Logical Frank

Those G&L Bridges are awesome. They have them on the Tribute ASATs too (what I have). It is a nice big sturdy piece of metal and that guitar sustains and sounds better unplugged than any solid body I own.

I have a dirt cheap top-loader on my first project body and it sounds good too but comparing it to the ASAT bridge really makes you appreciate the ASAT. Now that I know that the body I built actually functions (first build, remember), I am probably going to drop the cash for that nice Shaller bridge up there. If nothing else, it will let me experiment and figure out what string spacing I prefer.

Huh? You just drill holes the right size, and press-fit the bushings.

Ahhh... Great.

As far as why I want to change it to this particular model, the reason is over the years sweat from my hands have actually begun to to weaken the wood around the current posts and it has started taking a serious toll on its tone. (I know oftentimes one of the posts will have a little wiggle to it to fit the bridge but this is definitely well beyond that--and both posts.) I figured I would either have to dowel it and redrill or just go w/ these w/ the wider posts, which seemed simpler. I also didn't realize that there weren't more manufacturers making them than Gotoh and some no-names. I might just have to order some mahogany dowels in light of that...

Well--I was definitely hoping the tailpiece was grounded since that makes life that much easier since I don't intent to replace that.

This is the kind of TOM I'm talking about:

The only reason I mentioned the wood filler was it's mentioned in the link above for installing this type of bridge. It seems to me like wood glue or something would be better.

It is surprisingly easy to get a guitar w/ that kind of a range. Honestly, if you have a good clean sound, the amps (and whatever pedals) you might can do the heavy lifting as far as distorted sounds. You really can't go wrong w/ a pair of humbuckers. Get something a little bit hotter for the bridge and then something lower output and vintage sounding in the neck. Go w/ a Les Paul style 2 vol/2 tone setup and there you go: a world of sounds in one instrument. If you really want to go nuts, add some coil taps or some series/parallel switches and then you will have more than you know what to do w/.

OK. So this is the best guide I've found and it's not really clear to me. What I want to do is replace a Nashville style TOM w/ one of the ones w/ the large posts that that you can adjust w/ a screwdriver. Do I just need to remove the old threaded posts, drill out the holes, glop a bit of wood filler in there and then shove the bushings in?

Also, where is the bridge ground on a Gibson SG (faded special if that matters), to one of the bridge posts or two one of the bushings for the stop bar?

Thanks!

I made the routs in mine about equal to the depth of the pickup itself. This means that once you have the little pads in there, you can't quite get them at the same level as the guitar top w/ the screws tightened all the way. For what it's worth, I am happy w/ the range of motion I got and was able to find a nice sweet spot for both of the pickups.

Couldn't you just use a smaller router bit?

I guess you could. It would be tough though. I just bought a blank off eBay and noticed that very frequently routed bodies actually cost less than blanks.

If you have an eBay account, go through the initial steps of putting it up for auction and at the point where you set the starting bid, it will alloy you to search past auctions for free and then cancel out before you actually put it up for sale. (I think you can also pay to be able to do this w/o the hassle.) You might be able to find something in a similar condition and see what it sold for. Right now that G-word on the headstock is getting pretty expensive even for the less desirable years so I have a feeling you'll do pretty well. Good luck!

It's the simplest thing in the world. Just connect the one lead on the switch to the middle lead on the volume pot and the other to the ground. That will bypass all the electronics in the guitar when it's depressed.

250K will actually give you a darker sound, that is why they tend to be used w/ single coils which are generally brighter than humbuckers (which use 500K). When in doubt, I say you can't go wrong w/ 500K though honestly I've used the "wrong" value a couple times and never really found it problematical tone-wise.

On my last build I put the p90 in the neck so the top of the pickup is about a centimeter from the neck (approximately where a tele neck pickup is). It sounds fantastic there but I suppose I don't have much of a basis of comparison. Be wary of putting the bridge pickup too close to the bridge. When in doubt, move it further away. If it's too close to the bridge, the low strings will sound tinny and awful.

Of course it can always be shimmed if it is too deep.

And if it's too shallow, you can cut off part of the foam pads. I can't remember how deep exactly I made mine but I put them so that if the foam pad was completely squished down, the top of the pickup was just a little above the top of the pickguard. From there, I can get it to about the same height as the fingerboard or a little less, which is plenty of adjustment on my tele-style.

