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How to strip paint the fastest, which chemical? And are vinyl finishes frowned upon?


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3 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

Also, using vinyl wraps to finish a guitar, do they ever look good?

Gretsch Duo Jet and Silver Jet had the same plastic cover that was used on Gretsch drums.

A sharp scraper can be fast for removing thick paint. Chemicals... well, if they remove paint they're most likely not too healthy so at least proper protection and ventilation is required. Also, they can leave residues that prevent new finish from properly sticking.

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On 8/24/2022 at 3:16 AM, Bizman62 said:

Gretsch Duo Jet and Silver Jet had the same plastic cover that was used on Gretsch drums.

A sharp scraper can be fast for removing thick paint. Chemicals... well, if they remove paint they're most likely not too healthy so at least proper protection and ventilation is required. Also, they can leave residues that prevent new finish from properly sticking.

Well, I just cant see this paint coming off with a scraper.

But Im startng to find there are alternatives for pre routed floyd rose Poplar bodies. The one on GFS for example. Where else is a good place for poplar cheap bodies?

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On 8/24/2022 at 3:16 AM, Bizman62 said:

Gretsch Duo Jet and Silver Jet had the same plastic cover that was used on Gretsch drums.

A sharp scraper can be fast for removing thick paint. Chemicals... well, if they remove paint they're most likely not too healthy so at least proper protection and ventilation is required. Also, they can leave residues that prevent new finish from properly sticking.

I have found an Ibanez Iceman body from poplar with a floyd rose routing lol. $160usd. That would be the most amazing guitar ever. Only issue is it fits ibanez necks which I dont like much. Any ides?

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5 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

Well, I just cant see this paint coming off with a scraper.

In that case your scraper isn't properly sharpened or there's something wrong with your scraping technique. A bowed card scraper should remove almost any finish. If keeping it bowed is hard to your fingers, it's easy to build a handle that makes it look somewhat like a spokeshave.

3 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

Only issue is it fits ibanez necks which I dont like much. Any ides?

Find a neck you like and recarve the neck cavity accordingly. Make sure that the scale length remains the same. A simple trick is to mark the last frets on the body with a sharpie and align the new neck accordingly.

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On 8/26/2022 at 3:31 AM, Bizman62 said:

Find a neck you like and recarve the neck cavity accordingly. Make sure that the scale length remains the same. A simple trick is to mark the last frets on the body with a sharpie and align the new neck accordingly.

Actually this is something Im a bit confused about lately, when somebody builds a body, how do they know where the scale length is going to be if the neck ends up being a bit longer? ie you might end up with a 26" scale guitar. Which I guess isnt a huge issue.

I see a lot of bodies around that Id like to put the Fender made Charvel 42mm nut 12=16" compound radius, lovely rounded edges, awesome necks from the Player Series Factory. But then when I look on Stratosphere they also have the loaded pickup guard cheap too. But then they have a Ibanez body quite cheap. Im not sure if an ibanez edge pro type tremolo with line up with the charvel nut to equal exactly 25.5".....

how do people handle such issues with parts casters?

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1 hour ago, FuzzFace said:

Actually this is something Im a bit confused about lately, when somebody builds a body, how do they know where the scale length is going to be if the neck ends up being a bit longer? ie you might end up with a 26" scale guitar. Which I guess isnt a huge issue.

The normal method is to plan (and perhaps partially build) the neck and use the nominal scale length from that neck to determine where the bridge sits on the body once the neck is in position. Working in the opposite order (ie, randomly attach a bridge to a body and then marry it to an unknown neck) probably won't guarantee success.

Scale length is primarily determined by taking the nut-to-12th fret distance and doubling it. In your example a 26" scale neck means that the nut-to-12th distance is 13", and the bridge (actually the point at which the strings leave the saddle, ignoring intonation compensation) is positioned 26" away from the nut of that particular neck. The position of the bridge can not be compromised if you want the instrument to play in tune and intonate correctly. For this reason it's probably not hard to see why just bolting any old neck to any old body may not result in a working guitar, even if they happen to mechanically fit together nicely.

