dannyfsantos

If I planned on repainting it then swapping it out won't be much of a problem, but what I really want to do is stain it (although I assume that once I get a good look at the wood under the paint, I may abandon that idea). I probably wouldn't use chemical strippers and go the insane route of sanding it down but now I'm thinking first I'm going to work out all the electronic components before I even touch the idea of paint. It'll be cold here soon and I would rather do a paint job in the summer anyway.

Looks like the black fret wire can be abandoned-- ah well. I probably won't even touch the paint stuff till next year anyway. Here's my new problem, though (and Prostheta just reminded me): the pickguard is ALMOST a strat clone as far as I can tell but different enough that I can't just swap the strat pickguard in. The bridge is also a bit weird in shape and originally I wanted to swap it out for something else but now it looks like it would require drilling some new holes. So what I originally conceived as a straight swap turns out to be that I have to keep the pickguard and a change to the bridge requires a lot more work. In case anyone is actually curious what it looks like right now, I'm attaching some photos I took. Overall, it's in pretty good shape.

I'll be honest that now I feel kind of dumb for not thinking about it in those terms! First and foremost is definitely the sound! That's what really keeps me from playing it and my main guitar is a mid 90s Ibanez Talman which sounds beautiful to my ears. Plus I'm in the process of getting a rehearsal place so having one guitar at home and one guitar elsewhere seems to really be the endgame so thank you! I still want to eventually rebuild the guitar entirely but this gives me a plan of attack!

First time poster! I'm planning on rebuilding an old guitar in the new year. It's a late 80s/early 90s Hondo Strat clone but I really don't know the first thing about rebuilding a guitar. Here's the low down: GUITAR I never liked the sound, and it's an ugly stock red with black pickguard... but it was my first guitar so it holds sentimental value so I don't want to sell it. Last time I saw it (3 years ago-- stored in a case in my parents cellar somewhere) it was in pretty good shape. Since I don't want to sell it and I don't play it, I thought maybe I can sink a ton of time and some quality products into it to try and get something better out of it. ME I failed woodworking in high school. Last time I really touched electrical wiring was also high school and have never touched a soldering gun. I've spent the last few weeks pouring through YouTube videos and articles trying to get concepts to sink in. Basically, I'm ill prepared but the purpose of this is to learn more about guitars and know my instrument intimately. THE BUILD What I want to do is... ambitious. I tend to bite off more than I can chew (and then chew it) when I start a new project. So I want to strip the paint off, replace the pickups, knobs & pots (maybe), the bridge and install an XY midi controller into the body and permanently attach my livid guitar wing into the body (I play through Ableton Live and use a lot of looping and midi). Another crazy idea occurred to me to stain the whole thing black with ink and stain (so the grain shows up black on black)... But also do the neck and headstock black. Black screws, knobs and I don't even know if black metal fret exists or not. Or how to install them. That's not set in stone, though. Anyway, I'm planning on starting sometime next spring and don't know how to start. Should I replace the pickups first and check out the sound? I want to go with 3 strat Fralin Steel Poled 43s but should I try something cheaper first? Should I take the body apart and repaint it first? What about custom designing a pickguard to accommodate the guitar wing?