Jozer99

As said above, I would guess they aren't single coils. The fact that single coils pick up noise is not a function of the magnet material, but of the fact that electromagnetic noise is everywhere, and single coils have no way of canceling this noise. I suppose that with a very narrow pickup field the noise would be somewhat reduced, but this would seriously affect the sound (probably not in a good way, it would be ultra-thin). I believe these "noiseless" single coils are actually noiseless "single coils", or very small stacked humbuckers designed to try and minimize the fat humbucker sound. This is definitely more feasible than actually designing a noiseless single coil. To keep the single coil sound, you would probably want to use one pickup coil and a dummy coil. Since you want to try and make the impedance about the same as a standard single coil, that means that each coil will have only half the windings of a regular single coil. If you were to use regular alnico magnets, this would mean half the output. This is where the stronger SCo magnets come in, boosting the output of the smaller number of winds (output is a function of the number of winds and the magnetic field strength, among other things).

For a Telecaster I built, with a transparent black finish with "faux" (painted on) cream binding, I used the following amount of (large) spray cans: 1 can white primer 1 can cream lacquer 2 cans black lacquer 6 cans clear lacquer If you are doing a transparent finish, you only want to spray grain filler, no primer. If you are doing a solid finish, you don't HAVE to spray primer, but it will help the paint stick better (less likely to get paint flaws or chips), so I recommend it. You can use less paint than this, but in my opinion, its really not worth painting a guitar if you aren't going to do it right. I have seen some beautiful guitars ruined by a crappy 2 can, 1 day paint job. You can do a decent paint job for less than $100, which is what you pay for a single nice humbucker. The real investment is in time. If you want a nice looking guitar, but don't want to spend a long time, find a local car paint place, you can probably get the whole guitar finished professionally for a couple of hundred.

Be really careful, the thinner in many lacquers also thins sharpie, so make sure you do REALLY light mist coats.

As long as you aren't manufacturing them and selling them for profit, there isn't any legal problem. Even if you did, I somehow doubt that they bothered to copyright the design of a single image from the game. Paint away.

That is indeed true, wood can't be easily plated because it isn't conductive. How it is done is that the guitar is painted with copper conductive paint, then that paint is plated. This type of finish doesn't work well for several reasons. Wood slowly absorbs paint like a sponge for several years after it is painted. This can make the chrome paint slightly uneven. Wood also expands and contracts with weather, humidity, and age. This will complete ruin the chrome effect after less than a year. There is no chrome spray paint that is worth considering, except for the ALSA stuff mentioned above. I have actually experimented with most of these paints, so I can speak with experience. Chrome spray paints are: 1. Actually silver flake, not mirror chrome 2. About as hard and scratch resistant as that silver stuff on lottery tickets that you scratch off with your finger 3. Take about 3 months to dry 4. Can't take a clear coat over it without being completely destroyed Strangely, paints labeled as silver flake can actually be somewhat decent, even though they look just like the "chrome" spray paints. The best ways to achieve a chrome finish on a guitar are as follows: 1. Using silver mylar foil 2. Using a cheap plastic mirror as a full body pick guard Sorry to sound like a broken record, but next time, please search the forums. There are actually DOZENS of threads on chrome paint on guitars, and they answer ALL of the questions you asked, and in more detail than this.

I don't recommend pre-wired kits. I would get all new pots and a switch, and wire it yourself. You can get a (unwired) kit from stewmac, or just buy all the parts (5 way strat switch, 3 250k pots, jack). Do a star ground (all grounds go directly to the back of the volume pot, then from there to the jack ground. The fade in and out isn't because of ground loops, but the background noise is. The fade could be any number of things, but I can pretty much guarantee you its the bad wiring, weird switch, or a cheap 1/4" jack.

I actually really like the MightyMite P90s. They are about $30. Some nice bite to them, even in the neck position. For the price of a single Seymor Duncan, you can put 3 MM P90s in it!

