1928 National Tricone Resonator Tenor Guitar

Amazing, right? At 1928 this is fairly early-on for the company. I love these old Tricone tenor (and plectrum, for that matter) Nationals. The pear-shaped body, the kick-butt deco coverplate, the restrained styling, the crazy fret access, the lingering sustain -- it's all really, really good stuff. I think of these as having a sort-of cross between a tenor guitar and bouzouki sound to my ears because the three-cone setup gives almost a chorus-like vibe to each note. You can really hear that sound "kick in" on those 2-finger, modal chord shapes played mid-neck.

This instrument had some previous work done on it, but after a glorified setup here, it's now playing spot-on and is ready to go for the long haul. As-is the action was a bit high and it was quiet-sounding and thin with a rattle here and there.

I'm a little obsessive in how I "treat" cone seating and bridge compensation and there are some photos in this post to document that -- after I get everything "just so" I lock it all down with thin strips of aluminum-foil tape. This means that if you forget to restring by doing just one string at a time, the setup won't drift because it's all tidied-up and set in place. It also means that the three-cone setup has less of a chance to rattle around which can be a common issue with the design.

Everything is original to this instrument and it's in fantastic shape, with a nicely-polished body and hardware all in good order. Someone added side dots at some point but put the 10th fret side dot on the 9th fret instead. I smell a guitar-centric side-dot installer! Yesss that can be moved if needed.

Repairs included: a fret level/dress, cone re-seating, saddle repair/bridge seating, adjustments, and setup.

Body: nickel-plated

Cone type: tricone (3x, all original)

Bridge: aluminum T-shape, woo saddle

Fretboard: ebony

Neck wood: mahogany

Action height at 12th fret: 1/16" overall (fast)
String gauges: 32w, 22w, 13, 9 for CGDA tuning (can be setup for whatever)

Neck shape: medium C

Board radius: flat

Neck relief: straight

Fret style: medium-smaller

Scale length: 22 7/8"

Nut width: 1 1/8"

Body width: 14"

Body depth: 3"

Weight: 5 lbs 6 oz

Condition notes: it's completely original and in good order throughout. There's a little minor usewear in the neck's finish (finish weather-check and small scratches) and very minor tarnish here and there on the body. There are also some small dings here and there at the body's edges but not many of them.

It comes with: a non-original chip case meant for storage and reinforcement in shipping, but not really for use.