jlarremore

Thanks Pete. I didn't take it apart and the guy who did is in Germany now so I have no idea what it originally looked like. There is one similar connection from the bridge, underneath a hum its smaller but it's connected to the body. There are three of these circle connections, 2 pots and 3 toggles. When each component is placed back in what I believe to be the correct holes, the three circle connections appear to be close enough to connect to each other, but I don't see a screw or screw hole to connect them to. Is it possible they connect to the top of a pot or to the top of toggle? And now I have a free white wire. See the attached image to get a better idea.

I've got another post going on this project related to finishing, but I needed to know about the wiring of an Ibanez. I've never worked with one, but I'm not that concerned. One thing I'm not sure of re-connecting is these funny circle connectors. They look like grounds, but I'm not sure where I need to connect them to. Sorry the picture quality is so poor, but you can see these silver circles that look like the things you use to repair holes in notebook paper. There are 3 of them and they seem to connect to black ground (earth) wires. A couple connect to green and black or red and black or red and bare. What the heck to I connect these circles to? The body? The posts of the pots? The posts of the toggles? Jef

I've been assigned a project by default. Seems a kid in the church youth group promised to re-finish a guitar for the youth minister. I guided him through the process and he did pretty good. The finish is plain white and the kids in the youth group are supposed to sign the guitar with a Sharpie. From a totally unrelated project I knew that the Sharpie and Poly don't mix - the poly makes the Sharpie run. So I had some spare lacquer on hand and tried that. The Sharpie ran. Yikes! ( BTW - I'm testing this on an inconspicuous spot on the guitar, the kids have not signed it yet.) So I'm wondering what my options are for clear finishing this guitar given the two main methods I use will make the signatures run? I'm pretty sure a different type of marker will give me the same results. Any advice on what pieces of this puzzle I can change or try? Or should I put the poly on then let them sign it? As for use, the minister is going to mount it on the wall or something so it's not going to get a lot of play.

I think mellow is good word too. The body is like an Peavey Wolfgang. So we're looking at 2 pickups, preferably humbuckers. I like the body design. I like mellow, but too mellow sounds muffled and muted. Personally I like the crunch of the bridge and then switch over to the bridge and get the mellow jazz sound. I use them more as individuals than as a combination. I may have backed myself into a corner. Jef

This is all very interesting and informative. This is going to be my "go to" guitar so it needs to be rather versatile. On the clean side I want a crisp tone for both the bridge and neck. I'd like to be able to switch from a Jazz/Nashville type sound to a pretty solid and round, yet still crisp tone when I dirty it up with distortion. I'm starting to like the Eddie Van Halen "Custom Custom" pickup, but I'm not sure it's as versatile as I want. The phrase that keeps coming to mind is "general purpose" which seems to be a 59 type humbucker. I'm also considering something like a GFS Dream 180 which is cross between a P90 and a TV Jones. Any thoughts? You're not going to hurt my feelings unless you just say something mean. I'm here for the expertise. I just don't get the chance to really try these out for myself very much. Jef

So is about 8.x considered roughly the standard for hot or not hot?

I'm trying to determine pickups for a guitar I'm building for myself I thought I knew, but I think I've over thought it. I've been running across terminology for pickups and getting this as a specification DC: Neck 5.8K, bridge 10.0K ( this is just one I pulled off a pickup I found ) What do those numbers mean and how will raising or lowering them affect the sound? Jef

Ok, so I don't type well today. I meant "Dog-Eared".

When mounting a dog eared P90 pickup, do I need to route a cavity for the pickup or does it mount flush to the top of the guitar? I can't tell from any image I've seen.

Quick question, is there a difference between polyurethane and urethane? Or is it just a different word for the same thing. Thumbing through the Gretsch catalog a few days go I notice their guitars are finished with "urethane" and not poly-urethane. That's why I asked. Jef

I'm in the Dallas Fort Worth area. I found a few places but only a couple are really open.

