Cheap POS partscaster thread

Kivitel

Kivitel

New member
Okay, a while back I started making guitars. One was a cost no object (within reason) gorgeous neck thru telecaster. That thing has been a pain in the ass but it's almost done, pics to follow.

The other was a 'what's the best instrument I can make from cheap parts on ebay' - a beater that can actually play well.

I'm going to go through some of my discoveries as they happen on this thread.

So to begin with, the body. Started it out with an ebayed mahogany strat body. Nice weight, finished it, found out the pickup cavities / neck slot / electronics cavities were in the wrong places / wrong dimensions, so the pickguard wouldn't cover them up. This pissed me off, but the body was so cheap (~$25?) I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.
Solution? I got a nice ash body from EDEN (they sell tons of stuff on ebay...chinese I think). It's ash, 3 pieces, nice weight, very dramatic grain. Rather than smoothing the grain over with filler and lacquer, I decided to highlight it with some danish oil, which emphasizes grain more than filmy finishes. The result is very raw looking - huge dramatic swirls of tight grain that change shape as the curves of the body cut through them (the tummy cut looks like the ridges on an LP). The body is really great, and it cost around 50 dollars plus hong kong shipping.


Neck: searched ebay for "strat neck / buy it now / price: lowest first". I ended up with a pretty nice neck for 30 dollars - smooth satin finish, ugly headstock, free tuners. The tuners were garbage, the neck is straight, the fretwork is respectable. I took a screwdriver and burnished the playing edge over a little, following that with some 600 grit sandpaper, so the whole thing feels pretty nice.
 
Re: Cheap POS partscaster thread

Tuners: I found a great bargain in tuners! Wilkinson makes a budget line of guitar parts in Korea - not amazing quality, but functional and well built. Anyway, they have these EZ LOK tuners now that have two holes in the peg drilled ninety degrees to each other - you insert the string in one, wrap around, and pull it through the other hole (this locks the string in place). Anyway, these things cost around 26 dollars, and for some nice locking tuners that ain't bad at all. EZ LOKs come in a set of 6 regular height and 4 shorter ones - the two high ones are used for bass strings and the short ones are for anything else. In addition to the string-angle customization this affords, you can choose to string through the upper or lower hole - meaning no string trees. Very cool stuff.

The bottom line: cheap and totally stable tuning. Can't beat it.
 
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Electronics:

I got a pre-wired pickguard on the bay for $30ish. The pots don't make any noise, but the wiring itself was standard fender style garbage. I'm not an expert but I know ground loops when I see them.

Long story short, I did the guitarnuts wiring modifications to the pickguard and body. Soldering to aluminum foil is a P.I.T.A. of course, but it can be avoided by simply using one huge piece of foil for the whole cavity. Later testing confirmed that the shielding, in addition to the careful inspection of the wiring, really does improve the noise situation dramatically.

I don't like the pickguard or pickups, however, so the following changes will be made:
1. Black or tortoise (maybe black pearl) pickguard
2. New pickups! Obviously I will need input from you fellows on that (SDs are out of the question, however, due to the fact I am artificially limiting my budget for the sake of fun)
3. Pickup covers and knobs will be aged in color somehow. I'm thinking that leaving them in some strong tea (the inside of a tea leaf contains tannic acid, which is what makes it bitter, and also what makes things tan) will do the trick.

4. Bridge. The new body has a tremelo route, so I will need to find a good trem that isn't garbage. Can it be done? Stay tuned.

5. Other stuff. The high E buzzes, so I'm going to swap the nut out for something better. Suggestions welcome, but since I don't want to slot my own nut (I a reckless lorry slotted my nuts back in April and they still haven't healed completely) I am thinking of going either pre-slotted graphtech, roller bridge or something similar.
 
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Here's how we're looking so far. Actual pics to happen at some point.

stratone.jpg


There are a lot of parts I need to acquire before this thing is in its final form, so it will be a little while before I can show the finished product.

Note the headstock shape - in reality it's shaped more like a firebird headstock (my favorite shape for some reason, next to the 70s fender shape).
 
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I saw that one, but I'm leaning towards the Guitar fetish trem- it has a full sized steel sustain block (I doubt the gotoh has that, but who knows), and it's cheaper. Seems well made. The GFS guys seem like decent folks too, even if some of their product descriptions are a bit enthusiastic.

But yeah, I'm looking at the 30-60 dollar range. I figure with a graphtech nut and some locking tuners, any decent quality trem will work out fine.
 
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One piece of advice:

I have the wilkinson tuners and they work well, but you will need pliers and a good eye to get the smaller strings off when changing. I'm thinking of upgrading to sperzels.
 
Re: Cheap POS partscaster thread

Kivitel said:
I saw that one, but I'm leaning towards the Guitar fetish trem- it has a full sized steel sustain block (I doubt the gotoh has that, but who knows), and it's cheaper. Seems well made. The GFS guys seem like decent folks too, even if some of their product descriptions are a bit enthusiastic.

