My Guitar Project, Installment #3-"The Finished Product"

Well, folks, it's time to wrap up my mini series on my guitar project. The guitar is finally finished, and I'm very happy with the result. For those of you it will interest, here are all the gory details...

Here's a picture of the finished guitar. For the few it will interest, it plays very nice. It has a nice neck, maybe just a little on the heavy side. It's a nice C-shape, about the size of a typical Strat neck. The frets are fairly small and more vintage-style than the taller and wider modern ones.

The bridge unfortunately has the hole for the tremolo arm broken out, but that's ok, since I don't use a tremolo anyway. It has all five springs on it so it will NOT move.

Here's all the interesting details about the electronics. The pickups are all Seymour Duncans, a JB Model humbucker in the bridge, a Vintage Rails in the middle, and a '59 Model humbucker in the neck. Both of the humbuckers have 4-conductor wiring, so they can be tapped for a single-coil sound. This set works and sounds great in this guitar!

The controls are as follows- It is set up with two volume knobs, a master tone, a three-way Les Paul style pickup switch, and three mini-toggle switches. The top volume control (next to the bridge pickup), the pickup switch, and the two outer mini-toggles control the two humbuckers. The volume is self-explanatory. The pickup switch selects between the two humbuckers. The two outer mini-toggles tap the respective humbuckers to get a variety of Tele-ish (?) sounds as well as the darker, Les Paul style tones. The tone control works on all three pickups. The bottom volume (next to the end of the guitar) and the middle mini-toggle control the middle pickup. The switch turns it on and off. If you turn the first volume down, you can get just the middle pickup. So, I can get literally any combination of the three pickups, a whopping total of 15 different settings! This system is very versatile, to say the least. It does very good Strat and Les Paul imitations, as well as a few other unique tones.

At the other end of the guitar are the Sperzel locking tuners. In my opinion, they are some of the finest tuners available. They are very well built, and you don't have to worry about wrapping the strings around the posts. Just stick the string through the hole on the post, tighten the knob on the back, and tune.

Here's the matching strap and the Dunlop straplocks. I really like Dunlop's design on these. you put the ends on the strap, and to put it on the guitar, you simply push the button in the middle and put the pin in the hole in the part mounted on the guitar. Taking it off is just as simple. You also don't have to worry about the strap coming loose and you dropping the guitar if you play standing up.

And finally, my homemade back covers. I cut them out of a blank piece of pickguard material with a hacksaw and the sanded the edges smooth. They're not perfect, especially the tremolo cavity cover, but they work.

Well, folks, there's my project. It was quite an adventure, but I had fun, and it probably kept me out of trouble for a little while, at least while I was putting it together. :-) What do you think? Have I completely bored you yet? I'll try to post something a little more interesting to people who aren't guitar nuts in the future. Untill then....

MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE!!!!!!!!