Not sure of your point - 13’s on a Strat are bridge cables compared to the 9’s and 10’s that most use, and when you do the bending that SRV did. And 13’s are labeled “Medium” on acoustics string packs.
wguy123 - very fun and cool guitar. Totally worth the work - and the advice folks have shared about doing work on semi-hollows are typically the way to go. Those gold-foil front pickups have a lot of fans - and if it turns out one of them has issues, I believe there are modern replacements. Per the others, check the wiring and pot’s first before you look at switching out pickups…
Thanks for all the advice guys. I hadn’t thought about not having easy access to all the parts and the difficulty with getting things in and out. I’ve dinked around with the Hondo but it has nice panels to open and get at the stuff. I played with the Harmony more last night and even with only the back pickup I can have fun. It is a different playing experience though. Strings are a lot higher (more like my Guild) but it does have a thin neck. Intonation seems to be pretty good. Fretboard seems to be flat with no obvious dead spots. Frets are like new. I don’t think this guitar was ever played much but I have no idea of it’s history.
I forgot to mention the feedback! My hondo has to be at pretty extreme volumes to get feedback but this hollowbody squeals at low volumes if you aren’t careful.
Getting your pickups and wiring right can address a lot of that. Beyond that, well, how loud to you play and with how much gain? But until you get the electronics sorted out, you can’t dig into that.
Advice for the ages, Chefguy. I’m a fan of letting the experience show and not sweating the dents and dings of life. we all get scars from our experiences and our guitars should be the same. Having said that I really don’t like “relic-ing” as it seems to me like being a poser. I get that some people want to make a perfect replica of SRV’s Strat for example, but do it the way he did and play the snot out of it…
The Cube is a nice, clean amp. Now you have to find a nice, dirty one like a Mack, Ceriatone if you like DIY or a Fender Reverb… Sorry, I like spending other people’s money…
Just to clarify: this isn’t at all the same as the way an acoustic sounds, unfortunately. I vastly prefer the sound of a mic, even on stage, as long as it doesn’t need to be too loud. For the most part, we don’t use pickups on electric-acoustics because we like the sound, we do it for less feedback and not needing to hold still in front of a mic, plus the reduced hassle all around.
If you do any recording, try this: stick your favorite mic in front of the guitar, and also record the pickup, as a stereo pair. Then use a Mid-Side codec plugin and convert LR to MS. That’ll give a nice stereo image which collapses perfectly to mono by cancelling out whatever you use as the Side channel. Pick your favorite of the two (mic or pup; I’d usually pick mic) as the Mid channel.
Well, there’s only a gazillion things that can make a high E string buzz. Some folks just like the action so low it’s inescapable, and I’ve known really great guitarists who set up that way and it sounds great when they play it. Works far better for solid body electrics played with lots of juice. Not so good on hollowbodies, and really horrid on acoustic!
Sometimes I wonder whether my wife would rather see me walk into an actual porn shop.
It’s a good $0.02, but long ago I got a 65 Jazzmaster (with replacement Strat neck) as part of a 3-way deal (it gave the previous owner the money to buy my guitarist’s amp so he could upgrade.) I wouldn’t have predicted it but it became my favorite electric. It has a trem bar but I’m fussy about tuning, so I left it locked down (on this model, you just screw in screws) for FIFTEEN YEARS. Then one day on a lark I tried the trem and LOVED it. I kicked myself for leaving it off all those years. Of course, this isn’t a dive-bomber trem bar, it’s one that’s only good for subtle effects, which is what I love best – and it doesn’t affect the tuning! So, before you decide, be sure to try it out to see if you just might want to be a tremolo bar user. Also, if this one doesn’t suit you, don’t assume none of them would. There’s a big variety!
Yeah, we knew that from what you said. It’s the other ones that are in question. I really like the Texas Specials, but also really like a cleaner tone too. If I had a strat with Specials I think I’d need two Strats! (Currently I don’t have any … don’t get me started or you’ll be hearing from my wife …) They’re killer pickups, but they’re far from the be-all. I’d be tempted to put just the stock middle pup, or perhaps just the stock neck pup back on, just for grins sometime. It’s an easy job as long as you don’t have to solder a wire to a pot housing: I’d cut a lead rather than fuss with that (it takes a good hot iron and a bit more skill).
Don’t worship 'em, play 'em!
I agree with WordMan. 13’s and even 12’s are heavy as heck for a Strat. For electrics, 10 is labeled “light” but it’s pretty much typical for solidbodies, except for folks who go lighter. I believe 11 is labeled “medium” but those and heavier are probably seen on less than 5% of solidbody guitars. Maybe it’s more popular since SRV, but still a minority. I like 10’s, except on my fat archtop, where I have a rather odd set: flat-wound 11’s, with a plain G string. Sadly, I haven’t found anyone who makes half-rounds in 11, though D’Addario made them in 12 and 10! It’s been a while since I looked. I use 13’s on my dreadnaught, and the beefiest strings I can find on my classical. Light-top heavy bottoms (52-10) on my National “LPC” (cheap Les Paul copy, from the 60’s).
Doing more testing with the Harmony. On rear PU only, not too bad noise wise and doesn’t feedback easily. Tone and volume knob both work but are stiff. Front PU only cranked up you can hear some output over the really loud buzz. Only on both PU’s do you get the really bad feedback.
