplugged, rivaling the sonic output of much bigger electric hollowbodies like the Gibson ES-335 or a Thinline Tele. Weighing in at about 3 pounds, she has a warm “acoustic” tone plugged in with nice harmonics and “oomph” provided by the Schaller® Golden 50 Humbucker. MP3 audio files are available upon request. Please visit our Guitar Gallery to see more pics of the RS-175 Rambler® Custom Hollowbody Travel Guitar (courtesy of Speedring Studios).
As with all our Rambler® Travel Guitar models this is a full scale professional instrument with an easily detachable neck. The body and neck fit in your briefcase or computer bag providing you with a great sounding, great playing guitar that just happens to be easy for traveling.
It takes careful planning and workmanship to create a great sounding, great playing, high quality portable guitar. We are now pleased to offer the Custom Rambler® RS-175 Hollowbody Travel Guitar for sale. Please contact Russ at [email protected] to create the guitar of your dreams, designed just how you want it. Strobel Guitars works with you to optimize the wood selections, neck shaping and set up to match your style of playing. You pick the wood, the color, the neck shape, the inlay and choose any number of available options (piezo bridge, gold hardware, coil tap, etc.).
How did you find your way into music, and playing the guitar? Ever wonder how professional musicians find their way into a musical career? Here is Jimmy Thackery’s story – about how music found him, and how he found his way to playing the blues. Special thanks to Blues Radio International for making this interview possible.
Photo courtesy of Jay Skolnick
Jimmy Thackery is a singer, songwriter, and ultimate troubadour. He makes his living playing electric blues with his band, Jimmy Thackery and the Drivers (with George Sheppard on drums and Rick Knapp on bass). He plays his Strobel Rambler® Professional Electric Travel guitar on the road and makes it sing like only Jimmy can.
Thackery loves playing his Rambler® Portable Guitar on stage since it is a full scale guitar with humbuckers that will “sterilize cats at 100 yards”! And it only weighs about four pounds. The Rambler® is a “great sounding instrument that plays great”. Being a headless guitar, “you can really feel the neck vibrate. The whole thing just shakes like a leaf”. Hear about the Rambler® Travel Guitar in Jimmy’s own words in this video.
Music finds Jimmy ThackeryJimmy Thackery traces his musical attraction to being a part of the “TV generation”. “In the 50’s and 60’s we had these great TV themes – that twangy, reverby electric guitar sound.” Think about the 12 string intro to “Bonanza”, Johnny Rivers “Secret Agent Man”, the “Batman” theme, “Peter Gunn”, etc. His mother was very musical, and it was a natural thing for Jimmy to be drawn to music. And, like many (of a certain generation) guitar players, he was wowed by the Beatles appearance on the Ed Sullivan show. His parents wanted him to play the piano, but Jimmy was thinking he was never going to get a girlfriend playing piano…
Maybe you have in interesting guitar story as well, and we’d like to hear about it – please send us a note at [email protected].
Thackery remembers the exact day and circumstances that called him to play the blues. He was cutting the grass listening to his transistor radio on earphones. 
He recalls a recording session with the Nighthawks at Muscle Shoals where one of the players talked about a college frat party, and hearing a great band as he walked by. There was Slim Harpo with a bass drum, a harp around his neck and his guitar. That was it, just him – and it was the best sounding band he had ever heard. Hear the story…
When Jimmy was 18 he ran off to play music in Boston – which at the time, was the center of electric blues (not Chicago as one might think). Lots of blues clubs, James Cotton, the J. Geils band, Aerosmith coming together and of course the Standels with “Love that Dirty Water”. Boston was a place to immerse yourself in the music. Much more so than what you could find in Jimmy’s home town of Washington, DC.
Jimmy shows us the different sounds and tones available with a Rambler Travel Guitar. Hear how versatile the Rambler® guitar sounds with its dual humbucking pickups, 3 position switch and full range tone and volume controls.
In our first two visits to the Strobel Guitars Custom Shop we saw how a Custom Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Guitar body goes from a block of wood to a shaped guitar. In Part One, we selected the wood; attached the Maple tops and glued them together with Ash, Popular or Mahogany bodies. In Part Two we saw how the Rambler® Travel Guitar bodies get sawed, shaped, routed and drilled.
Today we are taking a look at one of the more difficult parts of building a Custom Rambler® Travel Guitar; making the necks. The necks have to be precisely shaped to give them a good feel and playability. They have slanting lines in two dimensions while the back needs to be curved with a “C” or “D” (or other) profile. We tend to make our Rambler® Travel Guitar Custom necks a little on the thick side (1” at the first fret) since a thicker neck contributes to better resonance and sustain. Customers may order a thinner neck if that is their preference.
