Prostheta Posted August 16, 2008 Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 Another project on the cards. The idea behind this one is an essentially faithful reproduction of the Red Special, with design specifications more towards my own preferences. No materials or hardware has been purchased so far, and as usual my progress will be nice and slow as a job done well isn't one that's rushed. That and I have so little time to dedicated to projects right now! I'm provisionally dubbing this one the "Crimson Exceptional" Briefly, a comparison of the differences/similarities in spec: Red Special/Crimson Exceptional Scale: 24" / 24" Radius: 7-1/4" / 12" Neck Angle: 2° / 2° Headstock Angle: 4° / 5° Neck Style: Bolt-on / Set Thickness at 1st fret: 25mm / 20mm Thickness at 12th fret: 27mm / 24mm Pickups: Burns Tri-Sonics / SD SSL-4 Bridge: Homemade roller / Schaller roller Tuners: ? / Schaller Grover-style The electronic circuit including the phase/off slider switches will be essentially the same as per the original. The aim of this project is not to capture the sound of the original, or indeed to be that faithful to it's idiosynchracies. I would however like to maintain the characteristics of the instrument visually, in that I wouldn't use humbuckers or a different layout. The bridge is the big departure in that it's fixed as opposed to the ahead-of-it's-time trem the Mays invented back in the 60s. The instrument was mocked up in CAD first of all to check string paths, hardware positioning, etc. I prefer this route to drawing the instrument out full-scale on the basis that I can easily print exact copies of various areas for making templates and other goodness. I may (ah-ha!) lose the heel of the neck for the purposes of higher register access. The volute may (ah-ha!) also be dropped in favour of a straight transition. I will be binding using thick cream binding, although I may (ah-ha!) consider adding a thin BWB multiply in addition to this. I may (ah-ha!) go with the "faithful" radius of 7/1-4" if I can source a suitable TOM/roller style bridge with this radius. Now I have this basis to work from, the first step is to gather the wood and the hardware together to check the real-world measurements so that the drawing is true. Since this is a lower priority project to the semi-hollow 8, my wife's LP and the Explorer I will take the time to select which hardware I am going to commit to, and to discuss this project to the final specs. Build will probably start in a couple of months, again depending of existing work and time constraints. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xanthus Posted August 16, 2008 Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 I'm provisionally dubbing this one the "Crimson Exceptional" aaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha Pro, you have won the internets! In other news, I approve greatly of the changes you're making, but I'd even go so far as to make it a full tilt-back headstock. Just feels "safer" that way, as far as break angle, string tension goes. If you lose the neck heel, I'd make it a longer tenon to compensate. You can still get Tri-Sonics. Why not go with them? Or is this really just an aesthetic-based project? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
riffster Posted August 16, 2008 Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 Sounds really cool. I have always been fascinated with the look of Brian May's guitar. I was reading your specs of what it will be like at it sounds like a very comfortably playing fast guitar. Lookin forward to it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prostheta Posted August 16, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 That's exactly what i'm aiming for really. I don't get along as well with thicker necks as I do with thinner flatter profiles. The headstock wasn't designed to be scarfed, and can be built out of one piece of mahogany measuring 680mm x 27mm x 80mm which isn't too difficult to source. I'll make the tenon as long as the material I use will allow given that the pickguard hides it back to behind the bridge. I might still scarf it, purely on the basis that the headstocks angle will expose the grain differently on the front face. I guess this really depends on the mahogany I get ahold of. I might have a source of very old-growth mahogany which would suit this to the ground. As far as I understand, the actual Red Specials pickups are wound north-south-north....does this mean that this can be reproduced by fitting one of the SSL-4s in reverse, or is the coil itself wound in the other direction? The SSL4 are available reverse wound reverse polarity which I presume is what this means. </humbucker boy> Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psw Posted August 16, 2008 Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 Nice...but why not go further! The "Red" is a tribute to the whole idea of a "project guitar" and it's innovative switching options has been used to great effect in May's music. It also has a distinctive look. A lot of the sound is to do with the originals pickups though, so yours is likely to be more hot strat like...not necessarily a bad thing. Electronically, I'd be tempted to add a master volume within reach of the picking hand. You might consider an addition of a varitone control for one of the back controls to get an even wider range of tones. I'd also feel that the old slider switches to be a difficult way to quickly select tones and would consider a gibson style selector on the lower bout. My apparently now infamous "sustain-o-caster" shows this kind of control set up... Ignore the back two controls and sustainer switches. The three mini toggles in the selector slot are phase switches for each of the pickups. The selector chooses between the bridge and neck pickups. The middle control adds in the middle pickup (in or out of phase) into any of these selections to varying amounts. In practice you get a huge arrange of sounds, but it is very easy to get around...generally using the three way and the other switches to pre-program the sounds selected by the main pickup switch. You could do a similar thing using the slider controls as the "program switches" and