 

1 hour ago, FuzzFace said:

how do people handle such issues with parts casters?

You either buy all the parts from a single manufacturer who go out of their way to ensure part A works with part B (eg Warmoth, Fender, Mighty Mite etc), or buy parts from wherever you like and modify the body to match the neck yourself. If you're really lucky you might find that a body and neck from two unrelated manufacturers matches closely enough to just bolt together and work, but I wouldn't count on it. Same goes for other mission-critical things like pre-routed trem cavities, nut widths.

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Yeah thanks. I get all that.

What I meant was when people are parts casting, which is to buy used body, neck, pickups so forth, but really only wortks within the realms of similar builds ie fender squier mim neck etc.

NVM, I was off looking at some Charvel  necks and have come to the realisation its too much gamble to trust a cnc'd cheap poplar body will be done to the specifications given to someone half the wolrd away.

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4 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

ie you might end up with a 26" scale guitar. Which I guess isnt a huge issue.

It is a huge issue, bigger than you may think! @curtisa explained it pretty thoroughly but let me try to put it in simplified rally English: If you have a fretted neck it's that very thing that tells where your bridge has to be. There's quite some math that tells how wide the distance between two adjacent frets is.

Scale length and the number of frets are two totally different animals. You can put any number of frets to any scale length, the distance just diminishes the closer to the bridge you go. Using a capo actually shortens the scale length, it puts the bridge to the fret next to it and you'll have to count the frets and barre positions starting from there. Lengthening the scale is impossible, you  just can't cut the neck and add an extension piece for one or more frets past the nut.

Thus if you have a finished neck and a blank body it's easy to determine the placing for the bridge, you just measure from the nut to the 12th fret and double that.

But if you have a body with a large hole for a tremolo bridge like on a Strat you'll have to either find a neck similar enough to the original which is the easy way. Or you can fill the hole and redo it in a new place. Or you can adjust the neck pocket and/or the end of the neck to get the 12th fret in the right place.

Luckily there's not too many scale lengths in standard guitars!

 

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15 hours ago, Bizman62 said:

Luckily there's not too many scale lengths in standard guitars!

Haha too true. I guess Im worried about if I have a neck and order a body and they get the bridge placement wrong. Shipping costs to middle earth are $180usd. So not cheap.

What Im realising is, I should have one or the other in hand before ordering the other just to be certain they will work, ie i have a lovely fender made charvel neck and want a cheap but cheerful poplar body to suit, its not just a case of scale length is it? my point was, do heal ends often end up a different length? (with a laminate fret length of fretboard left to overlap on top of the body?

I think the safest thing to have first is th neck, I can always order a body based upon what I do know when I have that in hand etc.

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6 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

I should have one or the other in hand before ordering the other just to be certain they will work, ie i have a lovely fender made charvel neck and want a cheap but cheerful poplar body to suit, its not just a case of scale length is it? my point was, do heal ends often end up a different length?

Ummm... just so you know there's horror stories, especially when ordering from some unnamed vendor in China but also when gathering parts from different sources.

Then again, the most popular necks are pretty well known. A Strat heel end has a radius in it as well as round corners so if you find a Strat body that should fit. The Tele has a flat heel end. Notice that the fretboard overhang can be straight while the heel is radiused!

Although the safest bet would be to choose the most common number of frets, you may well be able to choose between 21 and 24 frets without issues but that depends on the design. Here's some interesting reading about that: https://gearaficionado.com/blog/guitar-can-you-put-a-24-fret-neck-on-a-22-fret-body/

But yes, your safest bet is to get the neck of your dreams first. The Fender type body is basically a 2x4" blank with ergonomic extensions which lets you practice building a body around your neck very inexpensively. Really! The electronics are the only things that don't fit on a 2x4 on a Fender. Knowing that may come in handy if the body of your choice doesn't quite fit.

