Jester700

I think youre right. Doug @ Blackmachine usually goes for the 28mm depth to his bodies. He says it tightens up the frequency responses for the woods he uses. I guess the answer is as thin as you want to try and make it , but be practical. Electronics may be the biggest hurdle in youre quest for thinness! ← Which is why I like the radius body - thin up top for comfort, but thick enough at the bottom to fit a push-pull pot and 4 pole rotary switch!

As a practical matter, can you get any thinner than a Sabre or Parker Fly and still have electronics? actually, it looks like blackmachine was influenced somewhat by both of those designs...

I actually got one at Radio Shack, but the tip was broken. So I did some online checking, decided I wouldn't be happy, and returned it. What people are saying is, it has lots of drawbacks: 1) Because it uses a high current arc to generate heat, it shouldn't be used with ICs or other electrically sensitive devices. 2) Because you need to have contact with both halves of the tip, it's not so good on non-flat things (like wires). Many people have trouble getting the items hot. 3) It seems that you are to use the solder as the connection point between the tip halves, which will melt the solder well - but that's poor technique. You're supposed to heat the items to be soldered and touch the solder to THAT to melt it, so it flows well and you don't get a blob or a cold joint. BTW, you can replace the tips, and you can get differnt sizes, but they're $10 each. I can say that the size is a bit unwieldy as well. I was disappointed, but I'll stick with my trusty weller for now.

Not necessarily. I got this Ibanez 540R at a chain pawnshop called COMPTANT.COM. I got it for $300CDN (around $240 US) and it even has a backstop in the trem cavity. The backstop alone can go for more on eBay than the price the whole guitar cost me. So bargains can still be found with a little luck. ←

Nothing wrong with portability, and if you choose a standalone right, you can pipe tracks over to the PC for editing & mixdown. My Fostex VF16 is a nice little recorder, but has crappy FX and mixing features. No problem - lightpipe to the PC, and mix there. Pro Tools IS an industry standard. But like some other standards, that doesn't necessarily mean it's "best". There are LOTS of good solutions, and the best one depends on what you want to do, and your workflow. Cakewalk's SONAR, and NUENDO are popular, as is Adobe Audition. I use Audition for editing; the interface rocks. I use Sony Vegas for multi, so I could avoid having to learn another program for multiple cam video editing. Having said that, if you DO want it portable to take between different studios (beyond the tracks, that is; 24 bit wavs are very portable), that's a good argument for Pro Tools.

That is, in fact, a popular strat mod. Add a switch to wire the bridge/middle combo in series. It gets you half way to a humbucker sound, and may be something you like. *I* like that sound - think King's X...

I'll second the vote for Duncans. In fact, even the imported "Duncan designed" ones are pretty good; some people say there's an audible difference between those and the USA models they copy, some people say there isn't. It's up to you whether it's worth the savings. And yeah, the '59s sound like something you'd like. The JB is an overwound pickup, if you want more output at the bridge (I have one in a guitar, and I like it)

Well, for $350 I'd look at a Blueridge. They have some impressive stuff for that kinda cash. For a bit more ($400-ish) I'd check out the lower model Breedlove Atlas.

Sounds heavy-ish... ;-)

Well, that's one possibility, though not the one I hold. I think SOME people can hear the things they claim to hear, and some have superior hearing and can hear things that others may not. I think some other people THINK they can hear things that aren't really there, and aren't aware of just how poor human auditory memory is or how much the mind can influence our hearing. Yet other people will agree they can hear things that they KNOW they can't, just to avoid looking like a tin-ear. Which of these a given person is, I have no way of telling unless I know the person well. And the test to *prove* one can really hear something (blind ABX) is a pain in the ass, and even MORE so (maybe even impossible) for something like differences in guitars. As to this specific subject, I can't hear any difference with MY guitar I've tried it with, through MY rig, with the pickup I've used. That's pretty specific, and may not apply to others' guitars, pickups, rigs, or hearing. But my logical guess is, if there IS difference, it's a very subtle one. I would suggest anyone trying it to record the guitar before & after, and change nothing in the interrim. Maybe still not a perfect test, but a better indicator than trying to remember what it sounded like minutes ago (that sounds funny, but auditory memory is very short - SECONDS for subtle differences).

Another note on trem bridges... One of the best Floyd copies is cast - the Ibanez Edge series. It gets away with this because the stressed parts like the knife edges and the intonation screw holes use hardened steel inserts.

"Lessen it's performance" means different things to different people. A C2 would lose it's humbucking ability, but GAIN output and (IMO) better tone with the bottom dummy coil disconnected. But if you're connecting red & black, you HAVE no dummy coil connection; black is the center join, and red is the start of the "good" coil. Green is the end of the bottom coil on these, so you're using this as a pure single - and my experience agrees with your sonic assessment. With cover off, can't you see a connection to the bottom coil right above where the wires go through the bobbin? Right next to where the black one connects? Also, your measurement is a little high. None of my HS2s or C2s measure much above 8k, so you have one hot C2 there.