The travel guitar neck process starts with either a mahogany or maple board about 3” x 3” and about 3-4 feet long. A Rambler® neck blank should be about 16” long, while a Rambler® Custom Bass neck is about 18”. We try to cut the blanks so the grain of the wood is vertical to the fretboard, meaning “quarter sawn”. It is said this makes for a stronger more stable neck. For a Rambler® travel guitar, we need a neck blank about 2 ½” wide, 16” long and about 1” thick. The rectangular neck blank gets planed down to 7/8” thickness.
With the right sized neck blank, the neck template is attached with a slot in the template for routing the truss rod cavity. Using a band saw, we cut the blank into the approximate neck outline, and then use a router with a template bit (has a ball bearing that follows the template) to get the exact neck dimensions.
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Neck Blanks on |
Neck Template |
Neck Router |
The dimensioned neck now gets a slot for the truss rod. This router has a template following collate used in combination with a ¼” end mill bit to carve the truss rod slot into the neck. The truss rod access hole is accomplished with a long ¼” drill bit, drilling from the truss rod side of the slot to the heel.
 Strobel’s Router with Collate |
Strobel’s End Mill Bit |
The necks are now the correct outline shape including a truss rod slot. They need to be shaped to the proper profile. We use a special slanted sled to shape the necks getting thinner towards the nut.
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Attaching the |
Neck on sled |
Shaping the neck |
After getting the approximate shaped neck on the shaper, there are many hours of hand work to finesse the final shape using rasps, scrapers and of course lots of sandpaper. A variety of final shapes are available on Custom Rambler® Travel Guitars and Basses including the standard “C” and “D” shapes, “V” shapes, modified “V” etc. The customer specifies the final dimensions at the first and twelfth frets.
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Necks in various stages |
A batch of Custom |
It takes careful planning and craftsmanship to create a great sounding, great playing, high quality travel guitar. The best thing about owning a Custom Rambler® Portable Guitar is creating the guitar of your dreams, designed just how you want it. Strobel Guitars works with you to optimize the wood selections, neck shaping and set up to match your style of playing. You pick the wood, the color, the neck shape, the inlay and choose any number of available options (piezo bridge, gold hardware, coil tap, etc.).
Next month we will show you how we make the Custom Rambler® fret boards and inlay. Customer initials are included as first fret inlay and other custom inlay options are available.
Lefty Rambler® Bass with Gold D4 Bridge
Lefty Rambler® Bass with Gold D4 Bridge
We are seeing an uptick in orders for Custom Strobel Rambler® Travel Basses, and recently built a left- handed version for Simon from Tasmania, please check out our Bass Gallery for more pics.
Simon went all out when designing the Bass Guitar of his dreams – ordering all Gold hardware including the Schaller D4 Roller Bridge and the custom made Schaller M4 2000 tuners. The pickup is a Schaller PBX P-bass model, which unfortunately is no longer available from Schaller (we do have a few left in our stock).
Rambler Travel Bass in Tobacco Sunburst with Gold Hardware
Strobel Rambler Travel Bass in Tobacco Sunburst with Gold Hardware
Simon also ordered a AAA Quilted Maple top on a Mahogany body, and went with an Ebony fretboard on a Maple neck. We wanted a light Tobacco Sunburst to show off the beautiful grain of the top. Brown and Red colors go best with a Mahogany body, while Ash or Popular look good with Blue or Green finishes.
We have modified several Rambler® Classic Travel Guitars for left handed players by turning around the nut and the bridge and relocating the strap buttons. This works OK, as the Rambler® is relatively symmetrical, but the controls and the jack end up on top of the guitar.
Making a truly left handed instrument involves modifying the templates and paying close attention to drilling holes and routing pick up cavities to make sure they line up properly. We fabricated a special custom nut made from camel bone for Simon’s bass. The tuners have to be installed with the flat surface towards the outside of the guitar. The strings are routed to the tuners from the center of the neck so the angle of the strings line up with the holes in the D4 bridge. Consequently, the tuners tighten the strings the same direction as a right handed bass or guitar.
We currently are working on a left handed Custom Rambler® Travel Guitar for Wayne from Australia. He is supplying his own mini-humbucker pickups, and wants the jack moved to the side to make more room between the Volume and Tone Controls. This baby will be made from a solid piece of Honduran Mahogany with a Maple Neck and Maple fretboard. Wayne’s Rambler® Travel Guitar will be finished in Surf Green with Chrome hardware. Stay tuned to see how his guitar turns out…
The Rambler® Bass scale length is derived from a standard 34” scale by placing the nut at the 3rd fret. The string spacing feels correct since it matches a standard bass, but the overall scale length is 28-1/2”. The Rambler® Custom Bass is also available as a fretless model. Find out more about the Strobel Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Bass at our on our Rambler® Travel Bass Page. And see more Rambler® Custom Basses in our Bass Gallery.