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On 8/30/2022 at 6:16 PM, Bizman62 said:

of frets, you may well be able to choose between 21 and 24 frets without issues but that depends on the design. Here's some interesting reading about that: https://gearaficionado.com/blog/guitar-can-you-put-a-24-fret-neck-on-a-22-fret-body/

But yes, your safest bet is to get the neck of your dreams first. The Fender type body is basically a 2x4" blank with ergonomic extensions which lets y

What Im ideally trying to do is build an Ibanez S body, perhaps a JS body, with one of the many satriani necks, very similar to a stock standard PRS 22. But more radius. Something like 43mm nut, 21-23mm 1st-12th fret, 12" radius, 22 frets. That is fairly typical of the types of necks hes involved with List of neck types | Ibanez Wiki | Fandom

Im fairly sure I will be able to get a neck build with a pocket close enough that it just needs a sand. One thing Ive learnt is not to pre drill the holes, wait until you have your fit.

So, Im tossing up between the Option 1: Charvel Pro mod Jacskon 24 with the Seymour Duncan Custom Full Shred  SH-10B Bridge (the most insane pickup ever imo) &and Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pro APH-1N Neck Pickup which is versatile, it covers all the classic lead like Hendrix, Clapton, EVH etc. 

However, this is the tricky bit and I need to get into the communtity a bit more, I want to put a sunstainiac in the middle, so similar to Ibanez in that it is  an HSH config. But clearly I need to consider feedback noise etc so I will join their community first.

I would love to do a Rainbow Crackle paint job, but I have zero painting skills so probably best to do something simple. The body I have lined up is American Ash and should have lovely grain.

All a bit complex, but good project management can sovle those concerns 🙂

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So your plans are moving towards a neck-through? Finding a neck might be challenging... They say that building a neck-through is a bigger effort and after having built three I can say that in a way it's true but not too hard. One of the main issues is the weight and size. The centre block is about 1 metre long and at least 6 cm wide, the thickness depending on neck and headstock break angles about 10 cm. Not too bad if it were balsa or even pine, but it's hard maple, potentially laminated with other hardwoods. But most of the weight will be sawed off so at the neck carving stage it's just long, not heavy. Protecting the glueing surfaces for the body wings is something to take care of.

AFA rainbow crackle paint, I've never done that but for what I've read it can be much easier than you might think! See, as most of the rainbow is hidden you don't have to be too exact with the blending. The crackling is even easier, there's special paints for that! A few years ago women's magazines were full of instructions about pimping old furniture with a crackle paint. So if an average housewife can do that in her garden, your painting skills should suffice. Of course getting the very surface perfectly level requires several layers of clearcoat, sanded level in between. But it's definitely doable!

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On 9/2/2022 at 6:34 PM, Bizman62 said:

So your plans are moving towards a neck-through?

Long term that is likely the only guitars I will build, but I hear you about the weight issues, which is something Im sure I will learn as I go. Nothing sustains like a neck through haha, pure physics. Mind you a sustainiac pickup on a neck through would be dynamite with a Floyd Rose and a kill switch to top things off. hehe. My mind is drawn to the outrageous just before you get to over the top tacky, it has to be functional. I will give Crackle a couple of tries, I have a couple of ideas of how Id like to use it. I dont see why it has to cover the entire body for example. I enjoy rainbow crackle but im a bit moved on from that now, using it in a more subtle fashion.

It seems what the chemicals/paints involved in crackle are called different things in every country I go to online. Ive been trying to find a solid tutorial on here, but no  avail so far.

One other thing Im wondering, when people have rejuvenated a guitar ie a beat up old Jackson. How do you market the work done, clearly they are still a "Jackson", if you have put an SH10 and an SSL6 in the mid and neck., a rejuvenated trem, a perfect neck refinished/fretted etc, how do you go about marketing that in the for sale websites? Im not suggesting I want to make money for quite some time. I also think if I ever get good enough, any jobs that net me a profit should be custom ordered with down payment. But I will worry about that when I come to it I guess.

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2 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

I hear you about the weight issues, which is something Im sure I will learn as I go.

