An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

[daan]

I love JB-Players. My first really nice guitar was a Strat copy of theirs. I had to sell it to help pay for college, and had been on the lookout ever since for another. I found one on the Bay in the early 00's, all I ended up keeping from it was the neck (it lives on my main Strat now) I also have a neck-thru Strat, and a neck-thru P/J Bass. THey made Teles as well, I had been looking for one of those. I saw this one pop up and put in a low bid with a week left on the auction, fully expecting to get outbid. Well, the other person bidding retracted theirs at the last minute, so I just bought this. I'll have some 'splainin' to do tomorrow... :nervous:
Anyway, auction pix here:







The necks on these guitars are FANTASTIC, I'd totally buy them all up if I could, but I don't ever seem to catch the ones that go for what I can afford. Usually the guitars end up selling for what just buying a Warmoth neck, or whatever. THe tremolos on these suck though, and this one looks like it already broke and got bolted down. (That's fine, I was gonna pitch it as soon as I got it anyway). So yeah, it looks like I got another project for the pile... but it's a guitar I've wanted for a while and it was semi-affordable.

 

[daan]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

Well, I WAS gonna post up the pix of my "new" guitar (it just arrived as I was leaving for work) but just today they decided to block Photobucket... what do they want, me to DO MY JOB while I'm here? I thought I was here to drink coffee and F-around on the internet looking at guitars... Anyway the guitar is exactly what the auction pix show. It looks every minute of it's age, but it's all there and appears to work. I don't think I've ever gotten a dirtier guitar though... I'm for sure bustin' out the denatured alcohol to clean this thing off... It looks like it got played hard for 10 years, and then leaned against a wall when Nirvana hit big until they put it on the bay last month. EEEEW! I mean, I actually had to go wash my hands after unboxing it. I'm about to wipe it down with the hard-core disinfecting wipes we have so I don't catch something...

 

[BloodRose]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

Congrats! Cool when you get something youve long wanted! Looks like a rocker! I wondered about the trem. Looks like some kind of Kahler copy. Yeah, I can tell from the pix that it looks pretty funky.. I got a guitar like that once.. ewwww. gobs of mung around the frets and trem.. Im so AR about my gear, I cant imagine letting something get that nasty. plus, when I sell a guit, I polish it all up before shipping.

 

[KeeperOS]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

Congrats man, looks special, gunk aside. Give her a good rub and enjoy!

Happy New Guitar Day :headbang:

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

Give her a good rub and enjoy!

Ha! LMAO!!

 

[Aceman]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

You mean JB PLAYA

 

[elelpe]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

Cool guitar!

 

[daan]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)

Mung, hah. THis thing is DISGUSTING. I used the disinfecting wipes (the ones that we clean up after the Ebola patients, the stuff in them will kill EVERYTHING) first, then the reagent alcohol. Ick.

Not a good pic, but the cloth I used for the alcohol just turned black... and this is after I used the wipes.
It's nice and clean now, other than the tuning pegs. THose still feel coated with something, like whatever is on them, ate the finish and now the buttons are all "bumpy".

I tried a little polishing compound on them, but they don't feel any different yet... THe buttons come off, maybe I can soak them in something next. I did play a few Scorpions and Judas Priest songs on here though, for a few minutes there it was 1986 again!
I bought this fully expecting it to be crap (heavy plywood, dead tremolo, crappy pickups, like one of the Strat copies like this I had) but it's not much heavier than my "real" Tele, and since the POS tremolo is locked down, it played OK (Other than the rusty, dead strings that is.)


I was thinking about just taking the neck off and making another parts Tele with it, but now I'm just gonna replace the bridge and call it done. The pups aren't THAT bad, but I'll just get it playing again and figure out what exactly I wanna put in thier place.
The tremolo on these are pretty much worthless, they're heavy as s**t, don't hold tune well, and break. THis one's been locked down already with a big screw thru the frame http://www.wammiworld.com/Accutune.php

Oh, here's why these break:


THe frame is just pot metal or zinc, so it isn't very strong, and after using the bar for a few years, the giant springs crack the base off. If you're lucky, otherwise the whole thing cracks in half.

THis stuff just came off the bottom, these trems are definitely the weak part of these otherwise good guitars.

THey leave a pretty giant hole behind when you take them out, though... Gotta make a wood block to fit in there to fill it in.

 

[daan]

Re: An "OOPS" NGD (80's shredder Tele)


THe wiring is neatly done, other than the mini pots it looks good. It has a 5-way and a coil tap for the HB so there's a few different sounds in there. The bucker sounds... OK tapped but better full-on.


THey're all ceramic pickups. THe singles have staggered poles, unlike the other JBP I had. THese singles sounded different to me, they're definitely "ceramic imported Strat copy pups" so they don't sound vintagey at all. The bridge pup looks just like the Dimarzio pups from my Hondo project, other than no brand name underneath. I had read that those were "Super 2" pups (extra-bright HB's with 2 slug coils instead of slug/polepiece coil like normal) made special for import guitars in the late 70's/early 80s, and after a while the import guys just copied these pups. They don't seem to sound exactly the same, but that could just be the totally different guitars they're in. And my ears. And amp...whatever. WHen I was demoing it after the big clean-up I thought the guitar sounded OK but could be better. HEy, anybody here know anything about pickups, ha ha...
THe other bolt-on neck JBP's I have, have absolutely terriffic necks. THis one is just as nice, great back contour, big frets, plays real nice. I think they're worth the price of the guitar by themselves, especially since you can get these for less than buying a Warmoth neck, and you get all this 80's goodness with your neck...
THe neck-thru JBP I have has a real wide, flat neck. Doesn't feel the same at all. Not bad, just different.