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haha that picture.  no, i don't do that, thank god.  actually i don't use the legs anymore, they wouldn't extend far enough.  i had to buy this super heavy duty 4-legged stand (it's awesome), so the keys would be high enough that i wouldn't have to hunch over to play.  the problem with having one set of legs longer than the other is that i have another keyboard on top of the rhodes (i have a replacement mark ii flat top) and it'd probably fall off if i tilted it one way or another.  i might try doing that a little bit though.  hopefully i can get a sweet picture out of it, too.

Snowtires: Can I ask why you got the rubber pad even though Speakeasy's tops allegedly already have a slightly textured finish to keep keyboards from slipping? Is that textured finish not quite as effective as one might think? Or something else?

Also: Is the Speakeasy top black? The pic at their site makes it look slightly gray.

Thanks.

the finish really doesn't help all that much.  of course, the bottom of my organ is like poster board so it is really slippery to begin with, but the extra finish honestly doesn't help it stay in place any more than the rounded top's regular finish.  BUT, i've played gigs with just the rhodes and a small synth with rubber pads on the bottom, and the synth was fine without the rubber pad.  i guess it depends what you're putting on top.  if it has a rubber bottom or rubber pads, you're fine.  if not, get something rubber to put in between the two keyboards.

 the top i have is black, i think maybe they just have a bad picture of it on their website.

i have the mark ii style flat top from speakeasy, with a non-slip rubber pad (i got it at target, it's for putting underneath a rug, i just cut it to the right size) on top of the rhodes, and the organ on top of that.  i've never had a problem.  knock on wood.

i know someone posted a topic about having two sustain pedals, but has there ever been a mod made to extend the reach of the sustain pedal?  i play my rhodes standing up (while singing) and i have a hell of a time getting my foot underneath of the keyboard to get to the sustain pedal.  if there was something that extended it another 12 inches, that would be awesome, especially if it could then be angled towards either side.  i know it's in the middle of the keyboard to be more like a traditional piano, but sometimes i wish the sustain pedal was further to the right/left, so i didn't have to stand at a slight angle when playing.

i've read in a bunch of places that silicone spray on pedestal felts speeds up sluggish action, but i just read in the manual that silicone spray REMOVES pedestal felts.  am i reading that wrong?  is 'spray the felts' an inside joke rhodes repair techs play on people?

If your crying about your bandaided Rhodes... s**t or get off the pot.   :!:  :wink:  :wink:  :!:

now now, let's not revert to internet forum tough guy mode.  i wouldn't have posted anything if i hadn't been treated like i had two heads when i said i was looking for a cheap repair shop.  the people who responded to me might as well have said, 'if you pay to repair a rhodes, you're stupid.'  so seeing people say, 'you can only repair so much, techs are the way to go,' made me a little frustrated.

this forum is ridiculous.

not two months ago, i asked almost the exact same question ('is there any way to get a rhodes repaired without it costing an arm and a leg') and everyone who replied told me to fix it myself.  after thinking about what my rhodes needed, fixing it myself seemed like a reasonably cheap and relatively painless thing to do.

but now, a couple weeks later, you aren't supposed to fix it yourself because the rhodes manual can only do so much; you're supposed to pay the thousand dollars and have a tech repair your keyboard for you.

make up your minds, which is it?

Hmm.. I think that the value is really in how well your Rhodes is. I personally think the tech work is more valuable than the Rhodes itself usually. There have been many instances where cheapo Rhodes patches would've done a better job at behaving like a Rhodes than a REAL Rhodes itself! The mistake was paying 650 for a Rhodes in need of service. $250 seems to be the price for the average "used and abused" rhodes.

my rhodes is in perfect condition except for needing the action tuned up a little bit.  even so, the best estimate they gave me was $400-$1000.  

good luck finding someone who's going to sell you a rhodes for $250, unless it's missing half of its keys.  

keep in mind that some of us aren't made out of money and we can't just toss $1000 bucks to some tech to do something that, if we put forth a little effort, we could do ourselves for about 1/10th of the price.

i've never heard a rhodes patch sound like a rhodes.  ever.  even the nord electro doesn't have it right.  maybe they got it sounding good on a computer, but i'm not bringing a computer with me to play gigs; i've tried that before, for drum machine parts and sequencing, and computers just aren't reliable.

i'm in the same boat as you: i need my rhodes to be serviced and the thought of taking it apart myself gives me nightmares.  BUT, the cost of repair by a licensed rhodes repair place is almost always more than people have paid for the rhodes itself.  

i emailed speakeasy (in pennsylvania) about repairs, and their estimate was '$400-$1000.'  f that.  i paid $650 for my rhodes, i'm not about to pay almost double that for repairs.  

the fenderrhodes.org site has a link to the repair manual.  if you want to not spend an arm and a leg, i'd say go there.  i think you can pretty much repair and replace everything important by yourself for under $100 if you know where to look.

i know this has been asked a million times on here

my rhodes feels like the keys are covered in molasses.  they take an exceptional amount of force to play (i'd say about twice the amount of force needed to play a piano) and it often results in not that loud of a sound.  

is this something the silicone spray can help?  what else could be the cause?  might i need to get new felts and, if so, which felts would cause a problem like this?

