ksdaddy

I guess if you're looking for "edge", then of course they don't last very long. But in this particular case, they still sound fine to me, and if I were to change them, I'd go through a period of a month or more where they would sound too metallic to me. Then once they broke in nicely, I'd be right back where I already am, just $30 poorer.

I bought a 1983 Precision in 2003 or 2004, can't remember. I immediately put a set of mom n pop D'Addario roundwounds on there, normal gauge, 45-100 maybe? XL something. Nothing weird. They're still on there. They sound fine.

I retired in August but now I go back to my old work (USDA) 4 hours every Monday morning as a volunteer. I am a bit of an archivist, historian, and many times do the equivalent of title searches. All field offices maintain records of farm data for Farm Bill compliance. When the farmers come in for a loan, for example, one of the hoops they must jump through is following a Conservation Plan on highly Erodible Land. In this area, it's very easy to do, given the soil types and the crops we grow. They'd have to TRY to not comply. Problem is, sometimes these tracts of land change hands and the trail gets cold. Imagine someone buying a used Gibson and not having a COA. Imagine someone with the wherewithal and diligence to track that document down, because there is a paper trail and if it exists, I will find it, even if it was filed under Fender. That's kinda my job. Organizing old farm info. It's only 4 hours every Monday so it's not like it's hurting my retirement. There's some talk of them hiring me (paid position) a couple days a week to do the same, and then go do field work in the summer, doing checkouts on irrigation systems, pipelines, waterways, GPS-ing stuff.

Nope. You're fine. I did a free table several times last summer but since then I have bought many MANY junk lots at auctions. I make my money back (and sometimes a profit) from the shiny stuff I might find at the bottom of the boxes. The rest goes into a room over the garage. I plan to have a big yard sale next summer but I doubt many things will be priced more than $1.00. Whatever doesn't sell will go on a free table. And put the straws out too. If nobody takes them THEN you can toss them with a clear mind.

Fortunately we have never lost power for "days". Some did in the southern part of Maine when we had a big ice storm in '98 or so. People lost power for 4-5 days I think. The worst I ever recall was about 12-15 hours and that was 3-4 years back. I have a propane heater like this: I bought it a few years ago when my son in law was putting a transmission in my plow truck. A 20 lb tank would go about 24 hours. I know they're supposed to be used outside but when it's a matter of keeping the pipes from freezing, I'll use it. Ditto for the kerosene heater. I don't LIKE to use it but I also don't care much for fire extinguishes or defibrulators. Back in the 80s I heated my little house with a Sanyo kerosene heater for days/weeks at a time when I had no money for fuel. Stupid, yes, but we do what we gotta.

Supposed to be -25f over the next couple days. With 25 mph winds. I’ve got no plans to go anywhere. My only fear is if the power goes out. We have oil fired baseboard heat with no backup. We only have one chimney so the insurance company won’t allow tapping in a wood stove. Not that I would have a clue how to properly run wood heat. I do have a propane heater with two 20lb tanks plus a kerosene heater and couple gallons of K-1. I seriously think the next major purchase for the house should be a generator.

I had a 1974 L6-S Deluxe about 20 years ago. Bought it on ebay for $285. It needed a nut and the pickguard was made from aluminum. Also the vol/tone knobs were wrong. I made a bone nut for it, procured the correct knobs on ebay, and ordered a custom guard from dasbootguy (remember him?). I thought what the world needed was a black L6S with a white guard. Sold it a few years later. Last time I saw it, it was for sale in Florida with new frets.

My wife and I have been hooked on "To Catch a Smuggler" and "Mysteries of the Abandoned" lately. I watch Jerry Springer (reruns) and Steve Wilkos but she gets bored with that really quickly. Same old, same old. I agree, but sometimes I have a yen to see skanky hillbilly chicks. I do enjoy crappy old movies. This week I tried watching Superfly. Bored me to tears, couldn't finish it. Also watched Dolomite. The acting was so bad I couldn't HELP but watch it all. And there were many Cadillacs...

