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Epiphone S-310 Custom Re-Build - Strat-O-Tele


Aoresteen

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A few years back I bought an Epiphone S-310 Custom. It had Fender noiseless pickups in it.

 

http://forum.gibson.com/index.php?/topic/100080-ngd-epiphone-1994-s-310-custom/

 

epi_310_custom_front.jpg

 

I never did anything with the 310 Custom and it just sat. Last summer I started thinning the herd so I was going to sell it. The pick guard didn't look right so I dug deeper and pulled the pick guard and found a mess!

 

 

The prior owned had hacked up the inside to get the Fender noiseless pickups to fit. No way could I sell it in this condition :( . The ash wood had also cracked at the bridge pivot studs. The vibrato arm would damage it further. All I could do is to epoxy it up.

 

hacked.jpg

 

cracked_700.jpg

 

I would never trust this body with a whammy bar again. It needed to be a hard tail.

 

I used the pickups on a 1999 Stagemaster. What to do with the 310 body?

 

At the time I was listening to a lot of Chicago music. Terry Kath used a Telecaster with a humbucker in the neck. Maple neck. OK, let's do a Terry Kath inspired build.

 

terry-kath.jpeg

 

I had Pickguardian make a new white pick guard for it with a Telecaster bridge pickup and a humbucker neck. I filled 25 screw holes for the pick guard with hardwood tooth picks. It must have had 3 different pick guards on it.

 

screw_holes.jpg

 

I used a GFS Telecaster bridge pickup and a Tone rider Alnico 2 humbucker. I added a Blackhawk sticker but decided not to add all the Pignose stickers that Terry had on his Tele. I blocked the tremolo and put a 6mm cap screw in the trem arm hole so no one would be tempted to try and use a trem arm with it. I also added a new truss rod cover that says S-310 rather than the original one that says Gibson.

 

full_TC_310.jpg

 

body.jpg

 

pickups.jpg

 

I had Brown's Guitar Mill add a bone nut and they discovered that the neck need some serious fret work. It now plays like butter. One fine TK Strat-O-Tele!

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A few years back I bought an Epiphone S-310 Custom. It had Fender noiseless pickups in it.

 

 

terry-kath.jpeg

 

 

full_TC_310.jpg

 

 

Love it! Terry would be proud. First two times I saw him, he was playing an SG, so I always connected that guitar to him. The last time I saw him, he was playing a tele (and a firebird), not the one in your pictures, but still natural. Wonder if that was before he "modded" it?

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I was fortunate to have a couple of original S-300/S-310 pick guards on hand and I sent one to Pickguardian to use as a template. The new one they made fits perfectly.

Pretty cool mods you did there, Aoresteen. My oldest guitar which I've had for over 25 years is an Epi S-310. Among a bunch of other mods, I got a 3-ply pickguard for it from Pickguards.us. You have to get those S-310 pickguards custom-made because they're slightly smaller than regular Strat pickguards.
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