Okay, Here is the finished guitar. I'm still going to add a decal to the headstock. I'm making it myself and I haven't finished it yet so I don't know what it's going to be yet.
My thoughts:
I wanted to see if GFS products were any good based on the price. I opted to go for one of their kits rather than put together all the parts myself, because it was priced a bit better (I figured because they put it in a package and ship it out all at once).
I think I did myself a disservice here, because based on what I've seen on youtube and some other places. What I bought was not a GFS kit. It's just a kit they bought from somebody (probably in China) and re-sold. The biggest telltale giveaway I have for this observation is that even their cheap bodies have the bridges drilled or routed before shipping. My kit did not.
The quality of the parts was not good. Upon first opening the box I felt impressed by what I saw because I expected absolute crap, and got something useable. My first impressions, however, have soured over time.
Neck:
1. My rosewood fingerboard, while nice and dark. Is DRY DRY and cracked in a couple of places. This is nothing I can't fix with some lemon oil and a bit of super glue, but it's nto good. The frets are okay. There's nothing glaringly wrong with them, the ends did need a bit of dressing, but I expected to do that. The dry rosewood probably compounded this issue, as I'm sure it has shrunk since whenever the neck was made.
2. Tuner holes were not aligned.
3. Truss rod adjustment didn't have a little PVC collar or anything (like an old squire neck I have), Doesn't seem to affect function, but it doesn't look good and gets messy.
4. Inlays are fake MOP, no surprise there, but they are not level with the fingerboard. One even popped out on me when I pulled the masking tape off. They aren't very noticable, and I can't tell when I'm playing except for one of them.
Body:
1. Neck Pocket was nothing special. Very rough cuts and was not a snug fit at all. the open wood grain was pitted, and it looked like they routed with a dull bit all around.
2. Most of the edges were filled in with wood filler, which made staining difficult, since it would take the colour so differently. It's good that I planned on a textured finish, if I had wanted to do a sprayed nitro or something, it never would have worked without tons of grain filler applied properly.
3. LIGHT. The body was so light it was uncanny. (it still is) Itt is Pawlonia, which I think is supposed to be some type of poplar. Big porous grains, takes dye VERY well. and is a very light colour. I'm not super interested in a really light guitar, especially when it makes the guitar neck heavy, but I'ts interesting to have, and I wouldn't complain about it after three 90 minute sets at the bar. I'll bet the entire guitar weighs less than 5 pounds.
4. Routing was not correct. Now that I know GFS doesn't actually make these, I can give them a LITTLE bit of slack for thinking they would fit their pickups. In this case, it didn't. I didn't want to wreck the body by accidentally blowing something out with a router bit, so I took a dremel to the bridge pickup. Shaved about 1/8" total from both sides of the base so it would fit in the cavity.
Pickguard:
Didn't use it. Neck pocket was too narrow, Didn't line up with the bridge properly. Big fail here. Good thing it was a Tele, since the only thing it really did was mount the neck pup. Instead I took 2 little rectangle pieces of breakout foam from a pelican case, jammed them in under the neck pickup, and mounted it directly on the wood. It works. I have no complaints.
Electronics:
If it were a really serious build, I would toss out all of it and get some quality American, European, or Japanese made parts. They were fine though. so I used them.
Hardware:
1. Bridge. It's functional. It only has 3 mounting holes at the back, so the front lifts off the body just slightly. Annoys me. doesn't affect performance. The saddles tend to tilt side to side and cause buzzing problems if your strings are too light and don't have enough tension. The set of strings the sent with were terrible, and didn't hold the saddles still. I put some Ernie Ball Power Slinky's on, and the problem has gone away.
2. Machine heads. Lubricated with gravel. Manage to hold steady, for now.
I finished the neck with a Tung Oil based Varnish, Not knowing what varnish was I thought it would work like regular tung oil. But I did not end up needing 30 coats as I had originally planned, 2 was perfect. Of course I screwed it up by adding a 3rd coat. I've got it sanded out now and super smooth, but that was my fault. I actually quite like the varnish, It almost feels like bare wood.
Body was finished using Saman furniture dyes. Dyed it straight black with no dilution. Sanded back with 320, then stained with a (roughly) 2:1 mixtures of Emerald to Lime, and added in a few mL of water, I did not dilute much. Clear coat was a Varathane rattle can. Some sort of high gloss, quick drying Urethane. 5 coats. applied 45 minutes apart when it was still tacky, let cure overnight. Worked beautifully, I will report in a couple months with how well it held up.
You can build a hafl decent guitar with these kits if you're moderately skilled with a few simple builds under your belt (like me). It was the first time I finished a guitar, however, and while my results are not perfect, it gave me the confidence I needed to contemplate finishing my own Warmoth. That's worth the money right there, for me. The real star of the whole build, was the pickups. I did not use the OEM pickups that came with the kit. I ordered a Tele pair of GFS after market pickups they called the "Lil Puncher XL" in the "hot lead" winding. They are 4 conductor humbuckers, but I wired them up straight without any switching magic. GFS goes to great lengths to tell you how noiseless their pups are. They aren't lying. These things are really quiet when you arent playing them. But they punch. The pair cost me $50. Best value I have ever gotten in a pickup. Not as sexy as SD or Dimarzio, and the fit and finish isn't up to that level, but these things are worth more than they charge for them.
Now that I realize I didn't really ACTUALLY build a GFS gutiar. It means I'll have to try again with one of their SG bodies or something that is NOT in a kit. I doubt the hardware on my new tele is even their hardware. So for that I'm sorry, this was supposed to be enlightening. What I really built was a cheap chinese kit guitar, with damn good GFS pickups.
Ironeddie ordered a V kit from them right after mine arrived. He is working on it now and plans to have his own thread on here detailing it. It had better parts than my kit did, especially with the fingerboard, fretwork, and body. But it did cost a whole $40 more.
I look forward to seeing and playing his creation when he is done. Too bad it's also not really GFS stuff. But his pickups are, so we'll have to hear from him.
This guitar is not what I would call a dream to play or anything. It is enjoyable for me to play because I made it. It's a perfect punk rock guitar, because it's light. easy to throw around, has nice high output pups, and has no bells and whistles. I love the colour I concocted for it, but that is entirely my fault and GFS gets no credit for that. Would I build another?
No. I am however still interested in building something with ACTUAL GFS parts, because the youtube unboxing videos I've seen are a few orders of magnitude better than what I received. One thing is for sure though, it is no Warmoth.
I'm glad I did it. I'll try once more maybe around Christmas, with the better stuff. Maybe I'll get a bit more adventurous with the finish. Maybe Ironeddie and I can record a jam session with these 2 guitars when his is done, for you guys. That would be pretty sweet.
Cheers.