Need some advice on shortscale guitars

[Ty]

Very good all together. It's a beaut.

[ellengtrgrl]

Since I am having such a hassle getting back the money owed to me by the store that cancelled my eBay order (for another the guitar 2 weeks ago), I have e-mailed the store with a proposed way to deal with the mess: use the money they owe me to buy one of the shortscale guitars they have in their inventory. In this case: a Duo Sonic; or a 1986 Jaguar (I can't even come close to affording the vintage or reissue Jags they have). They don't have any Cyclones or Toronados in stock, and all of their Mustangs are vintage (mid 70s or older - they'll be way out of my price range). Now, I'll just have to wait and see if they're willing to go this route. On a good note, the meds my doctor put me on this time around to deal with my cluster headaches, didn't cost me a bundle. I hope they do the trick. Besides the mega pain these hadaches cause, I don't much appreciate having my sleep being wrecked umpteen nights in a row, by being woken up by a cluster headache attack. You can't even sleep when the headache is going on. It hurts too much to do so.

[Reece]

'86 jaguar?

i thought they stopped jags in the 70s and started them again in the 90s.

[ellengtrgrl]

They made them in the US until 1975. I the Japanese reissues were first produced in 1986. Here's the one I inquired about:

http://www.chicagomusicexchange.com/fen ... r/i-74854/

I inquired out of curiosity. I have a feeling its "wish list" price means that they're asking beaucoup bucks for it. But I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask. The 1989 or 90 Jag I had was a Japanese reissue.

[Ty]

Yeah Jags were produced from 1962—1975; 1999—present. So and 86 Jag would periodically be impossible and improbable.

[Reece]

ah yes, forgot about japanese ones.

[James]

... be impossible and improbable.

What?

[ellengtrgrl]

Yeah Jags were produced from 1962—1975; 1999—present. So and 86 Jag would periodically be impossible and improbable.

Uh uh. You're talking about the US reissues. I bought my Jag in 1990 brand new. It was a Japanese reissue.

Here's further info on the Jag Reissues.

http://www.fenderjaguar.net/reissue.htm

Go halfway down the page to where it says "Japanese Reissues", and you'll see that the Japanese reissues have been made since the mid 80s.

[Ty]

... be impossible and improbable.

What?

I actually didn't mean to add impossible, I couldn't decide what word I wanted to use so I used both.

[Ty]

Yeah Jags were produced from 1962—1975; 1999—present. So and 86 Jag would periodically be impossible and improbable.

Uh uh. You're talking about the US reissues. I bought my Jag in 1990 brand new. It was a Japanese reissue.

Here's further info on the Jag Reissues.

http://www.fenderjaguar.net/reissue.htm

Go halfway down the page to where it says "Japanese Reissues", and you'll see that the Japanese reissues have been made since the mid 80s.

Durr, gee why am I not thinking correctly today?

[Reece]

how is/was the '90 jag? i don't think i've heard anything about late 80s/early 90s jags.

[ellengtrgrl]

how is/was the '90 jag? i don't think i've heard anything about late 80s/early 90s jags.

It was actually a nice playing guitar. I was playing in a pop covers band at the time (the only pop band I've ever played in - I prefer heavy rock). I wanted a different sound, and I've never been much of a Strat or Les Paul player. I bought it from a place that sold used records, and used and overstock music gear. I think I paid about $500 for it at the time. I remember feeling ripped off on the price because I traded a Les Paul Special towards it, and I still had to kick in about $250 or $275 of my own money towards the Jag. It was basically NOS, complete with the plastic film on the pickguard and pickup covers. There was no mute (at least I don't remember one). The color was vintage white with a tortishell pickguard. the headstock decal said it was made in Japan. It was weird at first getting used to the rocking bridge (I like to rest my hand on the bridge and pick from the wrist when I play), and I had to avoid string bashing, or the strings would jump off of the goofy threaded barrel saddles.

Like I said, it played great - once you got used to its quirks. BUT, it had one major problem - uncontrollable microphonics. Unless you ran the tone contols at full mud settings, and/or played a lounge act volumes and with a very clean sounding amp gainwise, the damn thing squealed like a pig as soon as you stopped playing. Let notes hang after hitting them? - yeah right! More like let notes squeal! You couldn't even mute the strings to stop the squealing. For that matter, palm muted chunking was even problematic if I ran high gain - the guitar would squeal in between notes that were played. I wasn't even running my amp at the time (a 1962 Fender Tremolux with a Chandler Tube Driver for distortion), with the volume much past 2 or 3 most of the time, and it still squealed. I figured that since the pickup coils weren't potted, I'd epoxy the coils like I did (with good success) on another guitar I'd owned (it threw me for a loop at first, when I saw that the Jag's sawtooth pickup mounts were basically set up heightwise, by rubber bumpers under them). Epoxying didn't work, the thing still squealed. I decided to replace the pickups with Seymour Duncan Quarter Pounders in both the neck and the bridge (both pickups squealed to a greater or lesser extent). It cost me $180 for those pickups, and it didn't do a damn thing for the squealing when any kind of gain was used. I then realized that something else was causing the squealing. I never was able to track down what was causing the squealing. The guitar was almost unusable in a live situation, so I got rid of it (I traded it towards an SG). It's too bad. My Jag really had a unique sound when it wasn't squealing. And, when the Quarter Pounders were installed, it just plain slammed when I ran any kind of gain, and kept on playing to prevent sqealing. I was pretty disappointed in my Jag. I really had high hopes for it. But at the time, I couldn't afford to have several guitars, so in order to get a guitar I could gig with, I had to get rid of the Jag.