Where do people get replacement screws? Just at the hardware store? I did that with my hondo for some screws that were stripping out but they don’t look great. Maybe I didn’t look hard enough (it’s been many years since I did that). I can tell looking at the screws holding pick guard on and the selector switch that it would be good to replace them if I pull them.
I use 11-52 on my electrics; it’s not as rare as you might think. I have skinny fingers and a light touch, so anything heavier would be getting difficult, but I really like the stiffer feel of heavier-than-usual strings. Slows me down a bit, makes me play properly. Lighter strings make lead breaks too easy.
Pretty much. Find one of those places like Ace or especially Orchard that stocks a lot of weird fasteners. Though in my experience the screws in guitars aren’t that unusual, but sometimes you want a finish that doesn’t look like a hardware store screw, black maybe.
FWIW, I have a 12 set on my Strat right now, with an 11 high-E, so I can play in normal tuning rather than dropping a half-step like SRV (if you use a 12 high-E, it breaks when you tune it up to standard E). I’m doing that because I like how nice the guitar sounds when played clean (or slight grit), and really, on a Strat the trem helps you out with bends, so those aren’t that hard, but obviously harder than with a set of 10s. I had to add five springs to the trem assembly to get the bridge to flatten, and it looks like I should probably change the neck relief a bit too, but I hadn’t gotten around to it. Mostly I’m really liking the tone of these bridge cables.
I have 11’s-52’s on my blackguard Parts-o-Tele, but have had 12’s on it in the past. I have no problem tuning up to pitch - that is what the strings are designed for. Reading that you get breaks sounds like an issue…?
I simply haven’t been playing much, if any, electric - focused on my acoustics, and currently, as I have mentioned, focusing on a Knopfler-esque fingerstyle approach. I am primarily playing my little, old Gibson, which, due to its small size and extremely light construction, I string with acoustic Lights - 12’s. Since I have been getting used to that string tension for this fingerstyle approach, I have thought about putting 12’s back on my Tele so I can try playing it the same way…
Just thinking out loud - this line of discussion got me thinking about it.
First off: Sorry for all the dumb questions. Second: Thanks for taking the time to answer my dumb questions
I found some videos from a crazy Canadian guy that is redo’ing a Harmony Rocket (Dave’s World of Fun Stuff is his youtube name). I haven’t watched all of them yet but he glosses over some of the take down and other steps. My latest dumb question: If I take all the strings off, will the bridge just fall off? It doesn’t seem like it is screwed into the body and his videos don’t show any screw holes when everything is off. If it does just fall off do you try to get it close to where it was when you put strings back on? It is currently a little askew compared to the bridge pickup and I’m guessing that would be for intonation (no way to adjust each string)…would that be a good guess?
These are on my Vinocaster (with Bigsby!) and I have to say I have been very happy with them.
Another possibility for those of you with the wandering trem tuning blues is what we did with my son’s Floyd Rose equipped Jackson V, which was to install a Hipshot tremsetter.
He plays all kinds of low, growly tunings like open C and drop A with bridge cables for strings, Dr DDT Heavy, I believe. The tremsetter has helped enormously , as has upgrading from the licence build to the real article.
Many bridges on archtops - hollow and semi-hollow - are “floating” - meaning they are just held down by string tension. When I got my Gibson L-7c, I was cautioned to change strings 1 at a time unless I want to make sure and carefully mark bridge position. When my son got his '50’s Harmony archtop acoustic, the first thing we had to do was take the bridge out of the case compartment, reassemble it and position it correctly.
If you are going to do work on it, then a couple of temp pieces of good masking tape should do the trick - put them around the current bridge position in a [ ] shape and you would be all set. Just don’t leave that tape on there for very long - you never know about cheap (I say that with love) guitar finishes…
Please tell me some of you know and love Ronnie Montrose’ guitar playing. His first LP with Hagar singing was played constantly during my high school years. (and it was produced by Ted Templeman and engineered by Donn Landee, who went on to work on Van Halen’s LP’s, so I can help thinking of all those connections and how Montrose was a blueprint that VH followed)…
Anyway, that link is a demo vid from a vintage guitar shop in Germany. It is not discussed on the vid, but Ronnie’s '58 'burst was apparently stolen, off stage, when he was playing in Edgar Winter’s group in the 70’s. It has apparently moved around a bit and may have been owned by famed Irish Les Paul man, Garry Moore, who also owned Peter Green’s Les Paul (and yes, I hope you all know who PG is - if not, look up Albatross, Oh Well, and The Super-Natural on YouTube).
Either way, here it is in a German shop. But wow, just listen to how it sounds. Les Paul’s through Marshall’s - is there a better tone??
Apologies if it’s been posted already in this enormous thread; all I had the time to do was make sure it hadn’t been mentioned in the last ten pages or so. Anyway, it’s the story of Mark’s six favorite guitars, or six most formative, as told to longtime friend (and Dire Straits bass player) John Illsley. Watching and hearing him play “Money For Nothing” on a Les Paul through a half-cocked wah pedal into a Fender Vibrolux made me love that song in a way I never did when it was new.
Good lord, that gave me a massive guitar stiffy. I put it on just to get it started and couldn’t stop. Thanks, man.
Of all the stuff Knopfler was doing, when he picked up the '61 Fiesta Red Strat - a Hank Marvin model, to be sure - and played that syncopated rhythm, I just about plotzed. Getting that sharp, rhythmic attack using just his fingers - and setting up that level of syncopation - sigh.
Sorry, I like spending other people’s money…