koldo2552´s ES-3 (The WorkHorse)

No, I won't forget bridge wire... it becomes a nightmare when hardware and strings are not grounded... too much noise.

I didn't cut pickup wires, what you see is what comes in the box, hope i'll have enough wire lenght for an easy installation even if it looks neat. I left a litle extra wire in every connection, maibe the pic doesn't show it properly.

Finally i used modern wiring... if somebody wants a photo of tonerider's installing booklet, i'll post it. They explain the wiring options and diferent push/pull options very well with nice diagrams. And i followed what they recommend.

Interesting. I'll need to go and check the cable lengths on my pickups for my ES-3! If necessary, I can route the neck pickup cable on the other side of the bottom f-hole. Gravity should keep it out of sight.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Simon Barden

Interesting. I'll need to go and check the cable lengths on my pickups for my ES-3! If necessary, I can route the neck pickup cable on the other side of the bottom f-hole. Gravity should keep it out of sight.

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If you see the pictures, you'll see that neck's wire is long enough, bridge's one is shorter... and it must go around the F-hole. In a solid body guitar makes sense having a shorter bridge wire, but in this kit can be a headache if you break accidentally a litle bit of it...
I won't manipulate the harness to much until it gets installed just in case, don't wanna have a thick grey wire in the middle of the hole.

Hi!!

I,ve been working on the guitar since sealer and try oil arrived. So, here the pics:

First, the sealer. Very very sticky, fat, this is not like the stain...
http://i65.tinypic.com/303imw0.jpg
http://i67.tinypic.com/fcrz8y.jpg

A couple of Sealer&Filler coats and i sand the whole thing with steel wool.

My "working place" is not the best, so i had to be very careful with dust and dirt because as i said before, this thing is very sticky and everything goes to it. It reminds me a fat varnish, it also smells like that.

Once sanded, I begun with Tru oil
http://i66.tinypic.com/qowpbp.jpg

Well... That´s another story. Spreading the oil with a coat is easy and the colors and the grain become alive.
The process is quite simple, coat, coat, coat, wet sanding (1500 grit) and repeat.

As the process is so repetitive, and all the pics are quite similar i´m not going to put more of them.

Finally, after.... I don't know... About ten coats of oil and with two "in between sanding" (forgive my english), I think it´s enough, so i´ll polish the guitar and see what happens.

I´m very happy with the colors, it begins to look very nice at least for a first bid. Of course it is not going to be perfect, but it´s better than expected.

So, before polishing this is how it looks.
http://i67.tinypic.com/30sit5l.jpg

Cheers!!

Looking very good there.

Excellent. The colours look great with the oil.

That is looking awesome Koldo!!

Really nice. Great job so far

Awesome!!!!! Acojonante!!!!!

Where did you buy the sealer and oil? and how did you apply it?
A great job, man!

Thanks!!
Petrus, i bought sealer and tru oil in Mildot. From Valencia i think. They have both cheaper than Amazon and you can choose between Correos and Nacex for delivery...

I'm still working on the guitar. If you want to know how can you apply those products, take a look to some videos from youtube, in this one, he explains everything nice and clearly.https://youtu.be/VFT9kdJFkaI

This is looking very nice. I have not seen a hand applied sunburst before, they are usually sprayed, but this certainly looks the part. Well done. Deusenberg headstock looks great too.

Bravo! I love the colours in this

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ian A

This is looking very nice. I have not seen a hand applied sunburst before, they are usually sprayed, but this certainly looks the part. Well done. Deusenberg headstock looks great too.

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Check "BigD Guitars" youtube channel. It's full of guitar finishing videos. He made a lot of burst finishes using hand applied water based stains. Actually, making the burst this way is very easy. And after the finish, laquer or oil, rhe colours become alive.

Well, I´ve been busy last days but the guitar is already screaming!
After a little fretwork, installing electronics, Tusq nut and a nice adjustment today i plugged the guitar into one of my amps and all i can say is that it worth all the effort.
http://i66.tinypic.com/1109ag2.jpg
http://i63.tinypic.com/2w6v31l.jpg
http://i66.tinypic.com/ivbol3.jpg
http://i68.tinypic.com/1zguvs0.jpg

So, the guitar is the ES-3 kit with:
- Grover Mini rotomatics
- Tusq XL nut
- Tonerider Alnico II Classics
- Dimarzio Pots and Allparts/CTS pots with push pull for coil split
- Mallory 150´s caps
- Switchcraft connectors
- Piezo disc working as contact mic
- Stock bridge
- 11-48 strings

Nice action, nice tuning, it´s very confortable, very easy to play with.
Played unplugged it is a warm sounding guitar, not a lot of volume but more than expected. Plugging the piezo output gives a nice acoustic sound. I can imagine myself gigging an acoustic set list with it without any problem. It needs a litlle bit of EQ, but i made a preamp for acoustic instruments and i can use it.

But the real deal comes plugging it into a good amp. I´ve been testing it with my last made amp, it´s based on the ´57 5E3 tweed deluxe with some mods. What can I say... I´m impressed. Tone rider pickups are absolutely amazing. They give a fat, warm and full of harmonics sound. Low output, i´ll say that they are between powerful singles and my other gibson´s 498/490 set. Vintage voiced... You can get warm Jazzy sounds (it´s supposed to be a jazz box), bluesy, rockabilly... while playing clean. But if you crank the amp, you immediately get into 60´s and 70´s rock. Think about Led Zeppelin, Free... Well, very close to that vintage Les Paul sound. Less sustain than a Les Paul of course, but it´s surprisingly good with overdriven sounds.

