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Post by cynical1 on Jul 18, 2016 14:13:48 GMT -5
He Cyn1, you seen my videos and my arms, do I look like a bodybuilder? It's always the wiry ones you have to watch out for... Actually, a trick I learned years ago was to grab the shortest screwdriver in the box to attach the neck. You get less torque on the shorter screwdriver so you run less of a risk of over tightening. Well, he may be right. I'm still guessing on what his body dowel fix is, so give him the benefit of the doubt. Yeah, stubborn...where have I heard that one before... What he proposes and why he proposes it makes sense to me. I think we may use different terms, but the end result appears to be going in the right direction. I wonder where he gets that impression? Ok, the metal epoxy thing worked, but I'm certain I would have had a dissenting opinion if I saw it before you did it. His point is valid. If one fret is bad, reason dictates it won't be an orphan on the fingerboard. Leveling the fretboard and installing a new nut is SOP. I'd have told you the same thing. [OPINION] Too many people consider the aesthetics of a guitar or bass of more importance than the performance or playability. Some of the sweetest playing instruments I've seen all look like they fell off a truck on closer inspection. If you're convinced a pink "Hello Kitty" sticker next to the bridge makes the guitar play better, then by all means, put the sticker on and go. This is your personal instrument and it only has to make you happy. [/OPINION] At least you can have a dialogue with this tech. Granted, he's seen a lot over the decades and a nagging habit is to dismiss things you have seen fail, or don't have complete confidence in. I don't understand his body dowel concept completely, but I can only agree with the theory. Since he's done quite a few of these types of fixes I'm guessing they work pretty well. No one want's to do a complimentary refix as there isn't that much money in guitar repair these days anyway. Make sure you play the guitar before you take it out of the shop. The time to fine tune it to your style is before you pay for the repairs... Happy Trails Cynical One
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Post by Deleted on Jul 18, 2016 14:26:44 GMT -5
Sure Cyn1, the strings on it now are complete crap I have them for over 6 months and have done any possible patchwork on them to get them going (tying new pieces of strings to make them reach the keys, etc etc etc). But they will serve the purpose. So I will try to fine tune this before I pay (I paid half in advance anyway, the guy says none pays him these days, its hard to keep the shop ). We live less than 1 mile apart.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 28, 2016 8:58:26 GMT -5
I should have news tonight!
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Post by cynical1 on Jul 28, 2016 11:49:13 GMT -5
I've got my fingers crossed for you.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 29, 2016 3:06:26 GMT -5
I think it went well. I went in at 19:10 I went out about 21:15 we talked about everything. He told me about the nut and how this affects intonation, we talked about life in the 70s, I talked about the great 80s, about the digital era, he seems a really nice guy, he's been doing this job for 40 years. We did the final assembly together, he drilled the neck holes as I was watching, and put the screws in, I haven't yet put strings on, I'll do that tomorrow but it seems good. He told me the body is like from paper, that whenever basswood is used, harder wood plugs should be used where inserts, etc go (like the bridge). But the neck is stiff as a rock. I ended up asking more for the sake of knowledge and less for the sake of being suspicious. Tomorrow I will give you a full review. Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to take pics. Also he had some layer with black on the heel where the neck goes, don't know maybe he was trying to enhance and harden the basswood. The whole thing seemed pretty solid, the body dowels are from Mahogany. He told me the basswood has sucked in the previous ... sandpaper shim... This thing is soft, hence the mahogany dowels. (and not maple. He used a harder wood but not so much harder)
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Post by cynical1 on Jul 29, 2016 10:08:49 GMT -5
Glad it went well. If he remembers life in the 70's maybe I should be talking to him as well since most of the 70's was a blur...
Basswood isn't a terrible wood, depending on what you're after. Pretty much all of the shred guitars out of the 80's, as you know, used basswood. Ibanez pulled a page out of Leo's book by convincing everyone that a soft, easy on your tooling and readily abundant raw material was a actually a "tonewood". If I had to speculate why, (past the cheap and dirty aspect of basswood) I'd say basswood tends to absorb the high end and accentuate the mids to low mids...and since it's the low end that distorts best...and you guys in the 80's were all about distortion...it seems serendipitous that what was most likely a manufacturing decision wound up defining an entire genre of music...but I could be wrong...
