A pic of my Pub Props in action, cradling my 'twins' in a loving embrace...

A close-up of the bar stool top, just to show how wonderfully handy this use of space is at gigs... (note the all but subtle product placement...  heh)

Now, a down side to using the Pub Props as per the instruction on the web page is  that the butt of the guitar is sitting on the ground, usually right on its end-pin jack... as I'm constantly unplugging and switching guitars, this has been an issue for me not at all, but others who leave their instruments plugged in all night have remarked that the Pub Prop, for them, would be damaging to either cords, end-pin jacks or both...

I also have a bit of a problem with them in that, a lot of the time, my guitars are capo'd on the 3rd fret, which as you can see above is exactly where the Pub Prop strap crosses the neck...   Other guitar players may not have this problem because of different instrument size (more on this later) or different capoing habits...

"What ever can we do?!?!?!", cry the concerned masses!!!

While walking past my work bench on my way to the laundry room, I was hit with a FLASH of inspiration... I'm sure I woke up with the spirit of a wee Robert Llewellyn sitting on my shoulder... after I got up off the floor and dusted myself off, I headed for my various piles of bits and dog-ends that I have collected over the years, the theme song to Junkyard Wars clashing with the theme from Red Green in my head... A few moments, a few curses, and  few A-HA's! later I had the solution...

I present The Butt Prop

With  close-up of the bottom, so you can better tell what's going on here....

Now, I can hear ya from there saying, "Neat, but what is it?"  So I took this pic as well....

With a close up of the connection...

These are the bits involved in its assembly... The brace is just from an old guitar stand, common in any music shop... The clamp is from a swing arm lamp that can be found in any and all Zellers, Walmarts and any number of other general retail stores...

I'm slightly concerned about the amount of load the clamp might be able to withstand, it being plastic... and instrument size may be a factor  (get yer mind out of the gutter!)  But overall, I have to say, that for a brilliant flash from above, and a few minutes cobbling together of old junk, I'm really very happy with the results....

 

I can think of a few ways the design could be improved, especially with actual parts as opposed to the bodging that I've done... If the hole through the lamp clamp (that the brace peg goes into) was designed to be the same as the hole that the peg would go into on an actual instrument stand, the brace would be more secure and would tend to be slightly inclined, making for better contact with the bottom of the instrument as it sits in the cradle... I assume it could also be designed to be 'locking' the same way that the original "stand hole" is...

With this last pic (below) you'll see how even my issues with 3rd fret capoing have been eliminated all together

Clinton Hammond... folk musician, maille smith, mead brewer, and now... happy bodger!

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