vote!

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Sat Nov 03, 2012 3:20 pm

due to a spontaneous, repetitive LP Junior DC GAS I plan to do another kit project..
not sure what color..I had some hard oil finishes I liked, but maybe a TV yellow, white or simple burst is cool, too..

cur · Post by **cur** » Sat Nov 03, 2012 3:43 pm

This is maybe the only guitar that I really like in white. Maybe it is a Joan Jett thing.

benecol · Post by **benecol** » Sat Nov 03, 2012 3:55 pm

Had a TV yellow one, wished it was white.

I vote white.

dren68 · Post by **dren68** » Sat Nov 03, 2012 5:27 pm

cur wrote:This is maybe the only guitar that I really like in white. Maybe it is a Joan Jett thing.

Same here. Another vote for white.

DasBeef · Post by **DasBeef** » Sat Nov 03, 2012 5:55 pm

I'm always looking out for a deal on a TV Yellow double cut, so that gets my vote.

mixtape · Post by **mixtape** » Sat Nov 03, 2012 6:14 pm

TV yellow. The world needs more yellow guitars.

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Sun Nov 04, 2012 1:59 pm

mhh, not easy to decide..the heavy relic yellow one looks awsome, white , too..
the thing with TV yellow though is it has to be a certain tone, so maybe you have to mix it up with different stains..then grain filler and clear coat..(after that some relicing)

I only did water stains and acrylic spray can finishes which were ok..I dont expect a pro finish..

and the burst is not easy I guess..

speedfish · Post by **speedfish** » Sun Nov 04, 2012 3:10 pm

tv yellow.

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Sat Nov 10, 2012 9:58 am

update.. the kit arrived and I noticed some things I had to correct..
The stock headstock is just kinda paddle with funny predrilled in-line 6mm (!) holes.. had to be doweld redrilled. I took a Â´59 LP Jr template for the headstock form..

then I glued the neck heel, after correcting the heel cavity with 2 thin veneers, because there were some small gaps on both sides..
When glueing I realised the neck went in VERY HARD, I had to clamp it to get in completely in..after that there was small gap at the neck heel end which I closed with a 1 mm flat-sanded rest piece
..have to sand it flush..
not perfect, but absolutely stable..there will be NO heel issues here..

the nut was of plastic, a piece of crap, loosely glued, not even standing on its own footprint..bad

so I took it off, sanded it down, till the base of the new bone nut had a stable, angled stand.. of course due to sanding the nut now is lower than the old one, I need a new nut.

mockup..

kit is from here ( my second one)
ML guitars

Thom · Post by **Thom** » Sat Nov 10, 2012 10:17 am

Has to be TV Yellow, surely.

paul_ · Post by **paul_** » Sat Nov 10, 2012 8:06 pm

I made two of these kits (now my two main guitars), each were slightly different and it seems yours is different too. I'd noticed the place where I got 'em were selling ones like the one you have now. The first one I got was pretty close to Gibson spec (except with a scarf-jointed neck a la Epi) so maybe they're just reducing infringements here and there. The second one I got had a PRS-length neck heel (hate it) the squarer '58 style body edges and a more '50s style Gibson headstock shape vs the large '70s peghead of my first one.

I made both of mine with Reranch TV Yellow though I did them with different methods so they came out different hues. The first one was TV Yellow on bare, unfilled mahogany, then dark grain filler, then I cleaned the grain filler from the field of wood and clear coated it just like that.

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On the second one I did the same thing, but shot it with a final coat of yellow to "blend" the grain. This is more like the actual TV finishes but the yellow is too "neon" (it's actually closer to the "lime green" tv finishes of earlier single cuts). Also I didn't do as good a job leveling the grain on this one so it's more satiny looking like those Faded guitars. I also used Reranch clear instead of Stewmac this time, the Reranch stuff is proper old-school in terms of durability (i.e. it has none over pitted mahogany). I redid the back of the neck to feel smoother.

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Because the original '50s TV guitars were just white and the clear yellowed over time, the colour of "TV Yellow" is a bit of a moving target which depends on what kind of life the guitar lived in it's first decade. Even ex-smokers' '80s Gibsons that left the factory Alpine White are "tv yellow" now.
I vote either white, yellow or cherry. If I ever make another DC Jr it'll definitely be a trans cherry red, the typical SG finish.

