MIMF

It seems the consensus is that you buy by the looks for a solid body guitar. I noticed early in the thread you are buying online. May I ask who you are buying from? Is it too late to answer? Sorry, I have been away for a while. I bought some beautiful quilted maple on eBay. If you are interested I ...

Final update: problem 100% fixed/solved. Getting a more precise tuner did allow me to set the intonation more accurately, but that just made the problem less noticeable. It still sounded "wrong" to me. Yesterday I finally found someone in my town who knows how to properly level and crown f...

So I watched a few videos on YouTube, and decided to put an alnico 5 magnet into my DiMarzio super distortion humbucker pick up. I am hoping for less harshness and to make it sound more like my 1978 Ibanez V-2 pickup, which was a copy of the Dimarzio only with Alnico 5 magnets rather than ceramic. A...

I'll try installing it with tubing instead of springs. I'll also try potting it and see where that gets me. Sticking a piece of dynamat on the back is something I could always do in a few minutes.

I have a Dimarzio super distortion humbucker that wants to feed back at stage volume. Not squealing micro phonics, this is a steady low howl/whine. Internet searching suggests this is likely the base plate vibrating. I'm swapping the ceramic magnet out for an Alnico 5 in a couple weeks. Could I stic...

Beautiful! I really like the color combo. The dark sides & back really set off the top. I'm hoping to achieve something similar on my next build. Looks great.

Wow, this is more interesting and complicated than I expected! I have read over & over that covers change the sound, but the one time I pulled the gold cover off of an ibanez super-70 I was disappointed to hear no significant difference. Am I now understanding correctly, that a copper cover migh...

There are quite a few on eBay, made in China, that say they are chrome-plated copper. I'm ruling them out because they aren't that much cheaper, and if it's true copper sounds like an odd thing to surround a pickup with. But as far as I know chrome plated nickel silver and nickel-plated nickel silve...

Well, I am very sensitive to tonal changes but I once pulled gold-plated covers off the humbuckers in an old Ibanez with Super 70s and could not hear a difference. The copper seemed a bit odd to me. But I'm guessing nickel and chrome plating would sound about the same on the nickel silver base metal...

I am looking at smooth (no holes) metal covers to put on humbucker pickups. There are nickel silver covers with chrome or nickel plating, and copper with chrome plating.
Will these have different effects on the sound? If so, what are the likely differences between the three?

That thing is awesome. Do you think they soaked the cardboard with some sort of resin to give it more stability? I can't believe the neck joint holds up.

Thank you for the incredibly detailed response, Freeman, and especially for the photos. Just seeing the shot of your body carved up answered about half my questions, and the rest covered the other half. I appreciate you taking the time to share your knowledge and experience.

Draw a very accurate side view of the guitar, including the frets and the strings. It was when I was drawing it up that I realized I had a problem in the first place, so it's a proven technique for me! I guess I'll just have to figure it out. It's not exactly rocket science, but then again I'm no r...

I know what angle I need relative to the top plane. The problem I've run into is that the carved surface of the top is part of that angle. In other words, the back will be at a sharper angle than the top because the top will be wedge shaped between the neck and the bridge. I think I'll just have to ...

As the title says, I am starting a build on a neck-through guitar with a carved maple top very much like a Les Paul. Yesterday I drew it out full size on paper and realized I am not sure how to calculate the neck angle since the top carve will affect it. Do I do some careful math to figure it out, o...

Thanks, guys. I've been looking at a lot of different pickups, including the floating jazz pickups, and it's opened up my possibilities quite a bit. I've also looked harder at standard humbuckers and realized I can modify them to require a much shallower cavity. And drawing out the guitar full-size ...

I am planning to build a pretty thin solidbody guitar and I want a relatively high-output neck pickup but I don't want to cut a hole big enough and deep enough for a standard humbucker-size pickup. What are my best options? I am a pretty traditional guy, so I was hoping for something that looks like...

Everyone might want to check out this YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSpgAiuDpSY Nearly identical guitars. Same nut, strings, bridge, tuners, pickups. No finish. No pots. Same amp at same settings. etc., etc. And, most importantly, he's not trying to argue that every piece of mahogan...

The one and only guitar I've built from scratch is vaguely similar to what you describe: 1/4" maple flat top glued to a solid mahogany body hollowed out everywhere except from the bridge to the endpin. So the tom bridge and stop tailpiece are supported by the mahogany but the two hum bucking pi...

I believe you are correct that the shape of the top doesn't make much difference on a semi-hollowbody guitar. The composition of the top and what is under it, however, could make quite a difference. If nothing else, a typical arch-top semi-hollow has more material under it than a flat-top semi-hollo...