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Alrighty! I found some time to work on the guitar today to try and figure out what's going on with the bridge pickup.

I took the pick guard off today and reflowed the solder joints on it. Didn't do anything.

Brought out the multimeter, tested the neck pickup and got a reading of about 6.5 or so. No reading on the bridge pickup. Damnit...

Took the cover off the bridge pickup and resoldered any and all solder joints I could find connected to said pickup. Plugged in a cable and did a tap test.

...

SUCCESS! Bridge pickup now works! Put it all back together and dang, sounds particularly good in the middle position, so I think I might just jam a piece of guitar pick into the switch cavity and keep it locked in the middle position.

WOOO! So there you go. For $70, I have a fully functioning guitar. I also have been using an import strat vibrato arm and it actually works quite well. It's far from the body, but It actually works well because it stays out of the way of my picking hand. This will work for now.

Man that's really clean, good find espically for the price.

Hey hey! Good work and well worth the effort. Not bad for a 'budget' guitar!

Grey wrote: ↑

Sun Apr 01, 2018 5:07 pm

Man that's really clean, good find espically for the price.

Definitely!

kosmonautmayhem wrote: ↑

Sun Apr 01, 2018 5:34 pm

Hey hey! Good work and well worth the effort. Not bad for a 'budget' guitar!

For sure! I've put more work into more guitars and got less in return. This thing is actually awesome! It'll see a fair bit of use.

It sounds really great too! That tuning really suits it. It's especially clear.

I'll get a better, non-phone recording of it sometime. It really does sound quite wonderful. There's a few obviously cheap elements to the construction, like the pots, switches, tuners, nut, and maybe bridge, but other than that everything is well-crafted at best elements and serviceable at it's worst. I'm really in no rush to change anything on it.

And you're right! It really does work well in that tuning and it's really nice and clear sounding. It actually sounds similar to my Jazzmaster when tuned down, perhaps with a bit more mid-range though. I'm happy with it.

Those things are easily updated and fun to change out.

The short clip reminds me of how my Jaguar sounds . - especially since I keep it tuned down most of the time.

kosmonautmayhem wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 02, 2018 8:50 am

Those things are easily updated and fun to change out.

The short clip reminds me of how my Jaguar sounds . - especially since I keep it tuned down most of the time.

For sure! I think my next move is to figure out how best to keep it in tune. Not sure if that means new nut, new tuners, or maybe just as simple as stretching the strings a bit more. Right now, it's nowhere near as stable as my Jazzmaster.

There's honestly a lot of crossover with the Jazzmaster/Jag world with this guitar, so that doesn't surprise me. The pickups themselves are constructed like a mix between a P90 and a Strat pickup, in any case.

A nicely cut nut and new tuners will do wonders for tuning stability.

Man...now I'm gonna have to watch out for one of these. Nice alternative to the JM / Jag world.

Definitely do! While I wouldn't spend the $600 + these go for nowadays, I'd definitely pay twice what I paid for mine.

Awesome find! Consider me jealous.

I've been very lucky with a lot of gear finds. Helps to know what to look for and to weigh pros and cons of taking chances.

Another great find was getting a Harmony Rocket for $100 a couple of years back... A mint Boss CE-2 for $30... Who knows what else...

$70 Canadian is less than $55 U.S.!

Crikey, what a deal!

hansbrinker wrote: ↑

Wed Apr 04, 2018 11:15 am

$70 Canadian is less than $55 U.S.!

Crikey, what a deal!

I know! I kind of stole this thing, didn't I? I justify these good deals because while I'm not a flipper (though I could flip it if I wanted to), I feel more satisfaction in knowing that I have rescued and rehabilitated the guitar. It probably hasn't been in this working condition for decades!

wow what a score!

I have to ask which shop did you get this in? (im a toronto guy as well).