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Bonus BUCKS from Musicians Friend for your BASS

By Buck on January 20, 2009

Hi Di Ho boys and girls.

Earn Up to $150 in Bonus Bucks at MusiciansFriend.com (exp: 2/3)

What can I tell you about Musicians Friend other than they deliver to my house religiously…

I have a fun project for you to hone your guitar modification skills…. Buy a cheap bass from
and make it to play like a Fender…..first you will need to cut a new nut (most likely cut it’s cut too deep) that’s been my experience

Radius the new nut to the finger board, (see Stew Mac for Proper Tools) leave it high for later adjustments, next don’t be afraid to loosen the truss rod, (back bow) 1/8 turn at a time. Radius your bridge to the finger board..when you adjust your truss rod, don’t be surprised if it takes a day to re-adjust. It’s a cat and mouse game. I started with string buzzing, well past the 6th fret. I have dialed it down to the last 3 frets….

(G to E on the low string) Do not get discouraged, (1/8th turn at a time of the truss rod) Keep on twinking…slow and smooth is good..similar to Sailor Jerry Rum…. and remember, Rogue, Ibanez, Fender…etc… they all make cheap stuff.

If you are diligent you will make a bass guitar that will AMAZE, as did Mickey Rourke on the Golden Globes, but ask my wife about his speech…. anyhow.. back to.. slow and determined, it takes time to whip these puppies into shape, you can show the money mongers they really do make good stuff..

You can substitute reasonably priced thrifty best bang for the BUCK

or any other PC term that stokes your ego for cheap, but remember.. I am talking about “playability” sound wise you have to change the pickups..

Visit, Larry or Seymour…

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Categories: guitar

Fender Bullit

By Buck on January 11, 2009

There are so very many Fender Products and I forgot about the Bullit – so Boy’s and Girls, I am back!

Sorry for my absence, layoff’s at work and long winter mix of snow my work hours left me with little desire to do what I enjoy – and there is something wrong with that.

I modified a Fender Bullit back in the early 80′s for my friend Jack L – from Eleven Eleven, he gave it back to me this past weekend and said the volume pot was going bad. I told him I would replace the pot no problem, well after removing the strings and face plate exposing the electronics, WHOA! I had forgot what I did for wiring.

I had a cap and resistor wired in the pot and ground wires everywhere. Luckily I used a DiMarzio Poat (remember it’s 20 years ago0 so being shocked at my past wiring prowness, I thought let’s try and clean it. Bingo Bob’s your uncle, black crud everywhere. Although I had to change out the input jack, I changed the location doing the mod thru the side of the body.

Put it back together, I let my son Jake road test it and our Fender/Jackson Bullit was back barking with authority!

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Categories: Guitar Modifications

Gibson GA30-RVS Amp

By Buck on November 27, 2008

Creating the environment for guitar modifications, with it being Jimi Hendrix’s Birthday, I say crank up the tunes as loud as you can and get to work on that Foxy Lady.

Currently I am working on a Gibson GA30-RVS Amp this is the one that was made in England by Trace Elliot, bought it at our local pawn shop and let me say, it’s heavy…in more ways than one!

The amp played marvelously when we first purchased it, but looking into changing the tubes we found that the EL-84 tube sockets were burning – after contacting the people at Gibson, we were told this is due to an inferior material used in the socket. We found some sockets at British Audio Service right here in my back yard actually – Sugar Grove, Illinois.

I had a friend of mine – Alan – who is an electrical engineer re-wire the sockets, it was beyond my scope of taking the amp apart to actually get at the sockets. We are still experiencing quite a bit of static (the sound of crackling paper) when the amp is turned on.

Currently going through the amp and checking all the connections and solder joints, as there were a lot that were un-soldered. I’ll keep you all posted on the progress as this amp is much to important to leave on the shelf, as well as my son would not let me, it is his favorite amp. So I am “burning the midnight lamp” that Jimi spoke of on Electric Ladyland

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Categories: Amplifiers & Amps

Epiphone SG Junior – Revisted

By Buck on October 19, 2008

The Epiphone SG Junior is up and running, after finding all the necessary missing screws and what not.

It Plays…The God’s of Guitar Music at work again.

I twinked the neck, after years of no strings and neglect, it needed it, Truss Rod Stuff..

I have yet to set the intonation on it, my son is still playing around with it. Jake ended up filing the frets, (he’s quite good at that, go figure) New input Jack, you don’t want to know that story.

I am thinking of adding magnets (Stewart MacDonald) to spice it up the generic pickup and a monster is born. A side note to magnets, you know all those old hard drives that you are not sure what to do with that came out of old junk computers.. there are two powerful magnets buried within those bad boys. I just gutted about 8 hard drives that were laying around and am going to start the process of testing those out. Stay tuned…

Remember, one man’s junk is another man’s gold.. I am that other man.

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Categories: Guitar Modifications