Just for clarity, the end result will not be too heavy. It's just the raw material, the long thick block that is a bit clumsy to handle until you get the bulk of the material off. After that it's just a bit longer than just a neck which actually can be handy when clamping to a bench.

2 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

How do you market the work done, clearly they are still a "Jackson",

"Customized Jackson" or "Custom Rebuild", maybe?  Or "Custom Refurbished"?  As you said, they're still a "Jackson" with the neck profile and other ergonomics which are features some like and others not. But everyone loves a properly fine tuned guitar with level frets, rounded fret ends, low action and smooth playing!

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I recently sold a Jackson Dinky I'd rebuilt from bits and put new electronics into; in terms of time spent I made a loss but I bought it to do up for the practice. When listing it online I made clear what I'd done , which was remove and refit the fretboard then re-level and dress the frets, then put in push-pull pots for coil split and series-parallel. It's always worth mentioning you've done the Floyd setup too...

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Good points, Professor!

Wood is wood and if it's of good quality it doesn't matter whether it's from a Jackson or a piece of furniture salvaged from the dumpster. That's just the looks. What matters is the workmanship i.e. how the neck and body are fitted, how the frets are dressed and how the hardware and electronics have been improved.

Compare that to cars: How would you describe a self customized "sleeper"? Most likely you'd tell what's under the hood instead of just showing the outside of a dull family car! "For sale: 1995 Toyota Corolla, good condition, no rust" or "Turbo charged Corolla with tightened suspension and larger brakes, 0-100kmh 4.2 sec, tops 227kmh, all new parts"

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On 9/7/2022 at 6:57 PM, Bizman62 said:

What matters is the workmanship i.e. how the neck and body are fitted, how the frets are dressed and how the hardware and electronics have been improved.

https://stratosphereparts.com/ibanez-s570ah-body-guitar-parts-s-series-bound-ash-silver-wave-black/

Here is a question for you. This is an Ibanez S570 ash body on stratsphere. A gorgeous guitar when fully complete. Now normally you would put an ibanez offset bolt pattern neck on this (flip it over to its back and you will see what i mean) as they did some heel modifications some time back in the s series. I dont like the Wizard necks as they are 15.75" radius. I prefer a 12" radius, or even Satrianis 10" radius JS neck. Now what Im wondering is, is there any way I could like a strat neck from strattosphere to this body, given the bolt pattern etc? They make a cheap fender 12" radius 25.5" scale neck, marketed as fender licensed. I notice on the Ibanez Wizard necks they actually have 5 bolt holes drilled, I presume in case somebody wants to fit to an older style square style. My biggest concern would be how do I make sure a new neck can be intonated correctly etc? Id need to put a Gotoh replacement tremolo in it, Id try without a locking nut, some people have had success with behind the nut lockers of late and also just graphite nuts and locking tuners, Guthrie Govern is trying his out like that now. 

Anyway this is my dream body, I just dont know how I could fit a neck that I like to it and be sure to be intonated correcly, its kind of chicken and egg situation....

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5 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

is there any way I could like a strat neck from strattosphere to this body, given the bolt pattern etc?

The main issue is the shape of the end of the neck. Stratocaster necks are radiused at the end whilst the Ibanez neck has a straight end similar to a Telecaster. Bolt pattern doesn't matter, holes can be plugged and redrilled.

Knowing that publicly available drawings and blueprints can be full of errors, one viable way to find out whether a neck would fit or not is to find that sort of Ibanez and compare the necks face to face. Exact measurements could also help.

[Edit] By comparing necks face to face I mean having two necks of the same scale length facing each other fret to fret and looking if the neck ends match i.e. if the separate neck is of similar shape and length under the fretboard overhang.

image.thumb.png.9241314bef727e371def3314b6610cfa.png

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13 hours ago, Bizman62 said:

acing each other fret to fret and looking if the neck ends match i.e. if the separate neck is of similar shape and length under the fretboard overhang.

