Whats on your work bench?

[mozz]

Swapped pots on my Firefly. Full sized pots into a semi are fun, get rid of those mini pots and learn new curse words.

[redman]

Swapped pots on my Firefly. Full sized pots into a semi are fun, get rid of those mini pots and learn new curse words.

@mozz I have a complete extra vocabulary I received while working on/changing the electronics in semi hollow and acoustics over the years. I can now rival the father on The Christmas Story. "NUTTAFINGA"

[ILuvTeles]

I installed new AlNiCo 2 pickups, new switch, pots, etc. in my IVY jazz box. It went well this time

[mkgearhead]

I just fixed this Bosch router that I picked up for free on Facebook Marketplace. The control unit was bad and it needed a good cleaning inside. Now I can keep my old one permanently attached to the router table.

[mighty_duck]

I installed new AlNiCo 2 pickups, new switch, pots, etc. in my IVY jazz box. It went well this time

IVYpups.jpg

The pups look great on that.
The colors look wildly different than the picture they have up on Amazon:

[ILuvTeles]

The pups look great on that.
The colors look wildly different than the picture they have up on Amazon:
image.png

I bought this guitar in July 2019. Stole it for $130!

[RayStankewitz]

My Agile AL3010SE is on the bench, getting proper mounts for the GFS mini-humbuckers that I put in it some years back to replace the P90's. I bought the kits from StewMac to do it Gibby-style, rather than GFS style which involves foam and heaven help you to make them sit straight. The neck mounting bar needs some reliefs cut in the bar to clear the pole screws but other than that, it seems like the Gibby style to me. I contemplated cutting the pole screws down but then the thought of me, with a moto-tool, near a pickup with a cutting disk seemed like a wrong thing to do. Back in the day, when I was steady as a rock, that could happen. Now that I'm almost Medicare age, I'm not as steady as I used to be. I'll have to put some pics up for y'all.

[RayStankewitz]

Okay, an interesting complication - the neck pickup route is not deep enough! Uh huh! Well, tomorrow, when I have had some rest, gonna take the Dremel-monster to the poor axe and deepen the route some 3/16" or 4.76mm for you metric types. I have to say, this has been an interesting ride, so far. Nothing like trying to route a body with all the electronics in it.

Will report back on the carnage. Wish me luck.

[UrenragK]

Okay, an interesting complication - the neck pickup route is not deep enough! Uh huh! Well, tomorrow, when I have had some rest, gonna take the Dremel-monster to the poor axe and deepen the route some 3/16" or 4.76mm for you metric types. I have to say, this has been an interesting ride, so far. Nothing like trying to route a body with all the electronics in it.

Will report back on the carnage. Wish me luck.

Can you use a bearing router bit to clean it out and follow the contour?

Hog out the depth close with a forstner bit.

[mighty_duck]

Installed Grover tuners on 3 guitars. They are now at least 40% better.
Just ordered 4 more reclaimed Grover sets from Rondo. Great deal at less than $25 shipped each.

[Partscaster]

On new SX Callisto, I rewired stock 3way switch, replaced pots, wire, caps, and pickups. I used CTS 500k, braided vintage wire, NOS Russian K40N-2a .015uf & .022uf 400v PIO Caps. I use these caps alot.


Put in WCR Crossroads neck and WCR Godwood Bridge, AKA the WCR "American Steele" set.
Used Haze Guitar pole piece adjustment guidance. Worked very well. I'll be combing through all my humbucker guitars with this adjustment advice in mind.

here are some pics of pickup cavities. The wood looks same as other Callisto "mahogany" bodies. 1/2 maple cap looks same too. This guitar is a bit heavier at 8lbs, 15 oz. Still a fairly light LP guitar IMO.
Neck is of same mahogany wood. Long tenon didnt reach all way to fill its rout so I poured in some hard epoxy into open slot.

this page rotates photos 90degrees, they show up normal when clicked on to expand view

glamour shot, .

and I did flip bridge to place pole-pieces further from bridge and it did seem to cut some highs which I like.
So final look with flip is odd, but I do this wherever it seems to work to cut bridge brightness somewhat.

[RayStankewitz]

Okay, an interesting complication - the neck pickup route is not deep enough! Uh huh! Well, tomorrow, when I have had some rest, gonna take the Dremel-monster to the poor axe and deepen the route some 3/16" or 4.76mm for you metric types. I have to say, this has been an interesting ride, so far. Nothing like trying to route a body with all the electronics in it.

Will report back on the carnage. Wish me luck.

Can you use a bearing router bit to clean it out and follow the contour?

Hog out the depth close with a forstner bit.

I ended up using part of the small router body for a Dremel and carefully free-handed a channel for the mounting bar to fit down into. The way a Mini-humbucker mounts is kind of wonky but it works. The pickup, pickup ring, spacer posts for pickup height above the ring and the two height adjustment screws are soldered into a unit. A bar, threaded for the adjustment screws is fastened into the bottom of the rout with two screws. I needed the neck pickup to go that full bar distance further into the body, since the ring goes down to the bar but does not go past it. StewMac has a video on this but they cheat and use a Gibby Les Paul.

Actually, it looks nice to see the pickups sitting straight in the routs and now that I can set the pickup height to 1/8" under the strings, it sounds amazing. Also, no more rattling. Imagine that.

[ILuvTeles]

Another round of pickup upgrades. I installed a set of humbuckers from @Buddha Pickups into my IVY/IYV IP-350. Loving the look & sound!

[Partscaster]

Am modding my Taurus-2 Ash body.
Put CV 60's strat neck on it. Don Mare Zep tele pups.
Bought new PG for it, and new bridge plate with flat sidewalls and 3 brass wilk-compensated saddles, new 19:1 tuners, all yet to arrrive.

