Stage Robber´s Gear: 2013

Ten Horned Beasts - SG Group Pic

They are starting to gang up on me...

Cimar Double Cut

Back in the 70's Cimar was somehow connected to the Ibanez brand - if you believed in the interweb's information that is out there.
I for my part don't care much about the guitar's past - still sounds great in present days.

Kramer Assault 220 FR Powerstrat in Disguise

Well, since Gibson owns all rights for the once renowned Kramer brand, the quite common shape of the instrument does not surprise but this one is closer to a powerstrat than to a Les Paul.

Facts:

Mahogany body and neck
Rosewood fingerboard with 24 frets
Scale is 648mm
High output humbuckers can be split
Master volume and tone
Three way toggle switch
Floyd Rose style vibrato

So shape, woods and pickups are close to a Les Paul but scale, frets and vibrato make it a strat style guitar.

Best of both worlds?

Epiphone SG Overhaul - Finally Finished

It's evolution, baby... or are we actually moving backwards?

A bunch of pictures from the current status down to starting point of the overhaul.

I think I'm finally happy with the instrument now.

EMG pickups have been removed for good - I put some nice Epiphone pups in and wired them in a "vintage 50's Les Paul" scheme, which means that the tone control is wired after the volume control.

It is tuned in Dropped - D.

Aria MAC- 30 Finally Done

I got this one back in 2006 or 2007 and I love the slim neck.
But the original tone was pretty much unusable for me - loved the feel of guitar, couldn't stand the sound of it.

I always wanted to redo the pickups and pots and see if I could get some improvement.
Now I finally finished this project and I'm very happy how it turned out.

Original specs:

Alder body
Maple neck with rosewood fretboard
(Awful) black no name pickups with mini switch to coil - split the humbucker
Standard five way switching
Master volume and master tone
Hardware in brushed aluminium with a well - working vibrato which I set up quite stiff no up- bending

Changes:

New wiring and pots
DiMarzio DP184 "The Chopper" Humbucker in neck position
DiMarzio ISCV2 "Evolution" Single Coil in middle position
DiMarzio DP207 "D Sonic" Humbucker in bridge position

Changed the switching too:

Neck humbucker alone
Neck humbucker automatically split (north coil active) to work in conjunction with middle single coil
Middle single coil alone
Middle single coil and bridge pickup together
Bridge pickup alone

There is a DiMArzio EP1108 mini switch which that allows parallel / single coil / series switching on the bridge pickup.

So in the "in between position" the middle pickup can work with the bridge humbucker in all threee variants.

Eventually I got a very usable and versatile instrument after all these years!

Now, should you buy this guitar if you're looking for a new one?

I guess it depends what you are looking for.

It's a well built beginner's axe (at least my specific model was) easily up there with all the "cheaper" series of the big name manufacturers.

Best of all, it's very playable so you don't have to fight the guitar whilst just learning your way around the instrument.

But if you want good sound coming out of it, you WILL have to perform some modifications.

By the way - the "Aria" - logo doesn't mean it has anything in common with the "Aria Pro" instruments, at least as far as I know.

I love the Aria Pro instruments of old but i quite distrust this new Aria labelling.

D'Addario Super Light Gauge on this one, .042 to .009, bright, round wound.

Johnson JLP - 50 WA Classic Series

Now I know, I posted this one before http://bartbowlesblog.blogspot.co.at/2010/03/mr-brown.html

I didn't post the details though, so here they are, mainly to help me recall all the (useless) information:

Built in 2010
Mahogany neck and body
Korina top
Walnut finish
Rosewood fingerboard
Three Tesla VR - 60 Classic Gold Pickups

So there you go - all the secrets of "Mr. Brown" revealed.

Fenix Les Paul

Sadly she's mute at the moment... pretty much everything inside needs to be redone - hope to find the time soon.

Höfner Club Solid

HCT - CS10 in nice glossy black.

