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I bought a Mustang partscaster from the Offset classifieds at a price I could live with. Arrived intact with a brown stain and brushed on varnish. Bought a pearloid guard from another Offsetter and checked out the overall effect:

It looked OK but the finish was lumpy and the whole body felt uneven, so it had to go. The varnish came off fairly easily, chemical stripper on one side and a light touch with the heat gun on the other side, but the stain had penetrated the wood. The wood itself had been pretty unevenly sanded and felt wavy, so I tackled it gently to see if I could get it flat without taking too much off. Fortunately it came good pretty quickly.


The yellow primer and a bit of white in the neck pocket and cavities were the only remnants of the original finish.

Next step, sanding sealer and some very careful attention, followed by red lacquer to go with the pearloid. The 65 neck is in good shape apart from a loose fret and the holes from a Hagstrom style string retainer, which I've removed. Now waiting for tuners.

MatthewK wrote:

this looks absolutely awesome as it is... but, of course, the world needs another red Mustang.

I don't share your enthusiasm for walnut stain and sanding dings! And I have plenty of crappily finished guitars, I want this one to be nice.
I'll see how it looks with sanding sealer, how about that?

Great stuff! Can't wait to see it done up!

Damn, broken pickup means I need TWO now. I have some no-name alnico Strat pickups but would like something original.

Broken how? Get them rewound.

There are not a lot of options for that at this end of the world - once you add two way postage and the cost of winding it gets up toward the cost of a pickup. Plus only one came with it, so I need to buy one anyway, and a deal for two is likely to be better than a deal for one. But if a rewinding option comes up I agree it would be a good idea.

Ah fairdy dos. I thought you had a pair of broken ones and I didn't note you location. Catswhisker Pickups here was doing rewinds for £20 (not sure if he still does) - that's a very good deal. Do you get much Japanese stuff in Australia? Because the singles in my Matsumoku Hondo Lead II copy are some of the best I've heard.

I've got some alnico 5 no-name Strat pickups for now, and a MIJ Jag neck pickup I could adapt, so plenty to work with until I find a set of old ones. Or if they keep me happy I can just live with that!

That grain looked amazing with the brown finish. Are you finishing this in see-through red?

Personally I'd do it up in Oly white like it originally was, there's too many red stangs and not enough white-with-pearl IMO.

Interesting thoughts those. Was white-with-pearl ever a thing?
Problem is that I have two daughters into the idea of red, you know how influential chicks are when it comes to guitars.
I was pretty startled how good the grain looked too - thought it may have been a mahogany body actually - but no, it's poplar, with a mahogany stain. It would be very difficult to stain evenly now that I have sanded the ripples out of the body.

I don't recall olywhite+pearl ever being a stock setup but I could be wrong. I think it would look amazing, though.

Paint it what you want, and do a nice job. The world may be full of red Mustangs, but it is also full of guitars that people have screwed up. First, do no harm.

Well - it would have to wait, I will be away for three weeks! I've ordered a couple of vintage repros from Rose pickups, they did me a beautiful Jazzmaster set a while back, and they are very inexpensive.

Streak it with red and yellow dye, maybe some green. Finish it smooth gloss or satin

IRIE!

Oh, by all means paint it red or whatever color your lil girl wants it to be. I was only saying what I'd do personally, I think no matter what you end up coloring it, it's in better hands and shape now than it was before.

Keep us updated!