stratamania
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Vallhagen's shape looks pretty good to me.
Latest Project Velocity (sort of)
- Thread starter BrotherJack
- Start date
BrotherJack
Junior Member
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- 80
No pics for this one, just noting that yee olde pickups for this beast are ordered! As of about 20 minutes ago, I have a set of Duncan APH-1's coming, along with a custom-custom (which is an alnico 2 based pickup like the APH's, but wound way way hotter than an APH - bordering on EVH brown-sound land) that I'm going to A/B in the bridge position to see which one I like the most. I can't decide from listening to online samples, the APH is a little clearer but missing more mid-range, where the custom custom I think is probably going to be totally useless clean but has some great ballsy sounding tones with a bit of gain on it.... So I figured there's no way to know without trying them out at some length (ie: not just for 2 minutes in a music store somewhere, through my gear, with days to putz around with it and see how I like it or not). To date, my favorite pickups ever are Giovanni GVH-1's (though admittedly I've only ever played in cheap pickup land, where the GVH-1's are IMHO the undisputed king by a mile), but the more I looked at this guitar in mock-up, the more I was thinking I'd like to make this an open coil rig so as to reduce the amount of chrome distracting from the purty wood, and GVH-1's are only available in covered, which then seemed a perfect excuse to give the Duncan APH's a try, which have been on my list of "things to try before I die" for a while now, as has been the custom custom (and I did set this guitar up to be able to swap bridge pickups without so much as loosening a string....) :toothy10:
ccasion14:
Still about 2 months out for playing time, considering I'm tru oil'ing it, and that'll need a month to fully cure all by itself.
ccasion14:Still about 2 months out for playing time, considering I'm tru oil'ing it, and that'll need a month to fully cure all by itself.
BrotherJack
Junior Member
- Messages
- 80
Getting really (really) close. Technically, I could go ahead and call it "done" as she sits, as it's fully playable (and oh, how sweet this thing plays!), but it's got the neck from my semi-offset strat on it at the moment (because I'm not done with the 4x2 yet, and because the neck from the strat was just sitting there doing nothing while I had the strat apart to do surgery on a hairline crack I noticed starting in the lower horn). Oh, and this neck lacks a locking nut (though it does have nice 21:1 locking Gotoh tuners, but still, I prefer a locking nut on any guitar with a trem (even though I really never use a trem, but still)).
Specs - pretty close to 100% made-in-the-USA:
Body and Neck by Warmoth
Kahler 73xx trem
Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates bridge pickup
Seymour Duncan APH1 neck pickup
Oak 5 way super-switch (double wafer) (used a tele swtich tip, just for something different)
Switchcraft jack
Fender USA jack plate
Even the various screws and the strap buttons I used came in packages that said Made in the USA on them. The nut is Graphtech (Canada), and the tuners Gotoh (Japan), and the trem hole cover is South Korean (and I dunno where Warmoth got the cavity cover they shipped with the body, but I'll pretend it was South Korean also). So even the bits not USA made at least came from places I wouldn't be afraid to visit while wearing a US flag on my backpack.
The only control is the 5 way switch (me and knobs, just not friends), which I wired as follows:
Position 1: bridge pickup only
Position 2: bridge + neck pickup
Position 3: neck pickup only
Position 4: neck pickup with coil split
Position 5: off (ground + hot)
It's a pickup-direct-to-output-jack affair as switched, which gives the overall output a bit brighter (and more) presence and a bit more bite than you'd get wiring them up through a normal set of pots. I shielded the electronics cavity and plate with shielding foil and grounded the foil, so it's as dead silent/noiseless as any guitar with uncovered non-active pickups ever gets. 0 added noise when I remove my hands from touching the strings.
The APH1 in the neck I am really (really) happy with, so it's probably going to stay (though I still need to try a Pearly Gates in the neck before I completely settle down). The bridge I'm a little less settled on. In the running still are a Custom Custom, the APH1, and the Pearly Gates (and honestly, my Giovanni GVH-1 is by no means out of the running, it snarls with the best of em, but I'm trying to keep this axe as close to 100% USA made as possible, so the GVH's will stay in the semi-offset strat).
She plays like a freaking dream - I was pretty sure I was going to love the ergonomics and such from the get-go, but Whole E Wow, I love this way more than I thought I would. This thing feels more like an extension of my body than any other guitar I've ever played. That deep and narrow (by comparison to a strat or whatever) belly cut locks it in place like you glued the trem cover plate to my belt buckle, the balance is superb, and the forearm contour is exactly where it should be when hung waist highish like I do (unlike a strat that you have to pull half way up to your neck to get the arm contour to match your actual arm position).
To finish it, I sanded the body (polished more like) from 220 all the way down to 12,000 grit before I did any stain or finish on it. Tint is a simple dark brown (Provincial) stain over a coat of stain conditioner, with 7 layers of TruOil over the top of that for protection (though it's thin enough that I still expect it to naturally develop some 'relic' over the years). It kind of comes off looking splotchy in the pics, but when you see it in person, the light and dark parts will swap back and forth on you depending on the angle you're looking at it from giving it a wicked cool shimmering effect. This is due to end grain orientation variations on this particular piece of mahogany. I debated running another couple of coats of stain over it to even out the lights and darks, but I liked the shimmering color shifting effect more than I would like having it more evenly brown, so I just went with it.
