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Joined:
December 2001
Posts: 7222
Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | This post is with mixed emotions. I have a Blues client that wanted to lay down some Mando tracks yesterday to see if they would fit in this song he's working on. So I break out the Ovation and although a "tradionalist" he knows a good instrument when he sees it. The good news is that I was (and he) were VERY impressed with the tone. I turned the eq off, used the pre-amp on and went through my DI. Beautifulness.
However, before we got started I needed to put in a Battery. WHO THUNK THAT RUBE GOLDBERG UP? I unscrew the back door, which instead of the old Adamas style of just disengaging, has this foam and screw with leaves thingy that took a bit to figure out. Then.... uh how do you get to the battery? Oh, unscew the quicklock mount, try to fish it through the wires that were tie-wrapped with NO SLACK, then take the cover off the holder and replace the battery. Of course getting it back in is just as much fun because a childs hand barely fits in the access hole let alone enough hand to reach and support against the more foam, while trying to FIND the hole the quick release goes into. (note they call it a quick release, NOT a quick mount.) It should not require a screwdriver, a contortionist, and a psychic (to visualize the hole alignment), and 20 minutes of studio time, to change a battery on such a fine instrument. Oh yes, in all of this juggling, trying not to knock the instrument out of tune so the artist can spend more valuable time re-tuning.
I'm sorry, but does anyone else find the way the battery is mounted in the mando ABSURD!!!! | |
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Joined:
December 2001
Posts: 10582
Location: NJ | Miles
you are obviously an electric guy. Ovation has been using that battery setup since well....day one of the electric models. come over and let me "edjemecate" you some day.
the good news is you only need to change it once every couple of years
btw if you break a string don't buy standard mando strings.
and another thing probably there is no room for the top mount battery access.
[ October 12, 2002: Message edited by: alpep ] | |
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Joined:
December 2001
Posts: 7222
Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | Thanks Al,
I still think it's dumb. My Adamas has a quick release on the hatch, and the wires aren't wrapped, there is enough room to "move around." The later guitars I have all have the external access compartment. I think there is PLENTY of room for an external compartment, maybe on the heel or even next to the pre-amp where the rest are... but what do I know. I would think a smarter/easier way, is to mount the battery pack to the cavity cover (there is enough room without interfering with the prongs. That way, when you release the cavity cover, you get the whole mess coming out in one piece. Of course there could be an acoustics reason for the design, but I don't see it... as it's already a big abstruction no matter where it is in the cavity. | |
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Joined:
February 2002
Posts: 5750
Location: Scotland | Think yourself lucky. My band played a big local music festival during the summer. Between the soundcheck & us going on stage the battery in my Mandolin decided to drop below it's useful voltage. I always check the battery before gigs & the battery-check light was OK, but when we went onstage in front of about 15000 people it sounded like I was playing through a nasty fuzzbox. You're right about the battery being a pain to change & I knew I couldn't do it fast enough under these circumtances, so we dropped all the mando songs from the set. I don't think the body on an Ovation mandolin is big enough to take one of the external access battery holders, but it's something the factory should look at improving.
Paul | |
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Joined:
December 2001
Posts: 7222
Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | I took another look, and just mounting it to the access panel seems easy enough. I was thinking of just leaving it as is... but using a thin wire tie or electric tape to hold the battery to the cover. That way, if I ever have to change again, it's right there, and if I ever sell it, there is no modification. | |
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Joined:
January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | Miles, it was done that way because it's all so small the slide in type wouldn't fit anywhere. As to the door, it's the same type as the elites and adamii, just smaller. It is a bitch to work, I agree. I just had to change the battery in a mando and it took some doing but after a 1/2 hour and guidence and instruction from my wife and the dog I got it sorted out. Dogs really understand these kinds of things. | |
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Joined:
May 2002
Posts: 3005
Location: Las Cruces, NM | Dubyatoo
Babe, my Jack Russell lady boss dog is sleeping in my chair and my Border Collie is whining to go out. They each have an opinion about music. In a few minutes I'll put Babe to bed and then the collie will whine until I get out my acoustic guitar or mandolin and play some songs while she goes to sleep on the couch. Neither one likes amplified jam sessions, it makes them nervous, but just me playing my Viper is fine with them if I play well. If I screw up they show their displeasure that I didn't learn to play proper doggie music by having a barking session. Keeps me from getting too swell headed. My Babe, when I got her from the pound, was found chained out in the desert with no food or water and a bruised neck from the chain and an idiot who kicked and beat the little terrier, not knowing that a Jack Russell terrier can catch a rattlesnake before it can strike, so his wife had her picked up by the pound, my dog Tony had been hit by a car and died and my wife went to get me a dog at the pound and she was given this starving bundle of nerves on the promise that she was attracted to men at the pound who gave her part of their sandwich so she would be perfect for me (the alternative was the gas chamber), it took weeks before I could do any more than feed her she was so touchy and bit me until I learned to be faster than her. Well, now she is as old as I am in doggie years and she still runs everything. Moral: don't get a dog that is smarter than you are.
Bailey | |
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Joined:
January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | Beazlie is a basset hound and I don't know if she's smarter than we are or not, hard to tell with that look, ya know? But just like all women, as soon as you try to underestimate them, they get ya. She seems to like the Nationals, tricones especially but hates amps, something about being too loud??? | |
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Joined:
May 2002
Posts: 3005
Location: Las Cruces, NM | Dubyatoo
Of course Beazlie likes the Nationals and Tri Cones and I'd expect she might want to sing along, those were called hound dog guitars in the old days. The sound of the resonator guitar raised fond memories for those who knew of the sound of the hounds on a coon hunt which I have done a few times in the creek bottoms of Ohio. Bill, the friend that my brother and I played with, got one somewhere in the late 40's early 50's and we were amazed with it's sound, that may have pushed us towards bluegrass later in life as then we were totally country and it prompted me to get a lap steel so we could get that Hank Williams, Hank Snow sound. We set the National up for slide bar playing after we learned a little about steel playing. I joined the army at age 17 in '53 and Bill and my brother went on to play bluegrass all their life. Beazlie probably has dreams of chasing that coon through the pitch black brush and single handedly treeing it as the pack looks on in admiration, while you stumble, crash, curse, splash and charge through the brush way behind cause you don't have her innate abilities.
Bailey (the coon got away every time) | |
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Joined:
June 2002
Posts: 18
Location: Bham,AL | dog tunes....
My Chihuahua(Furious) loves it when I play Malaquena or something by Fernando Sor.
My Dachsund(Tootsie Roll) loves it when I play a polka or a waltz.
My Mutt(Maggie)likes traditional American Folk Music.
Me, I just like to have the audience and you oughta see them beg for more, whoops, the "good girl treats" were right behind me! Shucks, I thought I had them in my palm.
bukwheat | |
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Joined:
May 2002
Posts: 3005
Location: Las Cruces, NM | bukwheat
That explains why my Australian shepherd keeps herding me until I play "Waltzing Matilda", there is more to this than I thought.
I would have serious reservations about playing "Lili Marlene" around a massive male Weimerainer as he might destroy the guitar with his unrequited love.
Not knowing their nationality, I wouldn't play anything around a male Ste Bernard, especially if they were sampling that brandy keg they wear.
Bailey | |
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Ok, who's the brainiac?