P.S. Please check out our Strobel Rambler® Bass in the April Issue of Vintage Guitar Magazine in the article “42 Modern Basses”! We are number 14 on page 99.
Scott picking up his Maple Neck Rambler Guitar
Padded Rambler Gig Bag
Here is a story about Scott W. and his Rambler Travel Guitar. I met Scott in 2011 at the Atlanta airport while we were waiting for a flight home to Florida. Scott was carrying a normal sized guitar case and I had my nice little Rambler Professional Electric Travel Guitar. He was traveling every week for his job and carrying a big regular size guitar to keep up his chops for playing in his band. He talked about how hard it was to travel with a guitar and wanted to see what I had in my tennis racquet sized Strobel Guitars gig bag.
Scott was quite taken with my Rambler electric travel guitar because it looked like a real pro guitar and was impressed that it could be disassembled to fit in a briefcase for traveling. Scott visited our shop the following week and tried my Custom Rambler and some of the new (at the time) Rambler Classic travel guitars.He really liked the sound of the Schaller Golden 50 humbuckers in my Rambler Custom, and asked me to install a set in a Tobacco Sunburst Rambler Classic.
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 Schaller Golden 50 Humbucker pickups |
That weekend Scott played a gig with Split Image and opened the set with his new Rambler Classic Plus. The band was great and Scott was an awesome guitar player. Please check out the “Rock and Roll Fantasy” video in our gallery.
 Scotts Early Rambler SN 1007-003 |
 New Schaller tunomatic bridge and Graphtech string tees |
Scott recently got in touch and wanted to stop by the shop for a tune up. Scott noticed the new Maple fretboards now available on the new STROBELCASTER Standard model. He lamented that his (early version) Rambler only had 20 frets and asked if he get one of the new 21 fret necks with Maple fretboard installed in his old Rambler? Our goal is Total Customer Satisfaction, so we made it happen.
The Maple fretboard necks were prototypes, but we found one to fit his original Rambler body. We also installed a Schaller tunomatic bridge and Graphtech string tees. I realized that Scott had not been taking full advantage of the locking tuners. The strings were snipped off a little long and the sharp ends were poking my playing hand. When Scott came to pick up the guitar I showed him how to string the guitar so the strings would stay tight (stay tuned for “How to tune a Rambler video…).
 Early Ramblers only had 20 frets |
 Original Rambler neck with Rosewood fretboard |
Scott was really happy with the new neck and bridge, and was headed to a gig the next night with his updated Rambler.
While Scott was here, he told me about his many travels with his Rambler. People are amazed there is such a nice guitar in his little Strobel Guitars gig bag. He tells everyone if they want the best travel guitar, they should take a look at a Strobel Rambler Professional Electric Travel Guitar. He went on to say….
“I have been extremely happy with my Rambler over the years. The guitar is not only very well made, but sounds fantastic with the Schaller Golden 50 pickups that Russ installed when I tested the guitar. They have the perfect amount of punch I need for the music Split Image does. The guitar goes with me each and every week I travel, and I travel EVERY week of the year for my job. I have been from California to Maine and all points in between over the last four years with my Rambler Travel Guitar. It is a great portable guitar, so easy to travel with due to the size. I can easily put the guitar in the overhead bin of the plane behind my briefcase and not take any extra room on the plane. Although the Rambler is designed to take apart for “briefcase style” transport, I don’t take the guitar apart since I usually check my bag. I get asked all the time, “what kind of violin are you playing”? On many occasions I have opened the small gig bag case and people are amazed and intrigued to see a full scale length guitar”.
 Scotts Rambler Classic with new maple neck |
“I recently contacted Russ to talk about some modifications I wanted for my Rambler Travel Guitar. He said come on over to the shop and we can discuss your plans. As a lead guitar player I wanted the guitar to have 21 frets instead of 20 like my original Rambler Classic. Just that extra fret can make a big difference when I use the Rambler onstage. (Note: all new Rambler Classic Travel Guitars now have 21 frets). Russ showed me some options including the new STROBELCASTER models with Maple necks. They felt so smooth and exactly what I wanted to do to the Rambler Classic. Russ took the extra time to make sure my guitar had a new neck installed along with a new bridge, setup and intonated, to be ready by my next gig in 10 days time.”