I know that those guitars are for jazz, but i don´t play jazz (i wish i could)... so this one is going to be used for alternative rock, indie, pop-rock and acoustic stuff. That was the original idea, a guitar that can be used for everything from clean to rock and all in-between sounds with the plus of the piezo disk... A workhorse.

I´ll make a video-demo of it, but this week i´ve got a gig with my band... maybe next week.

Wonderful job Koldo, it looks "The Business" as we say in Australia. Very tasty!

That's a fantastic result. The colours, finish and features all combine into a beautiful classic instrument. Well done.

As i said, i´ll make a demo next week, but i recorded a little track of the piezo output of the guitar.

I used a preamp that i made a couple of months ago, it´s made for acoustic instruments and it´s been tested with my acoustic guitars an my bass player´s upright bass.
http://i64.tinypic.com/2nsthfk.jpg
That´s it... Impedance selection, bass, mids and treble, volume and bright switch. It´s based on Ripthorn´s F2B preamp that actually is a J-fet adaptation of the Alembic tube preamp for bass. I changed some minor resistor and cap values.

Guitar-preamp-M-Audio fast track 2-Garage band. It has no other eq, only a reverb plug-in. It´s short, but you can hear a little strumming with some kind of lead line...

https://soundcloud.com/koldo-fernand...horse-acoustic

See you!!

sounds and looks great Koldo well done !

Mate, well done!! That Piezo sound is awesome! Great playing too. Can't wait to hear what it's like through the pickups!

Really nice, an axe to be proud of - one for GOTM!

Outstanding build, looks great

Great job on the burst man. She looks amazing.

cheers,
Gav.

one of the nicest bursts I've seen. It has a real aged look with out being reliced....aged and looked after :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by koldo2552

Well, I´ve been busy last days but the guitar is already screaming!
After a little fretwork, installing electronics, Tusq nut and a nice adjustment today i plugged the guitar into one of my amps and all i can say is that it worth all the effort.
http://i66.tinypic.com/1109ag2.jpg
http://i63.tinypic.com/2w6v31l.jpg
http://i66.tinypic.com/ivbol3.jpg
http://i68.tinypic.com/1zguvs0.jpg

So, the guitar is the ES-3 kit with:
- Grover Mini rotomatics
- Tusq XL nut
- Tonerider Alnico II Classics
- Dimarzio Pots and Allparts/CTS pots with push pull for coil split
- Mallory 150´s caps
- Switchcraft connectors
- Piezo disc working as contact mic
- Stock bridge
- 11-48 strings

Nice action, nice tuning, it´s very confortable, very easy to play with.
Played unplugged it is a warm sounding guitar, not a lot of volume but more than expected. Plugging the piezo output gives a nice acoustic sound. I can imagine myself gigging an acoustic set list with it without any problem. It needs a litlle bit of EQ, but i made a preamp for acoustic instruments and i can use it.

But the real deal comes plugging it into a good amp. I´ve been testing it with my last made amp, it´s based on the ´57 5E3 tweed deluxe with some mods. What can I say... I´m impressed. Tone rider pickups are absolutely amazing. They give a fat, warm and full of harmonics sound. Low output, i´ll say that they are between powerful singles and my other gibson´s 498/490 set. Vintage voiced... You can get warm Jazzy sounds (it´s supposed to be a jazz box), bluesy, rockabilly... while playing clean. But if you crank the amp, you immediately get into 60´s and 70´s rock. Think about Led Zeppelin, Free... Well, very close to that vintage Les Paul sound. Less sustain than a Les Paul of course, but it´s surprisingly good with overdriven sounds.

I know that those guitars are for jazz, but i don´t play jazz (i wish i could)... so this one is going to be used for alternative rock, indie, pop-rock and acoustic stuff. That was the original idea, a guitar that can be used for everything from clean to rock and all in-between sounds with the plus of the piezo disk... A workhorse.

I´ll make a video-demo of it, but this week i´ve got a gig with my band... maybe next week.

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Looks great for all your hard work, the next one wont be long coming along, lol

Really nice, well done!

Great result! Both in Sounds and looks.

These are great fun guitars, I cant stop playing mine. And the Toneriders are brilliant.

One thing to watch out for is that tail piece. Mine bent and caused a few problems. Details in my old post:
http://www.buildyourownguitar.com.au...l=1#post118394

What a cool guitar. Well done

Thank you all!

And thank you enikoy, i´ll be watching the tail piece just in case. I´m using 11-48, your is with 12-52... hope it does´t bend like yours, if it does, i´ll change it for a better one... I´m thinking about changing the bridge too, but it´s working, so i´ll think about in the future.

Hello!

Here it is, the demo. Testing the pickups, the piezo and a litle mix without bass guitar.

https://youtu.be/eiSPIvCIjIE

Hope you'll enjoy it.

sounds unreal Koldo well done. I had no idea you had all those upgrades installed. Love your jam setup with all the amps and drum kit, is that at your place or a jam studio ?
The person holding the camera must have had sore arms towards the end of the video ahha

Dude, awesome demo, some great playing and a guitar that covers all the bases - a true workhorse indeed

Lots of good sounds there.

Not only does the guitar look sensational, it also sounds sensational!

Thank you all for the feedback. Last monday i used it in our practice session and it worked incredible. It's going to be my main guitar in this proyect... and that's a good new since i'm going to leave as secondary guitars my american standard strat and the gibson LP Standard DC plus!
It's more versatile

Quote:

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Originally Posted by wokkaboy

sounds unreal Koldo well done. I had no idea you had all those upgrades installed. Love your jam setup with all the amps and drum kit, is that at your place or a jam studio ?
The person holding the camera must have had sore arms towards the end of the video ahha

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If you are asking for the place, this is where i play with my band. But in the demo i used drums from garage band.

Sounds amazing!

cheers,
Gav.