Lake Placid Blue Competition Mustang (Now with sounds!)

[fdesalvo]

Holy arthritis!

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Holy arthritis!

You said it, man!

 

[Verne Bunsen]

So when last I visited the neck pocket with sand paper, I was cleaning up the floor to fix the neck angle issue. If you look back at the picture of that on page 2, you can see theres some clear and some blue accumulated on the walls of the pocket as well. I cleaned that all up and ended up with a really nice, snug fit. Very happy with the neck pocket situation.

The 1-1/2" neck mounting screws were just what the doctor ordered as well. Very happy with the neck mounting screw situation.

Today, I drilled the last hole. In the headstock. For the string tree. I was terrified that as soon as the drill bit touched the surface, the whole guitar would explode. Possibly the entire world. But it didn't.  :toothy11:

Not the glam shot she deserves (that will be forthcoming), but I'd like to introduce you all to rebneF: The Bunsen Burner  :toothy12:

Couple of setup issues to address, but we have a fully functional Death Star.

 

[fdesalvo]

Wow that's just outstanding!

 

[rgand]

Looks great! I like this one a lot. Very nice work.

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Thanks fellas! In fact, "Thanks!" to everyone who's been following along with this one. Doing this thread and getting all the feedback has been a really cool part of this build.

 

[Surf n Music]

Very nice! Killed it bruddah!

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Thanks!

I figure if a picture is worth a thousand words, the pic count in this thread is worth at least a half dozen sound clips. The pics are good and all, but what does it SOUND like?!

Signal chain is Mustang -> Boss DS-1 (Of course!) -> Fender SuperSonic22 clean. Pickup selection as described. Recording rig is Shure SM57 -> Apogee ONE -> iPad -> MultiTrack DAW. Tracks are raw save for trimming and fading performed on iMac in Audacity. Enjoy! A laurel, and hearty handshake for anyone who knows all the tunes :toothy12:

*I initially tried this with the embedded Soundcloud player, but it seems to be inoperative. These are links to my Dropbox and hopefully it works without any complications. It'll ask you to log in and blahh blah blah but you don't have to. Let me know if you have difficulties...

Neck Pickup
https://www.dropbox.com/s/j6s4j6zemt9pt1f/Mustang%20-%20Neck.mp3?dl=0

Neck + Bridge (Bridge Split) (Pickups In-Phase)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/lnc35wft0qdewxm/Mustang%20-%20Neck%20%2B%20Bridge%20%28Split%29%20%28In-Phase%29.mp3?dl=0

Neck + Bridge (Bridge Split) (Pickups Out-Of-Phase)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qxmemjdpf7lgne8/Mustang%20-%20Neck%20%2B%20Bridge%20%28Split%29%20%28Out-Of-Phase%29.mp3?dl=0

Neck + Bridge (Bridge Parallel) (Pickups Out-Of-Phase)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/14jfhitq2ybavcr/Mustang%20-%20Neck%20%2B%20Bridge%20%28Parallel%29%20%28Out-Of-Phase%29.mp3?dl=0

Neck + Bridge (Bridge Series) (Pickups In-Phase)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/o731abzxbevvgdn/Mustang%20-%20Neck%20%2B%20Bridge%20%28Series%29%20%28In-Phase%29.mp3?dl=0

Bridge Pickup (Series)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/eh8wj8t6lm3k8qj/Mustang%20-%20Bridge.mp3?dl=0

 

[Verne Bunsen]

After a couple of days of fiddling with the trem setup, I can officially say: OK, I get it now. Locking tuners, Black TUSQ slick'm nut with good slots, roller bridge, and the guitar still wouldn't maintain tuning stability with any kind of trem use. Pitch down: the guitar stays flat. Pitch up: the guitar stays sharp. The mechanism simply wasn't finding zero. Adjusting the spring tension requires removing the strings, tailpiece, bridge, bridge posts and finally the plate. There are three different options for hooking the spring to the post, each offering different leverage for the spring.  The leverage of the strings is in turn adjusted with the height of the stop tailpiece. I found decent stability with the springs on the outer notch (max leverage) and the stop tailpiece set very low (min leverage), but in that configuration the tension on the springs was very slight and they would vibrate and howl wildly every time a "G" was played. Any "G". So we're back to the locked trem and the regular Tune-O-Matic and things are much better now.

 

[fdesalvo]

Man, what a bummer.  Maybe someone can offer some specific setup tips for this particular bridge.  She sounds great regardless!

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Thanks for the feedack on the audio! I'm quite happy with how she sounds and how versatile she is, it's exactly what I had in my brain.

It kind of is a bummer about that trem, I really liked how it felt, really great action. Like a Bigsby, but with "more". I've had success dialing in guitars with Bigsbys and Strat trems and Jazzmaster trems, I thought the same concepts would work here. It's a different beast though. I'm sending the roller bridge and the spring assemblies for the trem along with the guitar, so it's an adventure that the guitars owner can embark at a later time on should he choose to do so. For now it will arrive as a tuning-stable hardtail. It was originally to be a hardtail anyway, so it was basically just a step back to where we initially intended to go.

 

[Verne Bunsen]

The Glam Shots, as promised. Courtesy of my wife, who has a knack for guitar pictures  :toothy10:

 

[rgand]

That's really beautiful, Verne. Outstanding photos of an outstanding guitar.

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Thank you! I sent her off to her new home yesterday. A little bittersweet, I must confess...

 

[fdesalvo]

LOVE the headstock shots.