“I arrived to pick up the guitar the day before my gig and I must say, I was blown away by the way the guitar played. I was always a fan of the guitar and the sound, but now with the new neck, it is one of my favorite guitars to play onstage. I get so many compliments on the sound and looks. I am extremely happy with the modifications and so grateful to have Russ work on my guitar. He really went the extra mile to make my experience great and I so much appreciate it.”
“Russ always told me when I bought the guitar to call him if I ever need anything. He means it. The whole entire customer experience is what makes his company special. He treats you as a Rambler family member from day one. So now we call the guitar the Rambler Classic Plus Travel Guitar. I have the confidence that if I ever need anything else modified on the guitar, Russ will accommodate my needs and work to make it happen. I look forward to another Custom Rambler in the future, I have a few ideas for Russ….”
Strobel Guitars builds on Russ’ many years of Motorola experience. We embrace Total Customer Satisfaction and Perfect Quality as the most important foundations of a successful enterprise.
About a year ago we told you about Tanya’s Deep Purple Bass. Today we have a couple new Rambler® Custom Bass guitars to show you, Deep Blue for Jim, and a Natural Honey Bass built for an upcoming review (stay tuned).
We built this Rambler® Bass for Jim in Canada. He wanted a Deep Blue bass to match his favorite PRS single cut. Jim ordered a Quilted Maple top, Ash body, and Maple neck with a Rosewood fretboard. This Custom Bass sounded great and turned out very pretty with the book matched AAA Quilt Top and a nice grainy Ash body. Jim also wanted the back of the neck painted to match the body.
 Rambler Travel Bass Deep Blue front view |
 Rambler Travel Bass Deep Blue back view |
Jim was a great customer to work with. Here is what he says about his new Rambler® Custom Professional Electric Travel Bass: “Strobel’s instruments are of extremely high quality and play-ability. You actually forget they are travel instruments. More importantly, the way Russ treats his customers and keeps them informed through the whole process of making the instrument is a bonus part of the experience. I have not yet met Russ, but consider him a friend”.
That last part means a lot to us here at Strobel Guitars. We love getting to know our customers, how they play, the music they like and how they feel about their instruments. Here is a picture Jim sent with his new Rambler® Travel Bass and matching PRS guitar. Thank you Jim!!
Jim at home with his Rambler Bass
We also created another Rambler® Custom Bass we called “Honey”. The top and back are toasted Flamey Maple courtesy of Alan at Guitar Wood Experts. I met Alan at the NAMM show and he had a couple pieces too small for a full size top, but just perfect for a Rambler®. Thank you Alan! The body is made from Bass wood, very light and resonant. This bass is on her way to a well known session musician in Nashville, so stay tuned to see what he has to say…
 Honey Rambler Travel Bass front view |
 Honey Rambler Travel Bass back view |
The Rambler® Bass scale length is derived from a standard 34″ scale by placing the nut at the 3rd fret. The string spacing feels correct since it matches a standard bass, but the overall scale length is 28-1/2″. The Rambler® Custom Bass is also available as a fretless model. Find out more about the Strobel Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Bass at our website. And see more Rambler® Custom Basses in our Gallery.
Last time we visited Strobel Guitars Custom Shop we saw how a Custom Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Guitar starts the building process. We selected some fine Tonewoods; book matched Quilted and Flamey maple tops and glued them together with Ash or Mahogany bodies. Today we’ll take a look at how the Rambler® Travel Guitar bodies are shaped, routed and drilled.
It takes a lot of planning and craftsmanship to create a great sounding, great playing, high quality travel guitar. Strobel Guitars works with you to optimize the wood selections, neck shaping and general set up to match your style of playing. You pick the wood, the color, the neck shape, the inlay and choose any number of available options (piezo bridge, gold hardware, coil tap, etc.).
After we glue up and plane the body blank (as seen in Part 1 of our “Making a Rambler®” story), we attach Corian® (the counter top stuff) templates to create the front and back outlines of the Rambler® Travel Guitar.
 Front and Back Rambler® Travel Guitar Templates. |
 Rambler® Front Template
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 Rambler® Back Template |
After the templates are aligned, we mark the front and back body shape, and the location of the pickups, tuning keys, controls, bridge, etc. Then we cut out the raw body with a band saw.
 Marking the body outline. |
 Tim cutting out a Rambler® body. |
To save some time and effort with the router, we hog out the pickup and neck cavities on the front of the Rambler® Travel Guitar using a Fostner bit. We also hog out the tuner flange on the back before routing.
