Crowyote Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 I FINALLY HAVE MINE! I shopped around online last week looking for a shop that takes the GE NAMM card. I found a few, but Rainbow Guitars gave me the best deal (including an expert setup) that I could possibly ask for. This guitar feels sooo much smoother than any of the models that I played at my local Sam Ash. The guitar is flawless and sounds very tonally rich. They did a fret dress and made sure the binding was all cleaned up and met each fret seamlessly, and they prepped the nut and saddle for my kooky custom string gauge. All for 10% off MSRP w/ free 2-day shipping and no tax! Thank you Rainbow Guitars! They had 3 left last I checked in case anybody else was looking for one. So I have a question for the more experienced Mid K players out there . . . do you find the nut width or string spacing to be different? I noticed that the "E.O.B." was listed as 2.234 as opposed to the standard 2.260. Specs I'm thinking of swapping out the pickups for P-rails and triple shots, and wonder if the different string spacing might throw things off. I'm glad to be part of the club! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RevDavidLee Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Excellent review Rev, I did not have to wait as long as you did but I am happy my guitar arrived in flawless condition. Thanks Doc! I am still spending all of my playing time with this guitar and I have a great brothel of wonderful pieces to pick from - it's just that I really truly am enjoying the hell out of playing it. It just feels good. Pretty soon I'll have to change the strings and still trying to decide whether to put some 10's on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RevDavidLee Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 I FINALLY HAVE MINE! I shopped around online last week looking for a shop that takes the GE NAMM card. I found a few, but Rainbow Guitars gave me the best deal (including an expert setup) that I could possibly ask for. This guitar feels sooo much smoother than any of the models that I played at my local Sam Ash. The guitar is flawless and sounds very tonally rich. They did a fret dress and made sure the binding was all cleaned up and met each fret seamlessly, and they prepped the nut and saddle for my kooky custom string gauge. All for 10% off MSRP w/ free 2-day shipping and no tax! Thank you Rainbow Guitars! They had 3 left last I checked in case anybody else was looking for one. So I have a question for the more experienced Mid K players out there . . . do you find the nut width or string spacing to be different? I noticed that the "E.O.B." was listed as 2.234 as opposed to the standard 2.260. Specs I'm thinking of swapping out the pickups for P-rails and triple shots, and wonder if the different string spacing might throw things off. I'm glad to be part of the club! Congratulations! Enjoy!!! I haven't noticed anything off or odd about the string spacing you mentioned. It just feels perfect in every way to me. I have no interest in changing out the pups - would probably devalue the guitar if it truly is a "limited edition" offering from Gibson, but it's your guitar and feel free to do whatever you want to it. If you plan on keeping it forever, any devaluation potential would not matter in that case. I would just play the thing for a few months and bond with it as is. You may well decide to not alter it. B) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaiser Bill Posted January 19, 2014 Share Posted January 19, 2014 Rev... I think you will find .010s are a lot better than the set they come with. I had a hard time playing it in tune. I must have a stronger grip than I thought, because most of the time it was out of tune with .009s Also the locking tuners didn't seem to like the .010s. I used the normal method for stringing the E & B strings...now it stays in tune without a problem. The other 4 strings are okay with those locking tuners. Thats just my experience with it... YMMV. Maybe I got a couple bum tuners. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vangoghsear Posted January 19, 2014 Share Posted January 19, 2014 I like 11's on mine, but they kind of defeat my reason for wanting the short scale neck: ease of playability. I'm thinking I'm going to change to 10's, but even with the 11's it plays easy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RevDavidLee Posted January 20, 2014 Share Posted January 20, 2014 Rev... I think you will find .010s are a lot better than the set they come with. I had a hard time playing it in tune. I must have a stronger grip than I thought, because most of the time it was out of tune with .009s Also the locking tuners didn't seem to like the .010s. I used the normal method for stringing the E & B strings...now it stays in tune without a problem. The other 4 strings are okay with those locking tuners. Thats just my experience with it... YMMV. Maybe I got a couple bum tuners. I have played it enough hours now that it's just about to the point where I'm going to need to change up the strings and I'll be putting 10's on it because that's what I use on everything and it's what I stock up on. Mine has held tune perfectly so far so I have no complaints to report. Maybe you need to lighten up on your sasquatch grip on that thing bro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crowyote Posted January 20, 2014 Share Posted January 20, 2014 Rev... I think you will find .010s are a lot better than the set they come with. I had a hard time playing it in tune. I must have a stronger grip than I thought, because most of the time it was out of tune with .009s Also