Mahogany body, maple top, set neck with rosewood fingerboard.
Höfner Hi - Power Diamond Pickups that really deliver a great vintage - style tone (which means something different to everybody but I like the sounds of this one a lot).
Two volumes and one master tone.

Rather round neck shaping and the string spacing is quite tight - which I like but for players with huge hands the strings might be a little but too close together.

The building quality is even higher than I expected, definitely an instrument to consider if you don't expect it to be a high gain metal monster.

Aria Pro II MA-30: Something Has Changed

Besides some obvious cosmetic "improvements" (and no - I'm not colorblind...yet) I also put in two DiMarzio "Red Velvet" Single Coils and a DiMarzio "B2 Humbucker" (a kind of OEM pickup used in old Ibanez models I believe).

Quite standard 5 - way switching fram back to front:

Humbucker alone (optional coil cut)
Humbucker (optional coil cut) + Middle Pickup
Middle Pickup alone
Middle + Neck Pickup
Neck Pickup alone

25.5 inch (648mm) scale length, standard tuning with D'Addario EXL120 strings.

As a reminder - an older pic taken before the changes:

Epiphone Baritone Iron Cross

Got this one a while ago but the original pickups didn't sound well in my ears.

Finally found the time to solder two EMG 85'es in there.

Master Volume only (second knob is a dummy) and regular toggle switch.
Scale length is 705 mm (27.75 inches).
Baritone tuning - B, E, A, D, Fis, B.

Not really an "Iron Cross" though - but that's the official name - one has to find a catchy name for advertisement I guess.

B. C. Rich Mockingbird - The Art Of Doomina In Spiro Lights

My second B.C. Rich - I'm sure you can guess my preferred design by this builder now.

Called "Spiro Light", out of the "Body Art Collection" - would love to have them all actually... ah well, sweet dreams.

The previous owner is a really nice fellow by the way and maybe some of you might even recognise this fine instrument of heavy psychedelia.

B. C. Rich Mockingbird Masterpiece

Finally found the time to grab the soldering iron - the wiring was shot on this one and the bridge pickup was dying too, so I replaced it with a brand new Epiphone SG pickup.

B.C. Rich Mockingbird in "Dragon Blood" (ha!).

Mahogany body with a quilted maple veneer - "only for the show" one might say.
Creme binding around the curved body.

Maple bolt-on neck with rosewood fretboard and nice cloud inlays.

Looks hot and best of all - sounds great too! Not quite a dragon's roar but appropriately heavy.

I altered the switching, B.C. Rich likes to do the controls in a rather unorthodox way and at least for me it's quite hard to remember in "the heat of a dragon battle".

Originally it goes like this: There's the volume for the bridge pickup up front, followed by the toggle switch, then the volume for the neck pup and the a master tone pot.

I changed it to a master volume for both pickups, then toggle, then tone controls for each pickup.
I like to use the middle position on the toggle switch and this configuration simply made more sense to me personally.

Tuning is Drop - D.

Dean Guitars MLXM SN - Crossing All Over

Metal - guitars should be black or have a bright, fancy colour, right?
And no blues player (with the exception of Poppa Chubby maybe) would show him or herself with a pointy axe like this.

I love the smooth "natural satin" finish on this one as much as Dimebag's very own screaming designs.
The shape has always been one of my favourites, excelled perhaps only by the Randy Rhoads - models.
This edgy one you can even play while sitting down and you can reach the highest frets with ease.

It's a Dean Guitars MLXM SN, Paulowina body, bolt - on maple neck with rosewood fretboard,
DMT designed humbuggers.

Not a high end guitar for sure... yet it actually sounds quite well with my setup.

Some might say it's a vulgar display of too many pikes and corners but I think it's high time to play some Hardcore Heavy Blues Metal Crossover.

Stage Robber´s Gear

Sights And Sounds

Bart Bowles

Headlines

Topics

Followers