But yeah, I'm looking at the 30-60 dollar range. I figure with a graphtech nut and some locking tuners, any decent quality trem will work out fine.
Click to expand...

Actually, the Gotoh does have a steel block. Everything is stainless steel on the Gotoh. The GFS trem sounds good, too. It's probably a better fit for the project though, since it's less expensive.
 
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Hot _Grits said:
One piece of advice:

I have the wilkinson tuners and they work well, but you will need pliers and a good eye to get the smaller strings off when changing. I'm thinking of upgrading to sperzels.
Click to expand...

Yeah, good to know. I find that due to my headstock thickness, the lower hole of the tuner (on the short ones) is jussst above the nut. I'm thinking of either sanding down the back of the headstock, just to get a little less anxiety here, or maybe removing the washers.
 
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Okay, quick update. Just went on the ebay and found:

1. A wilkinson bridge - black vintage style. 27 dollars shipped. Steel block and all that jazz. The black and gold ones tend to be cheaper on ebay, probably because they make too many of them and most folks want chrome.
2. Graphtech slotted nut - 8 dollars?

So, keeping track of the budget:
Body 50
Neck 30
Nut 8
Tuners 26
Pickguard/electronics 30
Jack Already had one
Bridge 27
_______________________________
$171

....which is pretty ridiculous. I think that number pretty much reflects the genius of Leo Fender.
 
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I'm wondering how the Eden body sounds. Currently refinishing my strat but might just pick up one of the finished SSH bodies or something already finished and get something stratty built in the meantime. Or possibly even that crazy lefty righty Warmoth strat body although that's more of a whim than anything else (not to mention $200+).
 
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I think it depends mainly on the weight. Try to find the lightest one you can. Their ash bodies are pretty heavy, of course. I think mine is a little bit over 4 pounds? Warmoth's swamp ash bodies are 3-4 pounds, hard ash are around 5. I guess that means mine is on the light side.

I'd imagine the difference between a trem route and a hardtail is much more pronounced than the difference between two types of ash, of course.
 
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Purchased pickups - 3 lace sensor Holy Grails for $105. They retail for about 180 a set. The list price is about three times that, I think. Anyway it's a killer deal on what I consider the best (or second best) noiseless strat pickups. I consider their tone to be about as good as Kinmans but more 'idealized'. A little more studio sounding. In either case I'm absolutely psyched to get these.

Incidentally, on ebay right now, there's a burgundy set and a light blue set going for $90. I guess most of you folks are magnet/wire/noise purists though.

Time for a budgetary update:
Body 50
Neck.............................30
Nut.................................8
Tuners...........................26
Pickguard/electronics........30
Jack...............................Already had one
Bridge............................27
Pickups..........................105
Pickguard.......................14
_______________________________
$290


OK who wants to try to make a better instrument for under 300? This is my challenge to all of you. (Of course, we'll see how well everything meshes in reality...on paper this thing should kill)
 
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Okay, a word on the quality of the parts recieved, since there seems to be some interest in the cheap stuff you find on ebay.

1. Necks. I would say those 30-50 necks you see on ebay are about the same quality as mighty mite necks or perhaps a little better. The neck I bought was obviously not made by a machine (small shaping inconsistancies only I would notice) but the parts that need to be straight are straight, the wood is very nice and the finish is silky and satiny.

2. Bodies. Those EDEN bodies are perfect but they are what they are - 2 to four piece laminated bodies shaped by a CNC. The best of them I would imagine are just as good as the Warmoth/Fender/USACG equivilent, of course the Warmoth/USACG advantage is you can get any body shape you want in any wood you want, in any finish (the disadvantage being they cost much more). If I really wanted, say, a shell pink vintage correct 50s strat, well, I'd probably be getting that made for me,you know?

3. All the hardware I've got for low prices is of fine quality. I got a tele bridge a while back for 15 dollars or so that was garbage (poor chrome plating...the saddles scratched it all up!) but the wilkinson trem I got is beautifully made, as are the tuners. The tuners aren't of the oh-so-sexy level of quality you'll see on really nice grovers/schallers/sperzels, but they look fine and are functionally equivilant.

4. Electronics - don't skimp on those pots! My experience has been that the hype about electronics is real. Spend the money on good potentiometers and switches. Same with pickguards- even if the control cavity portion is shielded, cover the rest of the pickguard with foil. Or get an axeguardz.

The moral of the story? The things I thought made sense to spend lots of money on (neck/body) can be made in Hong Kong on the cheap. Other things require more care and precision - electronics and PICKUPS. I am a huge pickup skeptic, but I will say that Duncans are, in fact, a bargain.

Anyway, the trem has a big steel block as advertised, the holographic pickguard is as fantastic as I thought it would be, and my graphite nut looks like a class act. I'll be getting pickups soon and hopefully I'll have this thing done in a week or two!
 
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Hahaha I just bought the plaid holographic pickguard! I'll probably put it on the baron for the time being, at least till I get the new body (though it might look kinda silly; oh well). I'm thinking it'll go best on a white body, black hardware, black pickups. I have plans for that pickguard.
 
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