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Mon Nov 12, 2012 6:36 pm

yeah, its quite nice to build yourself an jr DC with a kit, I already did 3 of them from different manufacturers. Two from the suplier I posted above and one from precision guitar kits from canada.
I also had two TV yellow JR DCs , one japanese from Aria Diamond ( alder body) and one from Bach..another red one from Aria ( with funny scratchplate because of 2! dogear P90s )

The prices and import tax from canada is the reason why I didnt buy another one from PGK, though the quality was awesome.. ..had a FAT baseball neck..one piece body, two pieces neck, ebony fretboard with metal markers.

their SG juniors look great, too..

mine looked like this, I just made a hard oil finish..

yours look nice, too..I tend to do a darker, natural yellow I think..

paul_ · Post by **paul_** » Mon Nov 12, 2012 7:54 pm

That oil finish looks very nice, the back looks a bit like my first TV finish which a lot of people figure for a stain rather than solid paint + filler.

I very much want to try a PGK, but I think I've given higher priority to Bulldogbodies for kit #3 (I've been into them since I wanted to build an LP Standard kit). They have Gibson style one-piece necks, which I think would make for the biggest difference between that and my other kits.

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jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 7:39 am

I would have tried at least one kit from BYO or bulldogbodies if they were available in germany..

..look very similar to the ones of the kit supplier I bought it from.. maybe chinese?
..same paddle neck, body made of 3 parts, allover quality..

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 1:01 pm

ok, I decided to install a neck pick up for the first time..I had a nice sounding fat vintage Ibanez ( 8kOhm) for that..sounds very cool in bridge and neck posiiton..
cut and carved the cavity with chisels, was a bit nervous if the neck stability would suffer, but its ok..

I wonder how I install a toggle with master vol and tone..

paul_ · Post by **paul_** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 5:02 pm

jamba72 wrote:ok, I decided to install a neck pick up for the first time..I had a nice sounding fat vintage Ibanez ( 8kOhm) for that..sounds very cool in bridge and neck posiiton..
cut and carved the cavity with chisels, was a bit nervous if the neck stability would suffer, but its ok..

I wonder how I install a toggle with master vol and tone..

haha, dude that's funny. I was thinking of doing that exactly.
You appear to have put the single coil far away enough from the fingerboard where stability shouldn't suffer much. Gibson actually learned this the hard way back in the '50s, they made a DC special with a neck P90 that was right up against the fingerboard and the necks were snapping off too easily.

They remedied this by moving it away from the 24th fret position, which doesn't sound as good but anyone who plays Fender shortscales/24 fret guitars is no stranger to that

I would wire it up like a regular double-pickup LP and use stacked concentric pots. Vol/Tone for each pickup. Have thought about drilling a new hole for a 3 way either between the knobs or on the treble horn of the pickguard.

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 6:08 pm

yeah, a big pain in the arse those neck pickups ....these are vintage ones that suffer from this..hahaha

I did two things, one, I took this smaller singlecoil sized pickup for not removing too much wood from that position..not like a standard p90..
second, I placed it a bit into the body..I remembered this red Aria DC with two P90 and bolt-on neck..a joke..unplayable

this looks interesting, too:

the twin pots..well, my brother did this with his basses..quite profesional, but a bit Â´poshyÂ´ looking..
otherwise I would have to bore into my body again for another toggle cavity extension..haha

thorndal did a good job with these:

paul_ · Post by **paul_** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 6:55 pm

jamba72 wrote:the twin pots..well, my brother did this with his basses..quite profesional, but a bit Â´poshyÂ´ looking..

As much as we perhaps shouldn't care about this sort of thing, yeah... I'm 100% agreed with you on this. I think the right stacked knob set makes all the difference though.

I reckoned I'd use the modern stacked JB sorta knob for a covert classic look. From a distance most wouldn't be able to tell the difference or just assume it's some random oldschool radio-style knob.

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:24 pm

cool knobs..

I was looking for wiring diagrams without a 3way toggle..
I installed two push pull potis for serial/parallel switching of a P90 with dummy coil in my older Aria Jr DC ..very nice, but with two pickups and without a toggle??
maybe thereÂ´s a possibillity to use push pull potis instead of a toggle?

I cut the scratchplate a bit.. looks cool so far..ignore the chaos on my table..

extended the cavity a bit, the toggle fits fine between..

jamba72 · Post by **jamba72** » Wed Nov 21, 2012 7:30 pm

does anyone know why the toggle middle position doesnt work with 2 P90s ?? its only bridge, bridge, neck..
In my musicmaster I had 2 single coils wired with an tele-switch and all three positons worked..