I'm curious where you find the wood you use to make guitar bodies. In my area wood is not as plentiful as it is probably in your part of the country. I usually go to a local hardwood dealer which is really hard to find in this area. And typical woods are oaks and Hickories. Where do you order or buy hardwoods for bodies? Jef

I apologize for not updating this topic. I am finished with the guitar, but I think staining the neck ebony would really help. I had to modify the pick guard tremendously as the tail section was too narrow and the middle pickup had no spot. I'll post pics as soon as I can. Jef

Man we got off topic. But I had to put the project down for a little while. I did replace the nut at the head. It's better, but not fixed. Open string chords are still slightly out of tune. I wondered if the frets were too high. Bar chords sound much better. Any thoughts? I need to record some things and let you hear the difference. Jef

I ran into an issue with the wiring. Basically, It's tele wiring, subtract out the tone pot, and make the bridge pup a hum. Everything was going fine until I hit the neck pup. Both pups are rails. the bridge has 5 wires - white red ( soldered and taped) green bare ( soldered ) and black. So far so good according to the diagram. The neck pup is way off. I have a red white ( soldered ), green bare ( soldered ) and NO BLACK! So this threw me off. So what I did is soldered red/white to the pup selector and the green/bare to the pot as a ground. Please tell me if this is correct or I need to do something different. Jef

That's really interesting you mention American public schools. That's the second time that subject has come up in conversation. My step daughter ran into a Canadian couple in San Diego a few weeks ago and they were impressed that a public school educated young woman would be able to discuss international events with such depth. The Canadians couldn't believe public school kids were smart. Odd .. at least to me. Internationally, I know that we are behind, however, there is a LARGE group of immigrants who are in our public schools who are not performing even to the standards. They move in, refuse to learn the language and don't attempt to try. They just have no desire to learn even though they are here. Then there are the families who just don't care about education and clog the system. education is guaranteed here, but they can't make them learn. The kids and parents don't care. Our school system is still based on an agrarian calendar (September to May) and is in need of an upgrade. Problem, as always, is politics in America. You can toss all the politicians in the sea if you ask me. They really are a lot of talk. Nothing gets done because someone doesn't want to offend someone or someone is mad because they can't get this ... it's just never ending issues. My wife is a public school teacher and I see the front lines first hand. 90% of the problem is parents. My step daughter is in high school and has aspirations to graduate high enough in her class to get good scholarships and she's in an average to not so hot school. It's perfect. She can be good in an average school. As with anything there are exceptions and ends to the continuum. Its still a great country and you CAN get a good education in the US, you just have to want it.

Hey KP, I think for an option like the original project, it's a good solution. And it's good to know it can be done and be something semi-usable. I was just never sure what paints/finishes/stains will mix. Knowing Rustoleum and Poly will work together opens rattle can possibilities. Knowing not to use enamel is another plus. I wouldn't mind playing around a little bit with some of the Rustoleums and Poly's for solid colors or even stencil designs. I finished cheap Baja starter guitar recently and I loved it. It's like instant finished kit. And the guitars - although light as a feather from pine or poplar - are really pretty good. I could easily trick one up for $200 and get a really nice guitar out of it. Jef