Pickguard

w/strat neck

one piece ash (it was a b-stock)

body

[Partscaster]

Modding Taurus-2 , pics now with new PG that just arrived. Pretty lush design, IMO.
Has strat neck w/ new vintage style tuners.
Really waiting for new Wilkinson ash tray bridgew/compensated 3 brass saddles, to get-r-done.
Will be a few days more. Then final picks.

[voodoorat]

it's no longer on my workbench because i finally finished it but i pulled the high sensitivity filter'tron pickups out of a gretsch g5230t (not stock, someone else had stuck them in that guitar) to swap them with the blacktop filter'trons in my g5420t. i had swapped the pickups in my firefly 338 but i half-assed that and spliced the wires, so this was busting my cherry with actually working with the electronics on a hollow/semi-hollow.

ironically the source of most of my problems was my own ignorance: i didn't realize the hs filter'trons would have to be mounted in a completely different way and that i'd need new brackets, new mounts, would have to modify the existing bottom-of-pickup-panel itself, etc. i realized it pretty quickly once i got in there and tried to build my own brackets but i pushed a little too hard and split the pickup ring so i had to order a replacement. i actually didn't have too much trouble getting the pickup wired using fishing line originally but i pulled it out and had to redo it and the 2nd time used some tubing which was *much* easier. in the end i'm pretty happy, especially since a guy traded me that supro dual-tone straight up for it even after i pulled out the better pickups (i told him i was doing it and he was still game). i like the hs ones considerably better than the blacktop ones although i can no longer compare them back-to-back since the jet is gone.

i wound up using a metal mounting bracket from philadelphia luthers. also used some tin snips to chop off the "wings" on the bottom of the neck pickup so it would fit. happy with how everything turned out and was actually surprised by how not-that-bad the pot wiring was, but man i really should have done some research in advance on the pickup mounting.

[Partscaster]

Swapped out bridge on this SX Taurus-2 Swamp Ash Body, had a 6 independent saddle bridge, now Wilkinson compensated brass toploader. Intonated perfectly. I am surprised as I dont do Tele's much. Waited for 2 weeks as new bridge shipped from Cali, to Florida where it hung out for 4 days, finally up to NH.

Had to plug and drill many holes as new bridge mounts right where old ferules where. So little dowels and plugs per each 6 string-thru hole. went fast

Tilted the new/used strat neck back with 2 metal washers to accommodate bridge set up.

Did full setup. Adjusted Don Mare "Zep-o-Tone" pups. It plays great. Sounds better. I've never been thrilled with playing a Tele until tonight. This one now sounds killer. Not super bright, clean to very growly and big sounding. This tele has a 4-way switch with 4th position being series for a thicker dual-pup sound.

Total weight, just shy of 6lbs, 9 oz.

[ILuvTeles]

@Partscaster - All that & it looks killer too! Congrats!

[Partscaster]

@Partscaster - All that & it looks killer too! Congrats!

Thanks, ILuvTeles.
Now, I know what you mean.

[tobijohn]

I installed new AlNiCo 2 pickups, new switch, pots, etc. in my IVY jazz box. It went well this time

IVYpups.jpg

So what did you do differently?

[ILuvTeles]

I installed new AlNiCo 2 pickups, new switch, pots, etc. in my IVY jazz box. It went well this time

IVYpups.jpg

So what did you do differently?

The smaller body helped, pot holes were closer to the F-hole. I laid the wiring out better, added a little length & twist tied the wires together. Having done a few semi-hollows before I had a little more confidence & patience. That & a dose of luck pulling the pots into place.

[tobijohn]

The smaller body helped, pot holes were closer to the F-hole. I laid the wiring out better, added a little length & twist tied the wires together. Having done a few semi-hollows before I had a little more confidence & patience. That & a dose of luck pulling the pots into place.

Good to know, thanks. I've got almost a dozen semi-hollows that are slated for pickup/harness upgrades. They're at the end of the list because I figure after more than three decades of not drinking, that's what will start it up again and i want to delay that as long as possible...

[tobijohn]

I ended up using part of the small router body for a Dremel and carefully free-handed a channel for the mounting bar to fit down into. The way a Mini-humbucker mounts is kind of wonky but it works. The pickup, pickup ring, spacer posts for pickup height above the ring and the two height adjustment screws are soldered into a unit. A bar, threaded for the adjustment screws is fastened into the bottom of the rout with two screws. I needed the neck pickup to go that full bar distance further into the body, since the ring goes down to the bar but does not go past it. StewMac has a video on this but they cheat and use a Gibby Les Paul.

Actually, it looks nice to see the pickups sitting straight in the routs and now that I can set the pickup height to 1/8" under the strings, it sounds amazing. Also, no more rattling. Imagine that.

Reading this too late to help but another option for others is the Wilkinson adapter rings which I'll be using on a bunch of P90 to min-humbucker projects. If you need black plastic, no problem but the crème colored ones don't quite match up with the Agile plastic. However, looking at pictures of numerous Gibson LP Deluxes, the pickguards and rings on those don't match either:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/2-Wilkinson-Mi ... 3069764876

[Buddha Pickups]

I Cobain'd one of my Squier Mustangs.
It's got an a5 5.7k heavy formvar mustang style neck pickup and a 13k a8 bridge humbucker with an EMG style cover to match the mustang cover.
I had to cut the guard and route the body. I dont have a router so I had to chisel and dremel away at it.

[Partscaster]

I had a reversed staggered Klein 65' pup set.
And I had a USACG reversed 70's headstock neck.
And I bought a reversed slanted bridge pickguard.
Put it all on a good Olympic White alder body.

Plays great. I love the resulting tone.

93564-c9dccd33ab13222115670a5658814a06 2.jpeg (34.4 KiB) Viewed 2378 times