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Busy Summer of Repairs

30/6/2019

It's been another great month of repairs, along with the repairs covered in our blog posts this month, we've had many other guitars through the workshop.

Highlights include a vintage late 70's Tokai Hard Puncher, two different 80's Japanese Fender Stratocaster, a vintage Yamaha RGZ and a 1960's Yamaha classical originally brought in South Africa!

Remember we've never too busy to discuss any guitar/ bass repairs, customisations or restorations that you're thinking of having done and we'll be more than happy to help!

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Jim Root Fender Telecaster Mini Restoration

29/6/2019

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This cool Jim Root Fender Telecaster was recently in the workshop for a mini restoration, it was suffering from very high action, with worn frets because of it!
It also had had something spilt over it which had melted into the nitrocellulose lacquer!
We gave it a full setup and fret recrown, along with a slight hand polish to remove the visual worst of the melted/stained lacquer, but preserving the style of the guitar.
First job was replacing the dead battery, we've never seen a battery held in with expanding foam before, made removing it quite interesting!

The top photos show the condition of the frets once the strings were removed. Firstly the fingerboard was masked off, then the top of the frets are marked before the recrowning begins.
After the recrown, you can see the wear has been reduced, but the top of the frets have not been touched so their level is not affected.
After the hand fret polish, the micro abrasives polish the frets to a high shine, also smoothing off the frets and removing the wear slightly further. The end result is shiny, smooth frets that intonate correctly and allow easier bending!

Once all the work was done, the guitar was restrung and setup ready for the owner to enjoy!

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Ibanez SZ Customisation

26/6/2019

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This cool Ibanez SZ was recently in for some customisation, including new pickups with custom wiring, changing some hardware, fret polish, along with a setup and detail clean!
The customer had been after one for quite some time, and managed to purchase and early model second hand.
He wanted some customisation to make the guitar look like a later model and more to his liking. Firstly the headstock was treated to a 'facelift' with the machinehead hardware changed, the trussrod cover upgraded to the newer Ibanez one and the nut was stained black.

The previous owner had fitted EMG’s and their active circuit, this all needed to be removed to reinstall a passive circuit.

The custom rewire including two coil tap options and master series/parallel switching with push/pull pots getting a wide range of tones out of the newly fitted pickups. This configuration also gave some tone options found on other Ibanez guitars.

The body was also hand polished to remove light scratches and give the body a shine. Once reassembled the guitar was fully setup and ready for the customer to enjoy!

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Telecaster Project

25/6/2019

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This ace Telecaster project was recently in the workshop for a full setup, custom wiring for the P90 the owner had fitted, along with a hand fret polish to sort some deep nicks in the frets.

Plus the P90 cavity also had one of it’s edges sorted where the owner had slipped off when routing the scratchplate!

The pickup cavity when it was brought in, you can see the uneven edge of the scratchplate. The cavity and the scratchplate needing sorting on the edge were the router had slipped.

The scratchplate and the cavity were evened out by hand to ensure an even finish as possible. After we’d sorted the uneven scratchplate and painted the cavity to blend in the work with the rest of the guitar.

The Bloodstone Guitarworks handwound P90 could then be correctly fitted and wired up to the guitar.

The customer has brought a pre wired loom from Bloodstone guitars, which allowed reverse phase of the P90 Bloodstone pickup, we thought why stop there so wired in a second push/pull allowing the ‘Dave Gilmour’ wiring option of having the neck pickup on at any time!

The photos below shows one of the nicks in the frets, although it looks small, it massively affects the playablity of the guitar.

After the hand polish, fortunately for the customer the nick wasn’t too deep and so was removed with the fret polish!

Once all the work was done, the guitar was strung up and setup before being ready to collect!

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1980's Japanese Fender Stratocaster

25/6/2019

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This ace mid 80’s Japanese Squire Strat was recently in the workshop for a setup!

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Fender Custom Stratocaster Setup

21/6/2019

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This lovely Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster was recently in the workshop for a setup!

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1976 Fender Jazz Bass Setup

14/6/2019

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This lovely 1976 Fender Jazz Bass was recently in the workshop for a setup!

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Spirit by Steinberger Fretwork and Service

7/6/2019

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This cool Spirit by Steinberger was recently in the workshop for some fretwork and some tlc. It had been heavily modified including a rare N-Tune fitted tuner!
The customer had brought it from EBay, which was then shipped directly to us, to have the work done, before being shipped on to the customer once the work was completed!
The guitar was thoroughly checked over and restrung after the frets were hand polished to restore their shine and smooth playablity before being returned to the customer to enjoy his new guitar!

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1972 Gibson SG Bass Setup

5/6/2019

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This ace vintage ‘72 Gibson SG Bass was recently in the workshop for a setup.
It had been heavily modified through it's years of gigging.
At some point it's original control plate was changed, and the new control plate didn't line up with the original screw holes, meaning control plate was loose and rattled when the bass was played.
Wooden screw anchor points were fitted to the control cavity, then covered with copper shielding to blend in the with existing control cavity. The new anchor points allows the control plate to be secured properly to the body!

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May Madness

31/5/2019

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It's been crazy in the workshop this last month, one of the busiest months we've ever had!
So many lovely guitars to mention include vintage Fender basses, a vintage 1980's Kramer, a lovely Japanese Fender Jazz Master, along with a Mandola too!
If you're interested in getting your guitar/bass playing the best it can be then please get intouch and we can arrange booking you in!