SE 7 String

[AZGiant]

This is probably going to be the next addition to the family. Curious if anyone has played one, what they thought, etc? For the price (used market) they seem to be a great deal yet I have not been able to play one locally.

 

[TroyBaer]

At one point I had two of the old 25" scale SE Cu24-7s, and I still have one of them. (It turns out that I really don't need more than one 7-string...) They play and sound great. The one criticism I have is that they don't handle tuning significantly lower than B-standard all that well because of the comparatively short scale -- the one I still have is in drop-A with an 0.064" as the 7th string, and it took more tweaking than I expected to make that play well. I have to assume that the current 26.5" scale SVN models are better behaved in that regard.

 

[garrett]

I agree with Troy. I have the older version, too. Drop A doesn't work as well as I'd like, but it is great in B standard. So if you are looking for tight sounding down tuned stuff, the SVN would be the way to go.

I do enjoy my SE-7. It feels relatively familiar, given the scale and body shape. I upgraded pickups and electronics, so it is a super versatile and fun instrument.

 

[shinksma]

I have both a 25" scale SE-24-7 and the 26.5" scale SE SVN.

The 25" SE 24-7 can handle tunings in Drop A if you put a heavier string on there. I think I swapped the stock strings (9-54?) for 10-62, but might have been 10-64 (by using 7 strings out of a set of 8). I bought both, and put on one. Just can't remember which...

The stock strings (9-54, I think) on the SVN handle Drop A just fine, though I am tempted to put on a set of 10-62 or similar.