Guitar Fetish just picks up overrun and discontinued stuff it seems. They are kind of the Big Lots of guitar parts. I bet that those necks were made for OLP guitars, which means they are pretty good.

I like the Fender-style head myself but it changes the whole feel of the guitar to something more tele-like, which maybe is what you guys don't like.

Actually, reading through the copyright office's website I get this under examples of copyrightable material: "Weaving designs, lace designs, tapestries" I don't really see how that is much different than a distinctive paint job so maybe you can copyright it after all. Still--I kind of think it's by nature a trademark like Eddie's stripes or Zachckkkchk's bullseye. But that might be not legal.

Quick, fetch me a lawyer! We'll straighten this out....

(And you're from Australia. Man, my head really wasn't in this discussion.)

not to be the d@#k the spoils all the fun but wouldn't sharks tooth inlays fall into this category?

Those would be a trademark, if anything.

Anyway, it would not be a copyright issue w/ this guitar when push comes to shove--however it might seem from that Wikipedia article. (I love the Wikipedia but it is not the best place to quote from in this instance, especially since you can quote directly from the U.S. Copyright Office's website w/ about the same amount of effort.)

I guess you could potentially say the pattern is a copyrightable feature on a useful article. (The rules are different for useful articles. You definitely aren't going to be able to copyright the whole guitar for all intents and purposes.) But then you would be trying to copyright camouflage and painting things to look like metal plating, which makes about as much sense as copyrighting plaid. The only issue here is that exact design being copied, which if you could argue was distinctive enough would qualify as a trademark, something like Burberry plaid to stick w/ that theme.

It is a fine line, I understand, and I kind of whish you could copyright it. As much as I believe a well-made guitar w/ a fantastic paint job is a work of art, legally it is simply does not get the same kind of consideration as a painting or a sculpture.

Edit: And while it is not much of a legal issue, it is still fully lame to have ripped off the design so thoroughly.

That is a funky looking thing. The shape kind of reminds me of one of those Gibson Blues Hawks as much as anything. The only thing that I don't really like about it is all the space around the neck pickup.

http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Hardware,_part...rap_System.html

These are nice and I have 'em on a couple of my guitars but they won't fit over a lot of strap buttons (though I find that when you have the big strap buttons you don't need 'em.) Personally, my weapon of choice has just become buying nice, thick leather straps and I never have any trouble w/o strap locks.

Dremel will never work. You need some horsepower. You'll understand once you get to work. I just built my first body w/ that pictured Hitachi and have no complaints but it's basically the only router I've used so that should mean very little to you. For what it's worth, I was able to get away w/o buying more expensive template following bearing router bits on account of the template following kit it comes w/ it.

It seems like you could cut off one fret's worth of a 25.5 inch scale length fingerboard and end up w/ something very close to a 24" scale length--like w/in an eigth of an inch, I think. You would, of course, have to place the bridge appropriately.

And what fret would you cut off Frank? I based this off of a 25" scale to 24"If you were to cut at say the first fret and this becomes the nut face, the difference from the New nut face to the new first fret will be approx 1.324 or 1.325 inches.? A 24in scale from nut to first fret is 1.347 inches. This means you are off by .020 + inches just at the first fret. Now compound this across the board and you will see that it will be highly improbable to intonate.

With a 25.5 inch scale there is 1.351 inches so there is still a diffenece that may cause a real problem as this extrapolates but maybe worth a try. Since it is only between .010 to .005 difference at the 12th fret. Who knows??

Just an FYI

MIke

I see what you're saying. I wasn't saying that you should cut off that much and just arbitrarily make the scale length 24" but that the scale length of such a fingerboard would be about 24", which is a bit different. I might be thinking about it wrong but it would be functionally equivalent to putting a capo across the first fret. I will measure it when I get home to see if it still makes sense after that...

Yeah. You need to keep the distance between the nut and the bridge consistent w/ the scale length..

It seems like you could cut off one fret's worth of a 25.5 inch scale length fingerboard and end up w/ something very close to a 24" scale length--like w/in an eigth of an inch, I think. You would, of course, have to place the bridge appropriately.

Those clearance pickups on Guitar Fetish aren't sold as GFS pickups. I have been happy w/ both sets I've gotten from them. Both went into my Gibson SG to suit various mood and I liked either set better than the stock pickups for various reasons.

I'd go alder. Probably the nicest looking, has good tone and, if I had to guess, I'd imagine that's what Fender used.

I like that Stretsbar tremelo. It looks like a nifty contraption of an old timey sort.