Lol and all you have to do is grind a little off the handle and she can have it back! One more thing (devil's in the details): Give the super glue 24 hours. It is misleading how it seems to solidify quickly. It ain't solid. It'll file and sand a lot better the next day. Fortyearspickin you are absolutely right to use epoxy as long as you can work it into the crack. I repaired a Gibson Firebrand LP with an ebony board. The nut had been pried off and it tore a chunk of the fretboard off. About 30% of the area between the nut and first fret was splintered off and the pieces were gone. I mixed ebony dust and epoxy, (heavy on the dust so it was super grainy and horrifically thick). I dammed it off at the nut. Lots of filing afterwards but it was pretty much invisible.

Got a belt sander? Got an old ebony bridge or a violin tailpiece? Make your own dust. I brush off the belt first, then hold the crap wood onto the belt with one hand and hold a clean sheet of paper at the other end to catch it. Clean the crack with some lacquer thinner, pack the dust in there, add a drop of super glue, repeat if necessary, then file and sand it smooth. Always pack the dust in the first and add the glue. It doesn't work as well the other way around.

Alex is a perfect example of someone who I liked until he got political. I always liked when he hosted SNL. Maybe that's all I have to base it on, now that I think of it. Wouldn't it be wonderful if people in the entertainment industry kept their mouth shut about politics and hot issues and just concentrated on their craft? As to the incident he is /was involved in, there were so many mistakes made. Every link in the chain is to blame.

Gibsons also went from a tapered peg head to a uniform thickness around 1952. About that same time, they also stopped using black cloth tape on the inside of the rims.

Whitefang, how is the coating on the cast iron? There’s a whole art to building and maintaining the “seasoning”. I don’t know much about it but I’ve seen people cook eggs n stuff and never stick. We have one cast iron frying pan and have not mastered the seasoning thing.

Yesterday I picked up my weekly load of auction crap. In there was a brand new cake pan celebrating the year 2000. I'm holding on to it. When the year 2000 comes around again, I'll be ready.

Wasn’t me.

1970-75 based on the serial number. Closer to 1970 based on the reddish sunburst.

My favorite. I typically use the rounded edges though. The pointy end is there if I need it. Big thick sound, not flappy or clicky.

I've never been in a GC. I don't even know where the nearest one is. Maybe Portland. But that's like... North Massachusetts or something. Their online listings for used/vintage stuff is horrible. Not even up to a newborn ebayer level. I did interact with one dealer in TX about a pre-CBS Jaguar. Nice guy. He was rigid on the price but after a couple weeks he emailed me and dropped $500 or so. I didn't buy it, holding out for 25.5 scale.

Re: Louvin Bros. Ira and Charlie took plywood that was being used as a base for one of their kids’ train set or racetrack and made the devil. They set it up in a gravel pit or some-such and started fires. Then it started raining. The photographer wanted to bail because he didn’t want his equipment getting wet. Ira probably threatened his life if he dared leave. Ira was a firecracker.

There was a model called the ES-135 around that time, looked exactly like a 125 but it had trapezoid inlays like yours. Not to be confused with the ES-135 produced in the late 90s/early 00s.

There was an estate auction in 2012 of Les’s stuff. The catalog was a couple hundred pages. You would not believe how much stuff that man had. And so many higher end guitars hacked to the point of no return because he wanted to tinker. I bought a rack mounted headphone amp several years after the auction. It’s on a shelf in my office.

Pee Wee’s Big Adventure had a dog named Speck.

You're absolutely right. I worked for NRCS and the local conservation district for 26 years and had my share of interactions with project engineers. When timber bridges are designed, we could choose from a short list of acceptable species, and within that choice list, there may be more latitude as to dimension... a 6x6 tamarack might be considered as good as an 8x8 western pine, for example (I made that up, by the way). But not many people driving over that bridge care what species it is. It only mattered to the engineers. Well, I made this banjo from a single stair tread...

I believe it's just before the neck is 'married' to the body.