No idea where the wiring diagram might be. I'm sure there are Danelectro fan clubs. If you can't find a diagram, you can sketch one yourself, your upgrade shouldn't change the wiring. Changing the pickups doesn't necessitate changing anything else. You don't even have to change the pots unless you want to. In fact, since the pots may be somewhat weird (what isn't in a Danelectro?), you might be better off reusing them unless they are scratchy or broken. If you do want to change the pots, the rule is as follows: the higher the value, the more treble you will get. Fenders, since they have very trebly pickups, use 250k pots, which help mute the treble just a little bit. Gibsons, with their more mid-rangy humbuckers and P90s use 500k pots, since they don't need to get rid of any treble. Some people like the sound of 1M pots (1000k), but I don't know of any manufacturers who use them as stock. Since the Danelectro uses single coils, I would bet 250k pots would be a good match. You can test the existing pots by using a voltmeter with an impedance tester, and test the outside pins (if you label them 1,2,3, test the impedance between 1 and 3). Whatever you get, make sure they are audio taper, not linear taper. You can get regular pots, as well as push-pull pots at stewmac.com For shielding, there are several options: You can buy conductive paint, which is hard to work with, toxic, and expensive. Or you can do metal foil, which is my favorite method. You can buy expensive metal foils, but I use "Extra Strength" tin foil (available at most supermarkets). Its cheap, and it works great. Get some spray can glue, spray one side of the tin foil, and line the insides of the wiring compartments with the pieces. You can use many small pieces, as long as they overlap. Also line the plastic cover for the wiring compartments. Run a wire from the ground on the pots to the tin foil. This sounds like a cool project! They are both great ways to start learning about guitar wiring.

P90 can be wired the same as any other 2 wire pickup. You can wire it like a 2 wire humbucker (as above) or use a Fender diagram. Keep in mind that P90s will hum, unlike a humbucker. They usually don't come with reverse wound versions, so don't wire two together expecting the hum to go away like with Fender pickups.

Except a guitar doesn't provide you with power like an XBox controller does, so you will have to make room for a 9v in your guitar, which can be a deal breaker for some people.

eBay has custom P90 covers occasionally. I bought a chrome P90 cover from eBay and it fit great. I never see chrome P90 (soapbar) style covers anywhere else.

Sounds like the motherbucker from Mighty Might (or whoever is making them these days. EDIT: No, I was wrong. The motherbucker is something else. But I know that there have been some three-bobbin HBs made, usually mounted in one single mounting ring like you described. The Motherbucker is actually a dual humbucker, or 4 coil pickup. In fact, some of the early models were actually just two of those standard single-coil slot mini-buckers in a special pickup ring.

I will give it a look, and see if the heaters are live. The tube in there didn't seem to heat up at all. First, I think I may try switching the tubes, to see if the problem lies inside one of the tubes. I will take your expert opinion that the amp is self-biased, and/or Class A. I was fooled by the potentiometer on the amp, which I mistook to be a biasing pot. Looking at the diagram, it appears the only thing it could be is a "hum control" pot. What exactly does that fancy hum control circuit do?

The Airline guitars are, and I say this with the utmost affection, pieces of crap. Thats the reason Jack White plays one, not one of his guitars (except the Gretsch) could have cost him more than $30. The airline is made out of fiberglass, not wood, with cheap single coil pickups under the humbucker covers. That being said, its the combination of terrible parts that give Jack White his signature sound (mostly on the older White Stripes Albums). You would think these guitars would be very cheap, but they aren't. They USED to be, before the White Stripes hit it big and they became collectors items. Since they were such cheap guitars, there are very few of them still around (people keep vintage Gibsons, not guitars they bought at Sears for $59.99). Those that are still around go for $600-$2000, depending on condition and how closely they resemble the red Deluxe 2 pickup that Jack White plays. You can definitely find them on eBay, maybe if you are super lucky you could find a thrift shop owner who lives in a cave. Recently, a company has started making reproductions, that are probably much superior to the originals. I don't know if they retain the fiberglass bodies or have switched to wood, but they definitely have nicer pickups (real humbuckers), and much better tuners.

The amp came today! I plugged it in to see if it works, and was disappointed when I didn't hear any speaker hiss. I thought it was broken, even though the tubes glowed. Then I plugged my MP3 player into it and VOILA! The cleanest tube amp I have ever heard! This thing sounds amazing! It smells like burning dust when I turn it on though... I have quite a few guitar pots sitting around, plus there is a guitar (and guitar parts) store much closer to me than the nearest electronics depot where I could get any other kind of pots. Most of the pots I have are CTS, so I imagine they are pretty good. I'm looking forward to beginning modifications soon (after I listen to a few Radiohead albums through it... ). Quick update: After listening to a Radiohead album, I noticed all the tubes were glowing quite nicely except for one of the power tubes, which was dark. I assume that means I need to replace the power tubes (2x EL84's). The amp still sounds fine, even with the dead tube. Out of curiosity, does this mean that the amp is working in Class A mode? I have heard I may need to "bias" the new tubes. Given that the tools at my disposal are a digital multimeter and some speakers, how do I go about biasing the tubes correctly?