Shims...don't get me started... Like everyone else, including the OEMs, I'm guilty of using partial neck pocket shims as they're cheap and dirty to make. The problem is that instead of supporting the neck heel evenly you wind up leaving an air pocket between the neck heel and the neck pocket...that place where all the string energy is supposed to be transferring... In time the heel can "ski jump", or warp, due to the force applied by the screws pulling the wood into the air gap.
My Peavey Foundation is a prime example. I used the Micro-Tilt adjustment...only for a couple of decades...and now the higher frets bottom out until you hit the end of the "ski jump". She's the one on the table now, so I'll fix that problem and make a full neck pocket shim out of maple. This time I'll take pictures...
Mahogany is a fine wood to work with. It's not as hard as maple, but it's generally more stable. Considering even on a bad batch of mahogany it's still over twice as hard as basswood I'd say you're gonna be fine.
I am curious what you notice on the guitar after the fix. Tell me if you "feel" the guitar more when it's unplugged. By that I mean do you notice more of the string vibration through the body as you play unplugged. Old habit I picked up from someone years ago, but it's true. If the guitar of bass doesn't "feel" right unplugged, you'll only accentuate those shortcomings once you do plug it in
If it means taking the neck off you can skip the pictures...that whole "enemy of good" thing... If you do need to remove the neck, remember, short screwdrivers only for attaching the neck. If you don't own a short screwdriver in the size of your neck screws then you need to go out and buy one BEFORE you touch them again...and lay off the protein shakes...
Happy Trails
Cynical One
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Post by Deleted on Jul 30, 2016 14:54:54 GMT -5
Thanx for the info Cyn1...
you won't believe this : the guy was also using a short screw driver. When he was cutting threads he told me to try and I could not turn the thing.
I have played the guitar a lot today, did some setups (with incredibly low action as you guys correctly predicted !!! - but I am thinking of letting this for higher action) and I have to say that it sings. Now it has a great difference between higher action and low action. With higher action I can get a lot of harmonics. But OTOH I also put a new set of strings, this is a big factor, the previous ones were dead for a long time. About energy transfer I don't know to be frank. Acoustically not much changed, this just feels more robust. Maybe I got some great tones with the action high in a combination (together with strings) that I hadn't tried before, who knows. The guitar sounds a lot livelier, but I am afraid the strings factor cannot be neglected. About taking the thing off, I simply do not dare. It went well over all I think. Next mission : get rid of the exoxy fret, and if I get irreversibly winter-boredom-sick, sell this and get some MIJ equivalent.
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Post by cynical1 on Jul 31, 2016 16:26:02 GMT -5
Thanx for the info Cyn1... you won't believe this : the guy was also using a short screw driver. When he was cutting threads he told me to try and I could not turn the thing. I know what to get you for Christmas this year... Feeling more robust is likely due to the strength in the neck\body joint now. The new strings will be a factor to some degree in the overall tone, but if it's more than the usual bump you get with new strings, then you can point back to the work your tech did. Yeah, action dictates quite a bit. I have a Peavey Grind 6 string bass with incredibly low action. It requires a very light touch, but man, you can fly on it...and chords...forgetaboutit... The action varies on most of my instruments, based primarily on lack of proper shimming, but I find that each one pushes me to play a different way. Certain runs or a different feel always come out of them, so I leave it. Keeps things interesting. If I get stuck playing on instrument, I can switch to another one and pick up or fall into something I might not have otherwise. I admit, I'd be torn between keeping or selling the guitar, too. As I recall, you got this Ibanez for a pretty good price. It might be worth it to take the price you paid, plus all the repairs and put it up for sale at that total. After all, the repair you just did has improved the guitar. It shouldn't be a loss on your part. If it sells, great. If it doesn't, no big loss. In the meantime, try some other 7 string guitars in the price range you want to buy. If one floats your boat then you know where the Ibanez goes. If none of them feel as good as what you've got, keep it. No matter what else happens to it, I'd bet the neck isn't going anywhere now. As far as the epoxy fret...you might be able to smooth it out with some super fine sandpaper or a very fine file. This is one of the few time I'd tell you to use a Dremel tool. With the polishing wheel and some rubbing compound you should be able to get it super smooth and shine up the metal part left like chrome. I'd get the frets leveled, but you already have enough sunk into this guitar as it is. depending on how much it bothers you, take heart, the more you play it's gonna wear off anyway. Happy trails - Cynical One
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