The bottom coil adds no signal; it only loads the pickup. So in addition to sounding better, there's more output if it's wired as a single coil. Wired that way, it's a medium output single - not Texas hot, but not low output either. The bridge bucker on these is pretty hot, too. Nice score, BTW!

I have a hard time discussing tone when I can't even make up my mind what I LIKE. Too many times I've gone to bed really digging the tone I was getting that day only to wonder what I was thinking the next day. Too many people disagree with me as to what the coolest tones are, even within the most narrow music style. SO many times I've gone back to listen to well-respected albums that I adored as a teen, only to find that I thought my V-Amp sounded as good or better. So. I've come around to not going for "ultimate tone" anymore, and just getting a good tone that fits the song and doesn't piss me off. It's different for guitar junkies who play instrumental stuff where the tone is the focus, but for average people listening to primarily vocal tunes, guitar tone is secondary anyway.

Priest's sound had lots of very different versions, so it's hard to call it "this" or "that". The one I'm talking about is the "Vengeance" and (even more so) the "Defenders" albums. It was the product of lots of overdubs - very thick. There was even some (shudder) low synth going on underneath - not that you'd hear it as a synth, it just added to the weight of the sound - like some Pink Floyd stuff. I'm no purist - I just dig a thick "wall of sound", and for guitars, that's one of my favorites.

They had lots of guitar tracks. I remember a GP article where they talked about using a 32 track deck on piece of mind. Still, I don't think their sound was that great - I preferred Priest's mid 80's sound. I loved Maiden's tunes, though. Both bands did a lot of harmony solos, but lots of "tradeoff" ones, too.

I like the reverse bursts, like Ibanez's old one or Jeremy's versions.

I'm with wes. That sure doesn't LOOK like a Gotoh. If a 5 day auction with FLOYD TREMOLO in the title goes cheap like that, there's a reason. I'd say you saved $10, brother.

I used to have a Fernandes Nomad, which I sold. Now I have a Steinberger Spirit, which I like a lot better. I use a little headphone amp, but you could also get one of those 9V micro amp things. Have you considered the Steinberger? For $320, IMO it's a deal. And the headless design is THE best arrangement for a travel axe, IMO.

Just some ideas... 1) ANY new PC is going to be pretty fast. I'd go for a P4 or Athlon before a Celeron or Sempron, but even the cheaper CPUs should do OK these days. It really depends on how many effects & tracks you want to mix at once, and you may not know that until you've played with it a while. 2) Given the above, I wouldn't get a top of the line CPU. I'd get a middle of the road one or even just below. You save a few hundred $$ that you can put in the bank and use to upgrade in a few years. Because NO PC (even a $3000 one) will be worth a crap in 10 years. PLAN on upgrading every few years and you'll be happier for it. 3) 2 hard drives is great advice. A big one and a small one and both 7200RPM is my advice. 4) Memory amount has nothing to do with latency, but it helps to have more. I'd recommend at least 512 with one stick. If you get lots of hard drive swapping happening, add another so you have 1GB. I don't know what effect memory speed has on recording, but I'd bet any new system would be fast enough, whatever the arangement.

Definitely call. I'm a regular on their forum, and this question comes up occasionally - but the answer changes and isn't always right.

I think they just changed it to a straight radius - not sure what, but I think in the neighborhood of 14"-15". For about a year it was a 12"-15" compound radius.

There are lots of people who believe they can hear things they really can't. Unless one goes through the rigors of good double blind testing, you never really know, at least on the subtle stuff that nobody else is hearing. Maybe Eric is superhuman or maybe he's just unaware of how fallible the hearing mechanism is; I have no way of knowing. But I know which type I've seen a lot more of. I'm with Frank on his whole spiel; good post. As for guitars, I never understand why people are so horny for Fender or Gibson. These companies are totally different from the people who invented the stuff. Both are now owned by large corporations, and none of the old timers who designed the stuff are there. So what does loyalty have to do with it, and who says their versions are the best? And for that matter, why are musicians (who are so often trying to be *different*) going for these 50 yr old designs? IMO, Steinberger and Parker should have taken over by now.

My "dream guitar" is taking shape, basically by combining & modifying parts of other guitars. But the main idea isn't radical, I just tweak the little particulars. Do you know enough about the particulars you want to communicate them to a builder? If so, he could get it very close without you seeing it. But IMO, you should get your hands on a custom axe BEFORE it's finished, so any final body/neck shaping tweaks can be done before finishing. On the metal neck - I can't remember who did it (Ovation?), but somebody had a metal T-beam in their neck at one point. The metal (aluminum, IIRC) was totally internal, but made it strong and stable. Also unadjustable. I assume you could do this with graphite, if you could form the stuff. As mentioned, graphite rods are used in necks, and Carvin used metal rods for a year before going to graphite.