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Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Sun Sep 27, 2020 3:04 pm
by papa_hotel_delta
So before I find out the hard way. . .

Telecaster body + Fender subsonic baritone neck + Bigsby B5

Is this a functional combination? I'm actually worried about string length for G,B and E, I know the string lengths (from D'Addario) but I can only guesstimate the string run on the guitar without all the components in hand. Can anyone provide photo evidence of this combination working?

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2020 11:21 am
by fuzzjunkie
I have not seen that setup on a Tele body, but the TV Jones Spectra C baritone guitar handles that just fine.

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2020 12:46 pm
by papa_hotel_delta
I guess there is limited risk in trying, at worst I will have to flip the neck and end up with AFT (another fucking telecaster).

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:10 pm
by Guy Guyatone
I have made a tele body into a baritone with a Aria medium-short scale bass neck. You might run out of room at the bottom for the Bigsby:
Image

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2020 4:01 pm
by Gordon
Guy Guyatone wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:10 pm
I have made a tele body into a baritone with a Aria medium-short scale bass neck. You might run out of room at the bottom for the Bigsby:
But PHD is using a conversion neck, the bridge stays at the same place (and therefore is no issue for a Bigsby).

As for the string length, it should be okay, there's many baritone with Bigsbys (Gretsch, Eastwood, ...), so I assume it'd be fine.

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2020 9:10 pm
by Redstar30
I have a Warmoth 28 5/8” baritone conversion neck on my JM modeled after a tele deluxe. It has a B5 Bigsby on it. I recently put a pack of Ernie Ball 62 gauge baritone strings on it. All the string lengths were fine until I got to the high B string (12 gauge). That string was about a Centimeter too short. :fp:

Luckily I found another 12 gauge string in an opened d’addario pack in my parts drawer that was the correct length.

Let me know if you need me to post the measurements from the B5 to the tuner.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9h0CyunoTI ... lsrdg4vruf

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2020 10:35 pm
by papa_hotel_delta
Redstar30 wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 9:10 pm
I have a Warmoth 28 5/8” baritone conversion neck on my JM modeled after a tele deluxe. It has a B5 Bigsby on it. I recently put a pack of Ernie Ball 62 gauge baritone strings on it. All the string lengths were fine until I got to the high B string (12 gauge). That string was about a Centimeter too short. :fp:

Luckily I found another 12 gauge string in an opened d’addario pack in my parts drawer that was the correct length.

Let me know if you need me to post the measurements from the B5 to the tuner.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9h0CyunoTI ... lsrdg4vruf
The Fender subsonic neck is 27.5 scale length so it sounds like it should be safe.

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Tue Sep 29, 2020 8:26 pm
by spindizzy
I have a Japanese Fender Baritone Special (the Jaguar bodied one 27" scale length) which ran a TOM bridge and tail piece.
I've switched it out to a B5 mounted on a vibramate and a roller-bridge. Works perfectly.

I'm using the d'addario xl157 14-68s on it and they're more than long enough.

I also took the opportunity to change it to a GFS Surf 90 in the bridge (Dynasonic lookalike) and their Goldfoil in the neck.

Made the whole guitar much nicer, sorry no photo hosting to share images at the moment.

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Thu Oct 01, 2020 8:01 pm
by papa_hotel_delta
spindizzy wrote:
Tue Sep 29, 2020 8:26 pm
I have a Japanese Fender Baritone Special (the Jaguar bodied one 27" scale length) which ran a TOM bridge and tail piece.
I've switched it out to a B5 mounted on a vibramate and a roller-bridge. Works perfectly.

I'm using the d'addario xl157 14-68s on it and they're more than long enough.

I also took the opportunity to change it to a GFS Surf 90 in the bridge (Dynasonic lookalike) and their Goldfoil in the neck.

Made the whole guitar much nicer, sorry no photo hosting to share images at the moment.
I just installed a new GFS telecaster bridge pickup in another body to discover the coil is shorting. Thats a first for me, they seem pretty good about returns but I might just strip it and rewind it myself.

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Thu Oct 01, 2020 10:51 pm
by spindizzy
I did the PU swap about 6 years ago and they've been fine for me. The Japanese Baritone special comes with the Dragster humbuckers which did nothing for me (or the guitar), I wanted something with more single coil flavour and the GFS PUs did the job very interestingly in a humbucker sized package.
It's a black guitar with matching headstock and a black pickguard so the bigsby and PUs look quite nice on it if I do say so myself.
Heavy though.

Re: Baritone + Bigsby B5

Posted: Fri Oct 02, 2020 12:27 am
by garyptaszek
Holy cow! Sorry to hijack but, more about this please!
Guy Guyatone wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:10 pm
I have made a tele body into a baritone with a Aria medium-short scale bass neck. You might run out of room at the bottom for the Bigsby:
Image