Motorik II

stewart · Post by **stewart** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 6:47 pm

theworkoffire wrote:And with the first one, which is back for a pickup and guard change (and a sensible effectectomy) before it goes off to the US.

*jizz*

is owen no longer the owner of the white fellow, then?

Bacchus · Post by **Bacchus** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 7:02 pm

I love this thread.

You're really good at taking photos of things in such a way as makes me want to touch them.

othomas2 · Post by **othomas2** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 8:14 pm

stewart wrote:
theworkoffire wrote:And with the first one, which is back for a pickup and guard change (and a sensible effectectomy) before it goes off to the US.

*jizz*

is owen no longer the owner of the white fellow, then?

I use my Japanese Jag 24-7 so I wasn't playing it as much as it deserved. It just sat in its case most of the time.

I had a broken car to pay for & soon to be moving into a smaller studio flat etc etc so I thought I'd sell it on for someone else to enjoy.

Motorik 2 looks even better fully assembled !! how does it play ?

theworkoffire · Post by **theworkoffire** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 9:50 pm

othomas2 wrote: Motorik 2 looks even better fully assembled !! how does it play ?

Cheers, everyone.

It plays really, really well. Shame you just missed it the other day. It feels really solid, like a compact, slightly darker Jag. I have it strung up with 12s and it just feels nice and tight. I need to lower a couple of the nut slots a touch more, but there's nothing else I'm not happy with. The spoke truss rod is awesome. With the white one, the neck was on and off all the time, every time I tried different strings or whatever. Two seconds work on this to get the neck relief spot on. Everything I build will have one of these from now on, no question.

hotrodperlmutter · Post by **hotrodperlmutter** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 10:33 pm

golly, that's precious.

where do you get the tremolo/bridge units from?

theworkoffire · Post by **theworkoffire** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 11:33 pm

The mint one was a lucky ebay find - BIN from Singapore for about $50. I found it the day I first started hunting for them. The other one is the best of the rest after three years of looking. I've never had the heart to buy a full guitar that has one and part it out.

hotrodperlmutter · Post by **hotrodperlmutter** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 11:37 pm

well, if it comes down to it, i'd buy an et-270 with no bridge/trem to replace the respective parts with jag/jazz bits.

theworkoffire · Post by **theworkoffire** » Sat Oct 30, 2010 11:47 pm

I'll bear that in mind!

lorez · Post by **lorez** » Sun Oct 31, 2010 10:03 am

lovely work and a great looking guitar. Really looking forward to maybe hearing it one day.

crofty · Post by **crofty** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 3:51 pm

has the trem got a name. any idea how i could snap one up?

theworkoffire · Post by **theworkoffire** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 11:13 pm

crofty wrote:has the trem got a name. any idea how i could snap one up?

No specific name - they were on loads of different brands that came out of the Matsumoko factory. They crop up on ebay every so often, but usually pretty shoddy. The last two I've seen didn't have the bridges, without which they're useless. I bought the first one, but sold it on and passed on the last.

I've been drawing up plans for getting some replicas made that will fit the guts from Jag/JM trems. The bridge is my stumbling block though - all the roller saddles I know of are for flat fretboards, and I think the trem plate is too close to the bridge for a mustang bridge to work properly. Getting custom saddles made would throw the cost way out of range I think. Any ideas on that gratefully received.

I've since been sidetracked by another idea I've had for a floating trem based on a Duo-sonic bridge. If Haze's build challenge gets off the ground I'll be prototyping it for that...

crofty · Post by **crofty** » Sat Nov 13, 2010 12:30 am

interesting

seems you went through a lot of waiting to get the guitars just how you wanted. props.

Dave · Post by **Dave** » Wed Dec 15, 2010 3:10 pm

theworkoffire wrote:
Mike wrote:What pickups are you going for?
I was going to just use some AVRI Jag pickups I have, then I spoke to Peter Leonard (The Pickup Wizard) about pickups for my next project...

...and he's wound me a set of AlnicoIII jag pickups for the bridge and middle, and an AlnicoV one for the neck.

That project will be a long time in the making, so in the meantime I'll have two of those pickups in this. I've just put a pair of his CBS JM pickups in my Jazzmaster and they're amazing. Bloody cheap, too, considering. $140 shipped to the UK for the 3 Jag pickups.

I've also seen your work on Offset - absolutley next level stuff by any yardstick.

I'm super interested in what you'll be doin with this yamaha Sg - one of my alltime WANTS is a Link Wray red Yamaha SG-2. No idea how easy to it is to get them vintage or how much but maybe one day if i have the disposable I'll pay someone to make one! Any chance you can show us updates on the SG as they occur? I for one would very much apreciate it.

SKC Willie · Post by **SKC Willie** » Wed Dec 15, 2010 10:34 pm

when you bought the trem, did it have the arm with it or did you find a replacment?

I just bought a 70s electra with that bridge and it needs a trem arm.

theworkoffire · Post by **theworkoffire** » Thu Dec 16, 2010 12:16 am

Dave wrote: I'm super interested in what you'll be doin with this yamaha Sg - one of my alltime WANTS is a Link Wray red Yamaha SG-2. No idea how easy to it is to get them vintage or how much but maybe one day if i have the disposable I'll pay someone to make one! Any chance you can show us updates on the SG as they occur? I for one would very much apreciate it.

Thanks loads - yes, absolutely, I'll post a new thread when I get properly started. Still at the template-making stage at the moment, but should have the funds to start building it by next month. Just about to have a replica trem CNC milled...we'll see how that turns out.

Re the trem arm - mine came with the trem, and is original to it as far as I can tell. It's 3/16 diameter, 10-32 thread, so a skinny American strat arm should fit yours, assuming it has the same collett.

SeismicProfile · Post by **SeismicProfile** » Thu Dec 30, 2010 12:45 am

Cool idea I really like the shape of the guitar almost like a jag and mustang combined. I really like the starcaster type headstock as well.

hotrodperlmutter · Post by **hotrodperlmutter** » Tue Feb 01, 2011 3:00 am

for sale

taylornutt · Post by **taylornutt** » Tue Feb 01, 2011 5:04 am

Beautiful work. You may have already answer this question but I thought you said you were not going with the Starcaster on this one?

Do you have a template for the Starcaster headstock? I am very interested in them. I have a drawing of one but it's not to scale and I don't have access to a Starcaster to check it.

theworkoffire · Post by **theworkoffire** » Tue Feb 01, 2011 11:36 pm

I don't have an original Starcaster tracing or anything - for the first (white) one I adapted the shape from what I knew of the dimensions of the original, using photographs to get the proportions right, but I ended up shortening it a little, just because the original is nearly as big as the MOTORIK body...

The headstock on the green one is actually quite a lot different - it has a sharp ridge by the high 'e', and the size and shape of the lower curve is different. I made the template for that by eye in the workshop, using a Jag neck template for parts of it, and the first MOTORIK template at an angle for the rest.

And, yeah, I was originally going to make a stock Jag neck for it, but decided I wanted to keep a stronger link between this one and the first one.

The first one has just flown off to the states re-routed for P90s, truss rattle fixed, and with a new anodized pickguard: