Practice First
This may be the closest thing to an action sequence that has ever appeared in this comic.
I’m slowly getting geared up for another guitar DIY project. I bought my very first electric guitar when I was 17 years old for $65 : an off-brand H-S-S superstrat-style guitar with a licensed Floyd Rose tremolo. It has been out of commission for a few years now, and I think it is about time to get it playing again – and hot rod it at the same time. I’m going to re-fret the neck with jumbo fretwire, re-route the neck pickup position to take a humbucker (so I can use my beloved H-S-H configuration), plane the neck joint down for better access to the higher frets, sand the neck a touch thinner (and refinish it), and refinish the body in surf green or something similar. I’ll probably make a lot of mistakes and there is a good chance that the guitar will be totally ruined in the process, but I expect I’ll learn a thing or two in the process.
Expect pictures in the coming weeks.
Have a nice week.
Oh that Brett! She’s so impetuous! 😀
On the other hand, her jump onto the stage looked pretty realistic, and I think you could probably handle even more action than that. 🙂
Um, what’s wrong with the guitar right now?
Technically it is playable (or it would be if it had pickups and wasn’t in pieces), but it isn’t very good. My hope is that these mods will make it nicer to play or at least teach me a thing or two about modding guitars. Either way it will be fun, which is a win in my book.
Is there a community of guitar modding enthusiasts out there, or are you on your own?
There’s a large community of luthiers (guitar builders) who know everything there is to know about building and modifying guitars over at projectguitar.com. I’ve also got a book I bought before I even played guitar that does a good job explaining most of the techniques.