badbluesplayer

Could be ebony. If that model and year was supposedly spec'd with ebony, I'd assume it was unless proven otherwise. There's probably some scientific way of identifying it by looking at the endgrain with a magnifying glass. That's normally how wood experts do it with most species.

The Thrill is Gone - listen for the cow at the first break at 0:29 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSDvipj2mH0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjSE1q-XRYA

When Gibson got in trouble with the Government, it was about claims of illegally imported ebony from Madagascar. The Government agreed to defer prosecution on criminal charges and Gibson, in turn, agreed to certain terms that were, in part, confidential. Nobody knows what Gibson agreed to except insiders, but it almost certainly included certain limited restrictions on the use of ebony. My guess is that they may have agreed not to use ebony for a certain period of time as part of the settlement. Maybe five years, maybe ten years, but probably not forever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRWGIyjcm_A

Duh - I think you're right. [thumbup]

Yeah, I hear what you're saying. And I can't tell you for sure why this happens, but my experience is that ES-s with the ABR-1 bridge are done this way. I think it's the way they've done them for a long time, starting back when they couldn't always line everything up perfectly to start with and they had to have a way to accomodate manufacturing tolerances. It probably is because the neck fitting process on the ES's isn't as accurate as the solid body guitars with the newer Nashville bridge. It's not an error, it's just inside the manufacturing tolerance. Most ES guitars will have the saddles notched noticeably off center. Both of the ES-s I've owned were like that. If they're centered, it's just luck. How they can line up the Nashville equipped solid body guitars so well is a good question. Maybe they fit the neck first and then align the bridge and drill the anchor holes. The Nashville bridges have the saddles pre-notched right in the middle and that's how they always end up. I hear ya. It makes you wonder.

It's normal to have all the saddles notched off to the side like that. On ES guitars, Gibson installs the bridge and then lines up the strings with the neck and then notches the saddles as required to achieve the right alignment of the strings and the neck. Sometimes it turns out that the saddles need to be notched off center like yours.

My bad. The guy was so impressive I thought he was somebody special. I have no idea about the MLP forum, but my experience is that the members of this forum are very representative of the Gibson customer base. They may be the one single smartest base of Gibson customers ever assembled into one forum. The people you're talking about, the people who are new to the world of premium guitars, are not Gibson's base. They do what other people tell them to do. The problem that Gibson is having now, imo, is that they think the market is structured just like you say, where the customers aren't smart enough to do some research and ask around before they jump into something new. Gibson's business plan was to make guitars in the traditional way. You can't change that plan without negative consequences. The reason that these new features on the Gibsons are bad is that they ARE bad, not that they're perceived as bad. It's not a sales or marketing problem, it's a product design problem. It won't take too long for it to shake out. Once the squire and Epi players who are looking to upgrade find out that real Gibson people don't like the new models, they won't like them either. I'm just guessing, but I have a feeling that this is going to be a rough go at Gibson after this stuff.

Sheesh. Here's a dealer who likes the knobs but says the G force is absolutely unacceptable and the neck shape is unacceptable. But nice knobs. I don't like them but they look good on him though.

Yeah, what Larry said. Just stick that old bridge back on there when you get a new screw.

'12

Good Golly Miss Molly, Little Richard

Whee!! Big night, huh?

Great article. The only thing I would add is when you tighten the trussrod, it's good to loosen the strings temporarily just while you're tightening the trussrod and then bring the strings back up to tension. That way the trussrod nut won't be so stressed while it's being tightened. If you need to loosen the trussrod, then leaving the strings tensioned will help make it easier to loosen the nut.

Um, aren't maple necks supposed to have a brighter sound than mahogany? :unsure:

Nah - They don't have any flat pickup rings in their shop. The 339 has a fairly sharp curve in the top from the bridge to the neck. That's why using two pickup rings with the same slant doesn't work. A 335 doesn't have so sharp a curve and so you can get away with two rings with the same slant and it's not so noticable. Les Pauls don't have hardly any curve from bridge to neck, so they're fine. Figure it out from there. They sure can't be all "designed that way" if they're all designed different, no?

Yes - Keep all your guitars in a controlled environment if you can. The semi-hollows aren't that sensitive. The only thing I worry about is making sure the fretboard doesn't dry out so badly that I don't get fret sprout or cracked binding. Most guitars will never have a problem with fret sprout, but some will and it's difficult to see that the problem is developing until it's too late.

Aren't tea cups used as currency in Britain?

Really nice job!! [thumbup]

Knights in White Satin - Moody Blues

The jack goes in first - using a coat hanger wire to pull it through works well. Then the tone controls go in - still pulling a little on the jack. You can use tubing on the tone controls to pull them toward the correct holes. You have to wiggle the whole harness around as you push it in to make sure it's all in the correct shape with all the wires in the right places. You have to pull here and there on the harness as it goes in to make sure it's in the right place. As you pull on the jack and the tone controls the volume controls and switch go in. And finally the bridge pickup. You should be able to tease the controls onto their correct positions. A hooked piece of wire or some kind of dental pick tool helps to grab stuff through the holes and push it around. If you have tubing or strings on the controls, you should be able to pull them right into the holes. Controls without any tubing or string will have to be pushed and/or wiggled into place.

The stuff all goes in through the bridge pickup cavity and then you stick your fingers thru the f holes to work the stuff into place. Here's a 339.

My 339 is # CS74280 and it's a 2007, made in Memphis. 4280 is the production number. Not sure what the extra digit is (the 5) on Chris's guitar. I don't think they made 52,000 CS/Memphis guitars that year. Maybe.