This is my 3rd shot at doing TruOil, and I am getting (IMHO) pretty good at it. Instead of laying the oil on somewhat thick and then wiping off the excess before letting it dry (the most common technique I am aware of), I would instead keep my oil applicator (lint free cloth) only lightly saturated, and so each coat went on thin and even. Imagine it like if you had a damp cloth that has just enough moisture in it to leave the surface glistening after you wipe it down. It was like that, only with TruOil. I gave it 24 hours or so between coats, and sat it down in the basement with (but not directly close to) the wood stove in between coats, and just before the next one I'd wipe the body down with a piece of cardboard. The cardboard did a great job of cleaning up any dust flecks and otherwise keeping things smooth and glassy. I never touched it once with any sandpaper, and it came out beautifully IMHO.
Anyhoo, nuff talking, how about some pics, yes?
Specs - pretty close to 100% made-in-the-USA:
Body and Neck by Warmoth
Kahler 73xx trem
Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates bridge pickup
Seymour Duncan APH1 neck pickup
Oak 5 way super-switch (double wafer) (used a tele swtich tip, just for something different)
Switchcraft jack
Fender USA jack plate
Even the various screws and the strap buttons I used came in packages that said Made in the USA on them. The nut is Graphtech (Canada), and the tuners Gotoh (Japan), and the trem hole cover is South Korean (and I dunno where Warmoth got the cavity cover they shipped with the body, but I'll pretend it was South Korean also). So even the bits not USA made at least came from places I wouldn't be afraid to visit while wearing a US flag on my backpack.
The only control is the 5 way switch (me and knobs, just not friends), which I wired as follows:
Position 1: bridge pickup only
Position 2: bridge + neck pickup
Position 3: neck pickup only
Position 4: neck pickup with coil split
Position 5: off (ground + hot)
It's a pickup-direct-to-output-jack affair as switched, which gives the overall output a bit brighter (and more) presence and a bit more bite than you'd get wiring them up through a normal set of pots. I shielded the electronics cavity and plate with shielding foil and grounded the foil, so it's as dead silent/noiseless as any guitar with uncovered non-active pickups ever gets. 0 added noise when I remove my hands from touching the strings.
The APH1 in the neck I am really (really) happy with, so it's probably going to stay (though I still need to try a Pearly Gates in the neck before I completely settle down). The bridge I'm a little less settled on. In the running still are a Custom Custom, the APH1, and the Pearly Gates (and honestly, my Giovanni GVH-1 is by no means out of the running, it snarls with the best of em, but I'm trying to keep this axe as close to 100% USA made as possible, so the GVH's will stay in the semi-offset strat).
She plays like a freaking dream - I was pretty sure I was going to love the ergonomics and such from the get-go, but Whole E Wow, I love this way more than I thought I would. This thing feels more like an extension of my body than any other guitar I've ever played. That deep and narrow (by comparison to a strat or whatever) belly cut locks it in place like you glued the trem cover plate to my belt buckle, the balance is superb, and the forearm contour is exactly where it should be when hung waist highish like I do (unlike a strat that you have to pull half way up to your neck to get the arm contour to match your actual arm position).
To finish it, I sanded the body (polished more like) from 220 all the way down to 12,000 grit before I did any stain or finish on it. Tint is a simple dark brown (Provincial) stain over a coat of stain conditioner, with 7 layers of TruOil over the top of that for protection (though it's thin enough that I still expect it to naturally develop some 'relic' over the years). It kind of comes off looking splotchy in the pics, but when you see it in person, the light and dark parts will swap back and forth on you depending on the angle you're looking at it from giving it a wicked cool shimmering effect. This is due to end grain orientation variations on this particular piece of mahogany. I debated running another couple of coats of stain over it to even out the lights and darks, but I liked the shimmering color shifting effect more than I would like having it more evenly brown, so I just went with it.
This is my 3rd shot at doing TruOil, and I am getting (IMHO) pretty good at it. Instead of laying the oil on somewhat thick and then wiping off the excess before letting it dry (the most common technique I am aware of), I would instead keep my oil applicator (lint free cloth) only lightly saturated, and so each coat went on thin and even. Imagine it like if you had a damp cloth that has just enough moisture in it to leave the surface glistening after you wipe it down. It was like that, only with TruOil. I gave it 24 hours or so between coats, and sat it down in the basement with (but not directly close to) the wood stove in between coats, and just before the next one I'd wipe the body down with a piece of cardboard. The cardboard did a great job of cleaning up any dust flecks and otherwise keeping things smooth and glassy. I never touched it once with any sandpaper, and it came out beautifully IMHO.
Anyhoo, nuff talking, how about some pics, yes?
treyhaislip
Junior Member
- Messages
- 106
Absolutely stunning! Awesome job! :guitarplayer2:
stratamania
Mythical Status
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Good job, well done.
DangerousR6
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That's cool, kind of a Brian May vibe to it... :headbang1:
BigSteve22
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Really SWEET looking! Congratulations on your new axe.......
