AcrylicSuperman wrote: ↑Sat Apr 20, 2019 12:56 pm
Amon 7.L wrote: ↑Sat Apr 20, 2019 12:28 pm
Eagle eye you.
Yessir. Only 3 screws on top.
I never bothered checking the top of the pickguard. All my brain focus was on the lower guitar body and never cared to give it a better inspection.. "
afterall.. it's just a STANDARD Mustang pickguard with a SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT shape on the bottom"
We should get in touch with the guy who perfectly replicated Van Halen's guitar by just using pics as a reference.. He would do the job before I could even tell him "well, the only ones I like in guitars are the competition stripes"
I dont know if your computer skills could tell you otherwise, but it looks to me like your pickguard template could still work. To my eyes, the screws seem to be in the same exact locations. It just looks like you would have to leave out the two screws immediately to the left and the right of the top middle screw.
Just to give you an idea of what this project is on my CAD board.. Trust me, I've got all kinds of revision's tweaks using all the better pics I've gathered online, then moving onto photoshop and then 3d cad modelling to sort out which version fits said references from different angles. It's proving to be very difficoult, I can tell you that.
Take a look at this madness:
From left to right you see from the production model up to my latest revision (#10 so far, doing tests)
This is just a sample to give you an idea that changes are subtle but definitely there and some tweaks look optically matching up until you go overlapping things out. If you don't have a picky eye, each one would be "as close as you can get" with this limited references
I did a test using a straight mustang lower horn as I thought fender would have done at the early stages but, believe me, it doesn't match. The lower horn is a completely different thing.
This last pic -out of many other more I did- will give a deeper insight.
In short, no matter how much you want it to be "just a mustang lower horn with a bit of jaguarish outline".. It's not.
I'm now 90+ % sure that it's a complete redrawn. Even the snapshot taken from R.E.M. "Let me in" video close-up (which is by far the highest quality pic available and also the less distorted by perspective) confirmed my hypothesis.
Production model has been tweaked A LOT and is close to match a Mustang in regard of the general lower horn area.
Prototype has this peculiarities:
1) Much fatter butt;
2) the lower horn is different and longer than a Mustang counterpart of things like 10ish mm;
3) the offset between upper and lower cutaway is diffent from production model;
4) the metal control plate is not in a standard mustang angle, it actually angles down towards the lower bum;
5) the pickguard perfectly mirrors the geometry of the lower horn (production doesn't, it's as clear as the midday sun);
6) the butt is roundier and fatter in the control plate area;
7) upper side of the pickguard has only 3 screws VS standard 5 you have in both mustang and production JS siblings.
I most certainly forgot something but.. it will come out, sooner or later.
EDIT:
8 ) of course, the upper horn is another devil that differs from production.
EDIT-part deux:
9) plain white pickguard (1 ply or 3?) for prototype, white perloid for production.