(i am going to replace the grommets and finishing washers just because of the link someone sent me, to a site that has them for like five dollars total)

they say it's supposed to increase sustain.  it just sounds a little shady to me, especially for almost $200

is this a worth while thing to have done or is this like the 'engine shampoo' jiffy lube tries to sell you with an oil change (i.e. 100% not needed)?

so does that preamp from speakeasy suck or what?  it's got a wall wart, so that turned me off immediately, but the price was right.  i've been using a dod overdrive pedal (cost $30 new) with the drive down as a gain booster and i totally can't afford a pod and can't even find that tc preamp.

are there any decent, cheap ($150 or less), non-discontinued preamps out there?

It's GOTTA' be a mechanical issue. How deep did you dig to tighten all of the screws. I would take the whole chassis out and check all of the internal components. For all I know, you did this already, but a physical buzzing is mechanical. If you turn the bass down on the amp, I'll bet the buzz is either reduced or disappears completely.

yeah it's definitely mechanical, i'm sure there are a few screws loose inside of the chassis.  i've tightened every screw i can find, with no luck.

it's not played in the same room, no.  it makes that noise at our practice space and at gigs.  i love the amp, but i've had enough with fender.  this happened to my last fender amp and i really don't want to have to take the chassis apart to tighten every screw every time one of them comes loose.  i'm just going to get a preamp from speakeasy and run it direct to our pa.

it depends on the inner-workings of the pedal.  i had a blues deville and i couldn't find another pedal that worked with it.  the only pedal that worked was the pedal that came with the deville.  you can order pedals from fender's website, they cost about 40-50 bucks.  also, make sure you're using a stereo cable, instrument cables won't work.

as far as i can tell, the cones are fine.  no castors, just feet

ahhh, see that's the thing.  tubes are brand new, re-biased, with shock rings.  i've also tightened every screw i can find on the f'in thing.  at this point, i'm about ready to say screw it and get a bass amp.

sorry, i tried to make that clear in my original post, i guess i didn't so such a good job.  it's not a hum from bad power or bad cables or a bad connection or any of that, it's a buzz from the amp's components vibrating, very loudly.  the buzz doesn't come out of the speakers, the amp chassis is what's making the noise.  i really don't think it's the amp's fault, because i've had two amps do the same thing after i've had them about 3 months.  

what i'd like to know is if/how people use fender amps with their rhodes and still compete with guitars, drums, bass, vocals, etc.  at this point, i'm thinking about getting a mixer, a power amp and a bass cab and plugging the rhodes into that.

the only problem i have is that i don't have a backup and my band doesn't leave me with enough downtime to be able to tear this thing apart and throw it back together.  regardless of what i do to it, i'm going to have to wait until we have a weekend without a gig and then just hope that i don't mess anything up.  

the reason i want to give it a tuneup is because the action has been anything but ideal since i bought it (i didn't know better and thought 'maybe this is how a rhodes is supposed to play' until i actually played one that was in good shape) and now some of the keys are starting to sound dead.  i am guessing that the hammer tips are bad because they didn't look so hot the last time i checked, and the grommets are probably deteriorating because there's very little sustain time on certain keys.  

what's this about flattening dampers?

i dunno, in my experience, fender amps and guitar amps in general can only handle a rhodes if you're playing with the volume down at like 1 or 2.  i've had two fender amps now (blues deville 212 and the almighty twin reverb) and, while they both sounded great at first, eventually the bass frequencies of the rhodes took their toll on the amp.  

i play with vocals, 2 guitars, bass, drums, drum machine and synths and, at the level i need my rhodes to be, fender amps don't cut it.  the wood vibrates (LOUDLY), the tubes rattle, the rhodes is distorted.  i tried playing through a bass rig and, lo and behold, no matter how loud it goes, the rhodes still sounds perfectly clear.  get a bass rig and a graphic eq and you're set.

i've never really repaired anything of that magnitude before, how big are the chances of messing it up permanently?



actually, i just went to speakeasy's website and, to replace the grommets, felt, hammers and dampers, it would cost almost $400 which isn't exactly saving me any money, if their base estimate is $400.  do dampers typically need replacing?  a full set costs like $220.  how do you tell if a damper needs to be replaced?  also, what about replating the tonebars?  worth it?

i've gotten a quote from speakeasy, for them to do a 'tune-up' on my rhodes would cost between $400-$1000.  considering i paid $650 for it, i'm not really willing to shell out more than that for repair.  it works fine, but it could definitely use a tune up.  i'm sure speakeasy's repairs would be amazing but i just can't afford them without getting another credit card.  

is there another place in the east coast that does repairs for a bit more down-to-earth price?

i have a rhodes mark 1, through a silverface twin reverb.  while what comes out of the speakers sounds amazing, the noise the actual amp makes sounds awful.  it's like the rhodes is hitting the resonating frequency of the wood and making it vibrate.  is this a normal problem?  this same thing happened with my last amp (fender blues deville), too.  both of them were fine for like a month and then the buzzing started and it slowly started getting louder and louder until i can't take it anymore.  

the buzzing doesn't come through the speakers, it's like, i dunno, it's like if you put a pager or cell phone on vibrate and then put it on your kitchen table, it's a looooud buzz.  i've tried turning the bass down on both the rhodes and the amp; even turning them both all the way off and it still does it.  please!  i'm dying here, somebody give me some advice.