keeping the "look" but making it more user friendly. .... Since you are also not using a tremolo, I'd consider a string through look and style or a custom tailpiece over a fake "May style trem". The guitar is an Icon and a great looker, but "improvements could be made while still retaining the look if you are not going for a replica... Something to consider...certainly a great guitar design and offers a lot of scope to experiment in various ways making it fun to play around with the various sounds. One of the things I found with phase switching on a three pickup guitar that I did not know before I tried it was that the usual "hollowed out" sound of the bridge and middle, and neck and middle is reversed when one of the pickups is out of phase resulting in a full midrange sound...almost the opposite of the "knophler" sound! have fun....too many guitar projects! pete Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prostheta Posted August 16, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 (edited) All good Pete, cheers! As per the design ethic, I'd rather keep everything "visually intact" so perhaps a different switching configuration, sure. I understand that a lot of combinations of the actual Red Special are redundant, but that's the nature of the instrument I guess. I'm not one for fiddling with controls in the middle of playing, so the managability of control isn't too much of an issue. Essentially i'm wanting to have the visual icon with the sound and playability of what is within my field. I'd probably hate the feel of the actual Red Special if I had my hands on it, and I don't really care for owning reproductions and copies that much. I do however have a lot of respect for BM in that he created an instrument which is iconic, and perhaps a little less respected by the masses for what it achieved. Which other instruments sound as unique and recognisable as the Red Special, even if you take the AC30s, Brian's fingers and the treble booster pedal out of the equation? I think this is (in my mind) a tip of the hat to Brian and his dad, with my playing field in mind. I'm on a building trip to reproduce iconic instruments at the moment for some obscure reason. Also considering building a Gibson Flying V in the style of Jim Martin's chrome/Super Distortion/Kahler'ed up V. The other instruments will be completed in priority order of course :-D Something turns me up about having a painted fingerboard, somehow :-\ Ebony, methinks. Oh, and the tailpiece....I never liked the reproductions with the hardtail so a bridge/tail setup has always been part of the end product. Ideally, a slender stoptail would be great as it is in keeping with the looks of the original compared to the chunky "Gibson style" stoptail. I think that perhaps it would be possible to combine the stoptail and string through idea in the form of a faux-stoptail. A good idea! I'm going to examine the trem unit on the Red Special a little more to see how this could be achieved. Perhaps a machined aluminium or brass tail with a ~90° curved channel for each string through the body would be a possibility. Edited August 16, 2008 by Prostheta Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zyonsdream Posted August 16, 2008 Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 Dude, Jim Martin gets zero respect for the work he did! As much as I love Mr. Patton, Jim was a killer guitar player (much more so than Trey) and I for one am all behind your flying V. I've always loved BM's tone but the guitar never did anything for my with it's looks. Still cool to see someone take up the challenge though! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prostheta Posted August 16, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 16, 2008 Big Sick Jim was the man. Not an extremely good guitarist, but underrated for his contribution for sure. Plus he hung with Cliff loads which puts him in the esteem bracket. That V was (is) a great example of a modified instrument. So much so, i'm going to invest in a chrome Kahler purely for that project. Bye bye money. Anyway - Red Special. It's not really a challenge as such given that the major obstacles are actually quite primary-school in essence. Making it "authentic" would be, however. That isn't my aim. Inasmuch as I would like to make acoustic chambers in the body, I can't justify overcomplicating the project in that respect as it's not meant to be faithful to the original design other than looks only. This is why i'm going for hot singles rather than the Trisonics. All the binding is on one 2D level. The body doesn't possess three planes like a Les Paul, or indeed a carved top, cutaways or anything outside of a 90° angle. There'll be a huge-ass rout under the pickguard, and all the electronics can be mounted onto the guard itself other than the hardware ground and jack wires. Even then I think I can make that simpler by using a three-point male/female cable connector :-D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thoughtless 7 Posted August 17, 2008 Report Share Posted August 17, 2008 I've come into this thread to say i approve of both projects. the Red Special and the Chrome V. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psw Posted August 22, 2008 Report Share Posted August 22, 2008 I was researching some wiring ideas for my over complicated and shelved strat thing and I came across this thread which may be of interest over at guitar nuts... Red Special Wiring and alternatives I had not really gotten in deep with the red special wiring...I knew it had phase switches and in my experience can produce very interesting tones...what I didn't know and probably very important to the sound, is that the guitar pickups are wired in series...unlike a strat which are wired in parallel. This can make a significant difference to the sound of the guitar (consider the difference between a humbucker wired in parallel or as normally the case, in series)...when pickups are used in combination. You may already have known this, or you might want a more strat like sound...anyway, I learned something new about the red... pete Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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