1930 National Style 1 Tricone Hawaiian Squareneck Resonator Guitar

My friend Rob just picked-up this Style 1 squareneck from a seller down in MA who had purchased it initially from the original owner's family. Said original owner even had a terrific band:

It was definitely played-in considering the plating wear to the right-arm, forearm position on the top. Still, it's ridiculously clean for its age and has never been altered. It has the original (failing) gaskets inside when we opened-up the coverplate. I don't think anyone had ever had that coverplate off, either, as it still had a giant old "toneball" inside.

Rob had strung it with 56w-13 for open D tuning but we changed that loadout to 20 plain and 14 plain on the top strings. Inside, we cleaned it all out, removed the failing gasket material, and made sure cone seating was accurate and tacked them down with a little tape to make sure they wouldn't move around with hard handling. After that, all it needed was finessing of the slots at the nut and saddle and one replacement tuner button (I always have random old ones on hand to swap-in).

Post-setup, it's loud, proud, and gorgeous-sounding. Tricones always have the best sustain of any resonator but true-blue, antique Nationals are the only ones that really sound this good to my ears. They've just got that little bit "extra" and are sing-songy in the mids in the very best way.

Yes, I'm jealous of Rob!

It's got a 25" scale and the body size is roughly similar to the roundneck guitars -- 00-size but thinner-depth.

For fun, here are some interior shots during cleaning: