Black Dog

Those all look nice. I haven't done that many but here they are.

Just got some specs from WW before they shipped. It has a '60s V2 neck that is .82/.92 and it weighs an amazingly light 7.98 pounds! It's coming Fedex overnight so I should have it tomorrow We'll see if I want to change or not. I must say it looks pretty darn good as is. Kinda like a root beer vanilla ice cream float. I haven't had one of those for a while.

Good eye! It is indeed Root Beer! I've already got a Gold Top so I didn't really want another gold guitar. I thought about Ox Blood, and I almost went with that but obviously picked this instead. I like how it turned out, though I am wondering how it would look with black plastics.

They're like potato chips. You always want one more.

Thanks. Yeah, they did me right on the top. It was spec'd out as a "lightly quilted" top but it looks like they missed the "lightly" part. I'm not complaining. ☺️ '

This just arrived at Wildwood for me and hopefully will ship out today. It's a R6 but obviously with a quilt top, so it's not really historically correct but they still serialized it as a R6 anyway.

good stuff

The '54 Custom was the first LP to get the ABR bridge. It is historically correct. Beautiful guitars. That particular guitar has a Nashville bridge though and since it's not solid mahogany it's far from historic spec. The only thing remotely historic on that one is the staple p/u.

The pickup ring is mounted to the body with the four screws in the corners. The pickup is mounted to the ring by the single screws in the middle of the pickup ring with springs to allow for height adjustment. That allows for some movement of the pickup which is normal.

I've seen lots of R8's from that era and they don't have that gap. Also, the neck binding looks thick, way thicker than a Custom Shop historic. Looks very odd. I'd be interested to see pictures of the headstock (front and back) and the control cavity.

Something doesn't look right there. Exactly what model is this supposed to be? You said it's a "custom standard", do you mean Custom Shop Standard, and if so is it supposed to be a R8? The gap between the end of the fretboard and the neck p/u is not right. Also, I don't see nibs. Do have some pics of the front and back of the headstock ?

The Freeway switch is great. However, for a Custom Shop '57 BB, you have to have the switch cavity routed a little deeper to allow it to fit. That's gonna be a deal breaker for most people. The next best solution is to wire it the Peter Frampton method (like what Wmachine has above). That has 3 volume and one master tone pot with the middle p/u wired directly through the old neck tone pot so it does no go through the switch, it's always on and you just control it by the pot. The switch then controls the neck and bridge p/u in the standard fashion.

That's totally normal. The tail pieces fit loosely in the screws. If you top wrap they will tilt because they're not really designed for that.

That was about the best the 80's had to offer (and that's not saying much) but I'll take GM car from the muscle car glory days hands down.

GSX Stage I?? LOL. You never know.

This morning I'm gonna rewire my Epi Black Beauty and replace the pots. I'm getting it ready to sell so I've been playing it a little. I have Emerson Pro pots in it and I hate them. They don't have enough resistance to rotating the shaft, they feel cheap. More importantly, I don't like the taper, way to steep, almost linear. I could just sell it as is but I'm gonna fix it.

I've never personally used super glue on a nitro finish, only poly. But, I was talking with a Gibson Repair and Restoration person named Todd a while back and he suggested using it saying that they use it for chips and dings on Gibson nitro finishes. Gluboost has an awesome line of products specifically for guitar finishes including Nitro. https://gluboost.com/

There you go right there. I'm not very good at finish work either so I try to stay away from it. If you don't know what you're doing it's easy to screw things up.

I would leave all that alone. IMO, that finished has aged and worn to the point that blending in any touch up work is going to be difficult. It almost seems like it would need a whole refinish. Although maybe just a good buffing and re-shoot with clear?? Dunno. All of that would be labor intensive and costly. Super glue is a valid method for small chips and dings but it looks like you have more than that going on there. Just think of it this way, you have some Tom Murphy type aging there and you got it for free!

If they went from 10's to 9's that would result in less tension and tend to flatten the neck. If you have a problem with your neck relief it's that it's too much, hence having to lower the bridge excessively. Just simply check the relief and see if it looks OK. If it's flat then you may have a real problem (unlikely), if you have a lot of relief then that's probably it (more likely). Put a capo on the 2nd fret and then hold down the low E at the 16th fret. There should be just a little space at the 8th fret, or so.

I did all the normal things then put my old Epi Black Beauty back together to get ready to sell. When I was hot rodding it out a couple years ago, I screwed up the finish a bit around the control knobs. In the process of trying to fix it, I made it worse (I'm good with mechanics and electronics, not finish work). Worked on it for a while and got it a lot better but then I got frustrated and put it a away. Pulled it out the other day and it didn't look as bad as I remembered it, so I'll sell it as a "basket case" as is.

Lots of nice kitties. Here's ours.

That's a super nice collection of Custom Shop splendor. Nice to see that I'm not the only Les Paul addict. They do look good with the PG off, not necessarily more or less than on, but I'm just so used to resting my fingers on the PG I think I need it.

worked. yep.

That is a beautiful Custom.