Re: Gentlemen, I give you... the Dangerous Type
major mojo re: that neck pocket / string alignment fix!
I can't stress enough how spot-on Dan Erlewine's chapter on this subject is. Basically it says, "Sometimes, it's easy, you just loosen the screws, scootch it over a bit, and re-tighten them. Other times, it requires more work, and here's what you need to do..." His list of things to do was exactly what I found when I pulled off the neck. Without his book, I would have looked in the pocket and thought "Now what?", but when I popped the neck out I looked in there and thought, "Yep, there it is." and knew what to do just like I'd done it a dozen times.
The only other guitar I ever did this on was a real-deal '73 Tele Custom. Back then, the neck pockets were so sloppy, there was plenty of room to realign it. Heck, with the 3-bolt Micro-Tilt mounting I didn't even have to loosen the screws; just gave it push and "Creak, Ping!" it was back where it needed to be (for the time being).
On the other hand, it's interesting to see the quality of the fundamentals on the modern MIM guitar. CNC routing makes for an accurate, tight neck pocket. The problems arise in the details - get a little sloppy with the Blue Agave around a nice, tight neck pocket, and suddenly it's
too tight. This makes MIMs a great deal for someone like me, who's gonna mess around with them, swap parts, etc. Not so good for someone who's going to play it, put no thought or effort into its setup, wonder why it doesn't work very well, and ultimately sell it. His loss, my gain.
Hmm, got off on a tangent there. The main take-away here is this: Erlewine's a freakin' genius.
Everybody should own his book. Although, if the guy I bought this guitar from owned it and read it, I probably wouldn't own this guitar.