the locking tuners didn't seem to like the .010s. I used the normal method for stringing the E & B strings...now it stays in tune without a problem. The other 4 strings are okay with those locking tuners. Thats just my experience with it... YMMV. Maybe I got a couple bum tuners. I had mine set up with the following gauges of Aurora strings: 12, 16, 18, 26, 36, 46. The guys at Rainbow Guitars supposedly filed the saddle and nut to fit these strings, and so far I'm only having slight drift on the usual suspects. My high E stays in tune perfectly tho. I might be moving the strings 3-6 up a gauge because they occasionally feel a little flimsy to me. I really am tempted to move my high E up to a .13 but I've been advisted not to, so I'm holding off for now. For those not in the know, Aurora strings are a coated string w/ an electrostatic-free coating. The old production of these strings was notable for having a tendency to flake after a short period. Now they are much more resistant to wear, and imo have the best tone of any strings. However, what I have noticed is that they have a slight tendency towards a bit of drift and can be very hard to dial in with a strobe tuner. I'm trying to pinpoint if this is a binding problem on most guitars or just a weird quality of the strings. It's hard to tell since I'm a masochist who likes to use heavier strings than most guitars are setup to handle per factory stock ; and I'm reluctant to leave my guitars with a tech for any length of time (and thorough techs who don't cost an arm and a leg seem to be hard to find). I started using Aurora's at Paul Vo's recommendation on my Moog Guitar, but now I use them on absolutely everything except my classical guitar. Personally, I can't possibly see why Gibson set these guitars up with such a wimpy gauge. It seems intuitive that the guitar need a heavier gauge to compensate for the lack of scale length. The heavier gauges in no way inhibits what I benefit most from in this guitar . . . the shorter distance between frets. Now I can shred like a madman through the middle of the neck and the middle of the higher register and hit the higher chord extensions with little to no wear and tear on my wrist. I also can make stretches I only wished for in the past. One other thing. I don't like the way that the pickups come stock with "the Ted Nugent method" of setting the pole-pieces completely flat and even with the bobbin. Every Midtown K guitar I've seen comes adjusted this way. I feel it doesn't shows off the quality of these pickups well and might be influencing me towards swapping them out. Of course, the other thing is I've grown attached to the way my choice of pickups and setup sounds. If I was playing with high volume that might be something different altogether. Paz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomse Posted January 21, 2014 Share Posted January 21, 2014 I have played it enough hours now that it's just about to the point where I'm going to need to change up the strings and I'll be putting 10's on it because that's what I use on everything and it's what I stock up on. Mine has held tune perfectly so far so I have no complaints to report. Maybe you need to lighten up on your sasquatch grip on that thing bro Hey Rev they are one nice guitar . I think string size is what you feel good with i have always played 10s on my guitars . So i think the best size is what you like. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crowyote Posted February 26, 2014 Share Posted February 26, 2014 Finally uploading a pic of my modified Midtown Kalamazoo. This baby now has White P-rails to match the binding set inside of Seymour Duncan Triple Shot Mounting Rings. Now I can switch the coils of each pickup to be in series or parallel with each other. I prefer the parallel sounds. I had my tech wire the push-pull pots for both phase reverse and series-parallel for the two pickups together. Now I can have both pickups set to parallel coils and have the pickups in series or with each other. In addition to being able to isolate each coil of the two pickups I now have nearly infinite tones coming out of this guitar. Les Paul, Tele, Jag, Fender, Casino, SG . . .not a problem, it's all there! My next step is to have the tuning machines replaced with Gotoh SGV510z locking 21:1 gear ratio tuners. I really hate the stock Grovers as the button of my G string goes loose all the time and they don't hold their tuning too well. I'm pretty sick of having to check my tuning every 5 minutes, but not much longer. Honestly, I like the way it looks and performs much better than stock now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaiser Bill Posted March 5, 2014 Share Posted March 5, 2014 I played mine two weeks ago on the gig for the second time. I didn't realize it until I was playing a solo on a western swing tune... but it has an inherent "jazz" sound. Forget the push/pull controls. For what I do live they are totally useless. For me its best to just use it OOB as we model builders say. (Out of the box). Nice guitar. Lots of compliments from the crowd on the appearance, and from the players on the sound as well. God how I wish it was an arch top rather than a bread board. I have Teles and Strats for that...LOL The only changes I've made to it are heavier strings, and Grover Imperial tuner caps. I don't care much for the locking tuners at all. ESPECIALLY on the high "E" and "B" strings. They constantly slipped....but they don't now that I've strung it in the traditional manner. Other than that it is a greatly appreciated gift. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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