My first build ES-1GT

Well, Time to get back to my log, it's been a while and I have recently (early December) finished my journey but have lagged behind keeping up with the documentation.

The four week wait passed really slowly so in the mean time, back to ebay to pick up a sander/polisher. Now that I have a compressor there are no end of air tools to explore.

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I also bought some foam pads and a bunch of sheepskin pads.

I wet sanded the Nitro by hand with 800, 1500, 2000 and finally 3000 grit paper.

I then polished using Meguiar's Polishing compound using my air polisher with 2 different grades of foam.
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Here it is after polishing:
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The pictures don't really show just how shiney this is now.

With the finishing done, I lined the pickup cavities with copper sheilding:

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I overlapped the edges of the pieces and soldered between them. This was probably unnecessary but easy to do to ensure continuity.

I then installed the Tonerider Birmingham Pickups and a roller bridge that I also picked up while waiting for the Nitro to cure.

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I found getting the electronics into the cavity a challenge. I started out using plastic tubing to pull the pots through but that turned out to be more trouble than it was worth and ended up using brass wire which was way more flexible.

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When I tested the wiring, I found that one of the volume pots was very noisy and intermittent so I had to pull the whole lot out again and order a new pot.

In the mean time I researched different wiring diagrams for split coil pick ups and went with a variation the following.

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This gives me a master coil split on the Bridge volume (I can have both pickups split or neither) and a phase revese on the Neck Volume.

The Variation is that I ran the hot wire from the pickups to the centre of the volume pots and the pickup selector swith from the lefthand terminal (looking at the back) so that I can blend the pickups without losing both if I turn one all the way down. This is hard for me to explain but here goes. With most wiring diagrams I have seen, the pickup selector switch is wired to the centre of the volume pot. When you turn the volume down to nothing this puts an earth from the pot case onto the centre of the selector switch - ok when using a single pickup. When you set the switch to use middle position (both pickups) and turn one down, that earth is applied to both pickups via the selector switch so if you turn one all the way down, you lose the signal from both.

I also opted for 50's wiring for the tone pots.

I then did a full setup following the TRAIN acronym:
Tune, Releif, Action, Intonation, Nut. I then balanced the Pickup heights to give an even volume bewween them.

So, Here is the finished ES-1GT in Cherry Red with Nitrocelulose Lacquer with a custom Mother of Pearl Headstock inlay.

with the following upgrades:

Tonerider Birmingham Pickups
Locking Tuners
Bone Nut
Push Pull Bournes Volume Pots
CTS Tone Pots
Orange Drop Capacitors
Roller Bridge
Strap Locks (I do not want to drop this instrument)

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She plays like a dream with a very low action.
Sounds great through my 5 watt Big White Monkey "Chimp" MK III valve combo.
The pickups are great. Very clear clean tones but not as 'chimey' as my Gretch.

Looks great, well done! The colour combo goes really well.

Thanks Trevor.

Super neat! great work there!!

Cute little polisher. What kind is that? Looks very light and easy to use with one hand.

BTW, it does look fantastic. Especially the custom work on the headstock.