Upgrades & Modifications: How have you "personalized" your guitars?

[twonabomber]

musta been Bob Sperzel. columnist in the local paper did an article back in March, says Bob's 85.

http://www.cleveland.com/morris/index.ssf/2009/03/see_the_opportunities_and_fine.html

[Coyote]

Pre-build, minor things mainly...

Pickup/electronics/tuner swapping, accidental dents and scratches...

And of course, stuffing tissue-paper under the trem springs, just so they won't ring or squeal when I'm playing loud.

[jhale667]

Pre-build, minor things mainly...

Pickup/electronics/tuner swapping, accidental dents and scratches...

And of course, stuffing tissue-paper under the trem springs, just so they won't ring or squeal when I'm playing loud.

You tricked your last one out almost as hard as one of mine...made me proud.

[Coyote]

I'll admit to taking some cues from ya, J.

[jhale667]

I'll admit to taking some cues from ya, J.

I'm honored!

[GAR]

musta been Bob Sperzel. columnist in the local paper did an article back in March, says Bob's 85.

http://www.cleveland.com/morris/inde..._and_fine.html

THATS him! I love that guy - he's the best. You're WAY lucky, if you haven't stopped by and met him you better do it. I wish I could spend more time with him.. he's the kinda guy like Les Paul they say has the effect of "transformative effect" on people. You got to go meet him Twona.

[jhale667]

Here's another question: Anyone raise or lower the screws on the screw-coil of a humbucking pickup to emphasize/de-emphasize specific strings, like say, boost the bass strings a bit?

First time I tried it as a kid did it to match the stagger on a single-coil I liked, with less than stellar results...ended up putting it back to normal...

[Diamondjimi]

THATS him! I love that guy - he's the best. You're WAY lucky, if you haven't stopped by and met him you better do it. I wish I could spend more time with him..

[Diamondjimi]

Here's another question: Anyone raise or lower the screws on the screw-coil of a humbucking pickup to emphasize/de-emphasize specific strings, like say, boost the bass strings a bit?

First time I tried it as a kid did it to match the stagger on a single-coil I liked, with less than stellar results...ended up putting it back to normal...

Tried it eons ago, same thing. Put them back to the original height...

[Coyote]

Here's another question: Anyone raise or lower the screws on the screw-coil of a humbucking pickup to emphasize/de-emphasize specific strings, like say, boost the bass strings a bit?

First time I tried it as a kid did it to match the stagger on a single-coil I liked, with less than stellar results...ended up putting it back to normal...

Yep, did that on a Gibson 500T the first time. I took my time and got a decently balanced sound out of it...
Did the same thing on the Duncan Custom in my build, and I'm satisfied.

Albeit, I'm constantly messing around with the pickup height, in order to get a balanced volume between the bridge and neck p'up...

[VanHalenFan5150]

I've always tooled around with pickup height, but either way I still feel the end result sounds the same

[jhale667]

Yep, did that on a Gibson 500T the first time. I took my time and got a decently balanced sound out of it...
Did the same thing on the Duncan Custom in my build, and I'm satisfied.

Albeit, I'm constantly messing around with the pickup height, in order to get a balanced volume between the bridge and neck p'up...

Yeah, IMO I find tweaking the overall pickup height to be far more effective...at some point you find the elusive "sweet spot".

[chefcraig]

Probably the goofiest thing I've ever done aside from sometime in 1981 or so rewiring my Strat's pick ups or replacing one with a Dimarzio Super Distortion one (a total disaster. The pick up had this annoying Tom Scholtz fake-Rockman sound that made you feel like you were living inside of an early Motley Crue album or parked under a bridge trying to listen to a baseball game on an AM radio. I yanked it, put back the original and threw the piece of crap in a drawer somewhere...) was to JB Weld a gear shift knob on the end of my tremolo bar and unscrewed it until it was barely in, then dousing the nut with 3 In 1 oil so I could do dive bombs. This worked OK until I over enthusiastically yanked on the thing so hard that it snapped off at the base.

This led to an unexpected modification. Not wanting to shell out for a new bridge, I unscrewed the bolts holding the neck to the body, removed the neck then cut a little rectangle out of an old inner tube. I placed this between the neck and the body, then tightened the screws not quite all the way. Now, the entire neck could be used as a tremolo system. The thing is, I got bored with this after a while, and wound up tightening the screws and just worked harder on my finger vibrato. Of course, this was a long way to go simply to improve my over all playing, but we are all young once and therefor all need to learn shit the hard way.

[jhale667]

Dude you may have made the original "guitar buddy whammy neck"! Dokken owes you money ....lol

[indeedido]

On just about any guitar I buy, first thing I do is gut the electronics. Quality pickups (SD/Dimarzio), quality pots and braided wire where needed, quality pickup switch ( a lot of junk out there) and always change out the tuners for Schallers. For me, I find the Schallers keep a better tuning than Grover. The reason I learned to solder was so that I could change out the pickups any time I wanted to try as many as I could. I recently changed out the bridge and tailpiece on my Les Paul for the Tone Pros locking set. I had some left over Ebay bucks from some purchases so they were essentially free. I have to say, it did increase the tone in that it has more bottom end and resonance plus sustain. I was skeptical, but very pleasantly surprised. Also, like Jay I am a proponent of the big block for the floyd rose. Put one in my Frankenstrat and noticed the difference. I also like the feel of a raw neck so I have no problem sanding the back down and applying some Tung Oil to it. I like the feel of it and have never had one warp on me. I also have a Tremol No for my strat, but I haven't put it on yet. Looking forward to it though. You can lock it so it doesn't float or make it so you can pull up only or down only. Remains to be seen if it adds sustain in the locked position.