PSW: I had an extra nut or two around the house so I removed one replacing with a new one so I'll take it to work on Monday and see if I can compare it and maybe shim the neck some. I have learned I love shimming the necks to improve the action. Do people still call it action? That is an amazing story about your daughter. She truly has talent and it looks like she is pursuing it. I'm glad she's getting a good foundation because in college she will probably fit in well. I'm jealous that she has something she really wants to do and can do well. It takes years for some people to discover a true life calling. I can do a lot, but not a lot that well. Computers and tinkerer by trade. Nothing is too tough, I just don't know that much about the millions of other things I do. The gift is just a gift. She wants the guitar I just painted red, but it working it's way up my favorites chart again. I have a standby for my church work, one I built from a kit, and a couple more that I have for grins. My most sentimental is a knock off of a les paul jr, but with a neck hum. It's a plywood, but it's sentimental. I just did the second "remodel" on it a few months ago. Screwed up the bridge. Need to fix that. I don't want my daughter to be a guitar player. I know, sounds odd, but I don't want her to have fat frog fingers. There I said it. I have a cousin that is an accomplished pianist and a child instructor and I'd like her to learn piano. So from the conversation it appears that if you can't play other instruments you get to be a drummer? LOL KPcrash: That's an interesting method to get the nut height. The new nut is much smaller. I'll snap some images of an after shot just so everyone can see. I have hopes for it. I guess I should quit a little sooner. My step-kids have absolutely NO desire to do anything musically except listen to it. They had a pretty bland music teacher in elementary school. My daughter loves to play music, but has horrid stage fright. Won't even get up on stage at church to sing witht he kid choir. At 13 I was told I MUST join the jr. high band because I needed to make friends. By that time I had already been playing guitar by ear for 3 years. Still haven't learned how to read guitar music properly. Single note Bb trumpet music ... no problem, a bunch of lines and dots for piano or guitar ... uggghhhhh. Maybe I can do some classical studying soon. I work at a university with a pretty good music department. I guess if all that fails ... I'll be a drummer.

Wow, that is a good explanation. So I can finish with poly and use like a rattle can paint?

See that's what I need to know. I would think manufacturers would go for the poly on inexpensive guitars. I see knew ones that are incredibly shiny. How are manufacturers getting such a shine with either poly or lacquer? Jef

Well, I should start giving a review of kid guitars because I'm learning a lot. On the problem child ... no pun intended. The nut at the top is REALLY high. I think I'll try to either get a new nut or shave this one down. It's a good 1/ 4 inch high. I would like to tune it and try a capo and see if that has an effect on it. Remember I bought a pink mini for my kid? Well took it out and tuned it. Great guitar. It's made by an Ebay company called 2kool4skool http://cooldiscountinstruments.com/ specifically this is the kid's 1/4 scale. Nice guitar. I'm impressed. I might give it to her for her first day of kindergarten. So after some more test on the problem child it looks like when I play bar chords it stays fairly well in tune. But any chord with open string sounds horrible. So could it be the nut is too high? Jef

I re=strung it today. It in-tonates well on the open strings. When you play a chord it's immediately off on every string. My fear is that the frets are not exactly right. Everything else is great. How so I test the fret widths? So I got around the whole thing and bought a 3/4 squire today. I can't return the other one so I'm going to stick with it and keep trying. Maybe one of you can make me a neck that has correct spacing. Jef

I like the idea of comfortably tuning. Not necessarily in tune or standard tuning, but not too loose not too tight. As far as the amount it goes out of tune, well that's hard to say. I tuned it with a tuner. Then play a chord and the chord is out. What I've noticed is that the higher 3 strings stay in tune better and are closer. Not quite a 1/4 step off. There's always some amount of dissonance. The lower strings can go up to a 1/2 to a whole step right after tuning. It's immediate and very noticeable. Tune, play a C chord and it's out of tune. Bending the upper strings does throw it maybe closer to a 1/2 step, but it's really all over even after tuning. I think the upper strings go out because of bending. It's hard to tell because it's never quite in tune. I bought my daughter a pink one. She doesn't have it yet, but I know she'll enjoy it. Jef

Good news. I knew these guys repaired them, but they had stopped repairing for a little while. Well they have started again. So if you have any SR&D products they are back in business. http://www.perfectsoundrockrefurbs.com/refurbrepairinfo.html

To answer some questions, - it did come pre-strung - it's a 30" guitar and mostly neck - I bought 8's with the thought that it could be string tension bending the neck causing it to go out of tune - Not sure about the tuners or their quality, but probably bad - I'll string it up and I usually tug on it to get rid of loose tension Any thoughts about no truss rod on a guitar this small? Jef