 Rambler® Front Cavities hogged out. |
 Rambler® Back Tuner Flange hogged out. |
We re-attach the templates providing a guide for the router bearing to get a nice smooth body outline, and to provide the precise dimensions of the pickup and neck cavity routes.
 Putting templates back on. |
 Routing contours and cavities. |
 Gene adding holes for volume and tone controls |
 Lining up neck bolt holes. |
Now that we have the Rambler® bodies routed and drilled, all we have left to do is sand, sand, sand, and sand some more before heading to the paint shop. We’ll get started on the necks while the bodies are getting painted.
 Rambler® Front |
 Rambler® Back |
 A bunch of Custom Rambler® Travel Guitars |
Please check back with us next time to see how we make the Custom Rambler® Necks and inlay. Ever wonder how the Truss Rods get in there??
This week, we thought it might be interesting to take you into our Custom Shop to see how we make your Custom Rambler® Professional Electric Travel Guitar. We will take you through the steps, from selecting the proper tone woods, laying out the guitar, gluing up the body and routing the body to shape. We will show you how we make the necks and fret boards, and a little peek at the paint shop and assembly process.
So, let’s get started. You want a great sounding, great playing, high quality travel guitar and you want the best guitar you can afford. You already know that the Rambler® can be easily disassembled to fit in a briefcase or computer bag for traveling. A Custom Rambler® Guitar or Bass could be the guitar of your dreams. You pick out the wood, the color, the neck shape, the inlay and choose any number of available options.
You decide if you want a brighter or more mid-range sounding guitar. Maybe you like playing a Les Paul, maybe you like playing a Strat. The wood choices are endless, but normally we use either Honduran Mahogany or Swamp Ash for the bodies. Choose Mahogany for the more mid range sound of a Les Paul and the Ash for the brighter sound of a Strat. A flamey or quilted maple top can be used to brighten the sound, and to enhance the visual appeal of the guitar.
 Looking at wood for a Custom Rambler® |
 Merrill’s Wood Shed in Alva, FL |
After we select the raw lumber, we cut it to the right size and plane the boards to the proper thickness.
 Body blanks cut and planed |
 Body, top and neck |
 Some nice Mahogany blanks |
Let’s find some nice Maple tops. Sometimes we have a pretty piece of quilted or flamey maple wide enough for a top. Most of the time, we need to book match two smaller pieces to make the top.
 Which set looks best to you? |
 Gluing book matched pieces |
 Book matched Rambler Tops |
Ash body, quilted maple top, maple neck Mahogany body with quilted maple top
 Ash body, quilted maple top, maple neck |
 Mahogany body with quilted maple top |
 Takes a lot of clamps to glue these babies… Takes a lot of clamps to glue these babies… |
 A couple of Mahogany Ramblers getting glued |
Check back with us next week to see how we cut out, route and shape the Custom Rambler® Travel Guitars…
Getting pretty hot down here in South Florida, and rainin’ most every afternoon – makes it hard to get the nitro going…
This month we are featuring our latest custom creation, a Strobel Rambler Professional Travel Bass in Deep Purple Burst! We haven’t spent much time talking about our Custom Bass guitars in this forum so thought we would highlight one this month.
We built a Rambler Bass for Tanya from Tennessee. She chose “IAM” for her custom inlay, more about that later.
We model the Rambler Bass after the most iconic bass we could think of – a vintage Fender P Bass from the early 60’s.
The Rambler Bass is outfitted with all Schaller hardware, just like our Custom Rambler guitars. We use a Schaller D4 roller bridge. This bridge is really versatile, it has adjustments for string height and intonation plus the rollers move back and forth to get the strings exactly where you want them.
The pickups are Schaller PBA Precision Bass Humbuckers, and they sound GREAT!
Something about the absence of a headstock really makes for great sustain (all that string energy above the nut is lost in a normal bass, but routed back to the neck in a Rambler Bass).
The scale length is derived from a standard 34″ scale by placing the nut at the 3rd fret. The string spacing feels correct since it matches a standard bass, but the overall scale length is 28-1/2″. The Rambler Custom Bass is also available as a fret-less model.
So back to Tanya’s inlay. So what does “IAM” mean anyway? In Tanya’s words:
“I AM – it is the truth of all truths. And to which I tell the others – put that on your bass and slap it. It’s a testament to my existence, to existence itself; to life and the living for without it things would be less interesting. Without it, the beach sand would not be so white, the water so pure… and without it those chords and notes would not be so soul drippingly potent… I am… I am the notes, the music and I am the bass.”
So eloquently put Tanya, thank you for your beautiful passage, and the inspiration to all of us “pickers”…
