New project

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BeatTheBastard

New member
I recently build this Pinecaster, but I ended up being really disappointed with it. It played fine, electric circuit was good but all in all I should have researched more about the pine as a tonewood. Someone may like it, but I didn´t so I ended up tearing it apart. I`ll keep the body and maybe someday it´s going to be a base to another project.

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So I took out the electronics, neck and all the hardware. I had the body from the beater-Ibanez lying around (http://i1291.photobucket.com/albums/b542/JiiCeeQuu/IMG_31461_zps8313718c.jpg this one), which is a nice basswood/mahogany body. I decided to use all the electronics from the Pinecaster and use the hardtail Strat bridge instead of the TOM, needed to drill the string thru holes. It took me only few hours to make it playable.

I plugged the TOM holes and sanded the wood plugs down. At this time I managed to put the neck better, and it´s not moving anymore. Just testing it with Jackson CVR2 pickup...

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The bridge needs to be slightly moved towards the neck.

Need to route the middle pup cavity. I was first thinking a Fiesta Red with white pickguard, but I´d like to have chrome hardware with it. It seems now that it´s going to be painted black, with white pickguard (I have a template for a one which fits to GSZ body) and white pups. Winter is coming, so I´ll have to wait until spring to paint it. Body needs a lot of grain filler and sanding before that. I want to build this properly, which is something I´ve never done.. And if somebody remembers, the Pinecaster had pups in series and ON/OFF-switches for every pup. Friend of mine promised to sell me a white hb, so I only have to order couple white pup covers for the single coils and a white Strat vol knob.

Continues someday. Cheers.
 
Re: New project

I'm excited to see how this ends up as I've recently done my first build. Mine was a huge disappointment and I'm likely going to start over on it. What electronics were in the pine caster?
 
Re: New project

My first partscaster was assembled mostly by me and had the neck mounted by my local tech. I want to delve deeper into building so seeing that not everyone gets it right the first time does my perfectionist heart some good.
 
Re: New project

The Pinecaster had originally two cheap single coils and Jackson CVR2 in the bridge (same hb as Jackson JS30DK has and single 500k vol pot, pups were wired in series and every pup had its own ON/OFF switch). Pine just sounded so twangy to my ear and I couldn`t stand it. It was a funny project though.

Those single coils are actually quite ok even though I ordered them from China.

Next I´ll route the middle pu cavity and then make the pickguard. Exams are over in couple of weeks so then I´ll have time.
 
Re: New project

TIGEREYELASER said:
My first partscaster was assembled mostly by me and had the neck mounted by my local tech. I want to delve deeper into building so seeing that not everyone gets it right the first time does my perfectionist heart some good.
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That would have been the easiest money he ever made :18: I hope you mean routed a neck pocket or something because bolting a neck on is easier than making 2 minute noodles.
 
Re: New project

kramersteen said:
That would have been the easiest money he ever made :18: I hope you mean routed a neck pocket or something because bolting a neck on is easier than making 2 minute noodles.
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Nope, he attached the neck. Seeing as I'm doing more studying and seeing how easy it really is I can say next time I'll try it. It's just at that point I would've rather been out $30 than out a $70 neck, knowwhutimean?
 
Re: New project

A change of plans. It felt quite scary to start routing the body, so I thought what the heck, let´s try it as HH. I had those Jackson pups, so I first tried the bridge one. It sounded way too trebly, so I tried the neck pickup at the bridge position. And yes, it sounded awesome. I used the ON/OFF switches from the Pinecaster and wired the pups in series, and put the switches to old second vol and tone pot holes. Now I have to only plug the original pickup switch hole.

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It´s strange, that in Jackson I have the old Ibanez neck pup in bridge, and in this Ibanez I have the old Jackson neck pup in bridge.. But who cares, they sound good were they are! I used to prefer single coils in neck but the CVR2 hb is very nice and mellow. I don´t think that I have to change these pups, in mahogany/basswood body they sound sooo much better than in Jackson´s Indian cedro body.

Temperature is getting lower as the autumn keeps coming. That means it´s not possible to start working with the body or anything before, let´s say, April or May. I´m gonna play around and experiment with this geetar during the winter time.

I have no idea about the colors or painting scheme now. I´ll drop out the pickguard idea, and just paint the body somehow. Any suggestions?
 
Re: New project

And yeah I was careful as hell on my first build but messed up a lot and learned a ton. The fatal flaw in my first was the quality of the materials I ended up getting and also my own impatience during the finishing project.

I've had good luck with neck pups in bridge spots too. Some people even prefer them, I've heard more than one guy on this forum using a sd jazz neck pup in the bridge. I'm not a fan of flashy colors. My recommendation is a cream color.
 
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