Thats something I didnt even consider, I was thinking more about the shape of the neck join, but now you say it like that, I see that even the length might be different under the neck hang etc, different length neck join per se.

They do have a Wizard 3 ibanez neck they sell at stratosphere, its for an RG470, but Im pretty sure RG and S Wizard 3 necks are the same. 

This would be the ultimate partscaster for me, an Ibanez S body with a Charvel 12=16" compound neck and Charvel SD SH10 Full Shred and (I forgt which neck pup but sounds amazing split, best single coil from a bucker ive heard) pickups and wiring (amazingly cheap compared to buying the pickups seperate etc). Im pretty sure (can check with mates) the GT1996T Gotoh trem fits in the ibanez posts and route, they are also quite cheap via stratosphere. That place has some cheap authentic components. I look at real Fender bodies vs unfinished ones on Trademe and there is like $50 difference. Pickups as I mentioned, hardware etc. I get why some people dont like it, but to me it offers an assortment of quality parts.

Here is the s570 for $600. Almost makes the body for $150 seem cheap given the electronics are $70, although a real Ibanez trem isnt cheap the edge zero 2 is like their middle of the road offering.....Ibanez S570AH - Silver Wave Black | Sweetwater

The Charvel DK24 dinky, Charvel pro mod San Dimas 1 and the Ibanez S series (they all pretty good) are my favourite non custom gats. The ESP 87 series Tele with floyd rose would be up there too, especially the current rainbow crackle paint model. The problem with the San Dimas though unlike the DK24 and Ibanez is they stuck to the original neck which was a non tapered heel, which some shredders dont like. Me personally Im not quite fast enough to have it bother me haha. Im more like pentatonic scale on crack than 7 note scale soloist shred.

Edited by FuzzFace
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On 9/15/2022 at 2:21 AM, Bizman62 said:

By comparing necks face to face

The problem I face is, I dont think Stratosphere are going to do this for me which kinda sucks, but I guess they are just inventory and sales.

If the Charvel or Fender neck heel is too big, that is a good thing, if it were too small then I cant fix that, but a heel thats a bit larger might mean Im able to shape the heel down to size?

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5 hours ago, FuzzFace said:

a heel thats a bit larger might mean Im able to shape the heel down to size?

Should be doable with relative ease. It's always easier to take away than to add.

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On 9/18/2022 at 7:40 PM, Bizman62 said:

Should be doable with relative ease. It's always easier to take away than to add.

The real hard part is finding one that will work with that body.

I do start to think it be much easier to add a Floyd route to an existing budget but good value strat like the Aria's. For example the Aria Fullerton DG tribute model. Nice roasted maple neck. Alnico 5 pups. It has an upper pickguard so I could either use the charvel wiring for the Full Shred and Alnico Pro II humbucker pickups and wiring, or keep that wiring and go with the DK24 HSS pickups and wiring. They all use the EVH 500k potentiators which is a large part of how they get so much dynamic range in tone out of the pickups, Charvel that is. Its not just the SD pickups, as good as they are. I look forward to deciding which path I take and getting toward putting the wiring in etc. Who knows I might like these Alnico 5s as is. They dont list any specs on the website, I havnt dont any digging around as of yet),

All I really need would be a Floyd Rouse routing template, although I have seen folk on youtube draw up the routing directly to the guitar, which is free vs $59-80 for a route template.

Roasted maple neck and fingerboard with a Heel-less Bolt-on join, with a bottom of the FB truss rod wheel adjustment which I have found to be incredibly useful, even ifBack to the Gat, Roasted Maple neck (and separate  it is not a thumb wheel as such.

714-DG -Fullerton- Aria Guitars - Electric, Acoustic, Classical Guitars and Bass (ariaguitarsglobal.com)

The 714 Mk2 is rather pretty in Aqua Blue and sophisticated in the Pewter type grey. I like how the natural finish to the sides and pack accentuates th kane

714-MK2 -Fullerton- Aria Guitars - Electric, Acoustic, Classical Guitars and Bass (ariaguitarsglobal.com)

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