Slash Epiphone Les Paul Review by wazkelly

Andy's pimp job on his Tobacco Sunburst 'Artist' LP60 GNR tribute was the donor for the only upgrade required on the Slash Epi LP that I bought July 2015. Gallins online were having and end of financial year sale and it was reduced from $499 to $199 and that also included delivery to the Sunshine Coast. Bargain.
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Straight out of the box it was already in tune and the setup was spot on. Action was also great and only had a few minor tweaks to get the intonation right and was then ready to play.

A couple of months later was when I started building PBG kits and this axe was sadly neglected for almost a year before I picked it and started playing it again which is when I realised the only cheap part of the axe was the dodgy sealed machine heads. They are supposed to have 14:1 gearing and felt fine when tuning up but past experience has taught me not to trust these sad excuse for string tensioners. Thankfully when I saw Andy's pimpin job I grabbed his unwanted Artist Tuners as they had to be better than the ones on this guitar.
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To my surprise Andy personally delivered the tuners to me at work on Friday and I thank him very much as they look and feel as good as Schallers or Grovers, just not the locking type. Here are some shots of the progress made earlier today....
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As is usually the case with replacing tuners invariably there will be holes left behind from the previous ones. Am I bothered about this, not at all as this is on the back of the headstock and if anyone picks up on it most likely they will be a guitarist too and understand the value of having better equipment vs cosmetic appearances.

Whilst the strings were off I noticed that the rosewood fret board was a dry as a dingo's ....... and luckily still had some Dingo Wax lurking in the garage. Damn stuff goes as hard as rock and ended up putting it in the microwave for about a minute or so to soften things up enough to dig out of the pot and smear all over the fret board.....cue in the before
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and now after shots....
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One of the cool and unique features on this guitar is the inbuilt tuner in the Bridge PUP.....
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There is a small switch you press on the low E side of the PUP that turns it on and it glows Red when out of tune with an indicator as to whether flat or sharp of a particular note which is lit up in Blue. Once you reach the correct tuning the Red light goes Green and being chromatic you simply move on to the next string, etc.

Being a Slash axe you are probably wondering what it tunes up to......traditional A 440hz so no, not Eb tuning as he usually does, and many other Americans for that matter? Strangely enough I think my Vox amps tune up half a step below but as I mostly play A440hz always use an electronic tuner out of habit just as a secondary check.

So how does it sound?

It is a Mahogany body with a bolt on Mahogany neck, flat top, not curved or carved, and fitted with Epiphone Ceramic Plus PUP's which sound awesome both clean and dirty.
http://youtu.be/lTWSaFhbG6s

http://youtu.be/5idx13djT_s

Will try and do a demo video sometime soon and add to this post.

sounds like it was a bargin Waz

That looks really good Waz. Glad to help you out. The tuners look better than i thought they would, nice dingowax job too! Wow tuner on the pup ring, I have never ever seen that! Hope it gives this axe a new lease on life, that was a brilliant bargain.

sweet axe Waz, good score mate, first I heard of a tuner on the bridge pup surround ! Only thing that would improve the look would be trapezoid fret markers. Neck came up great after the Dingowax. My tub went hard too, I might try the microwave trick. I tried sitting the tub in boiling water and that didn't soften it enough to use.

Wokks, I just dig a bit out at a time and squish it and heat it up in my hands till its pliable that way you don't have to nuke the whole lot.

cheers Andy I'll try that, but got a feeling I need to order a new tub

Cheers guys.

The Dingo Wax was so hard that it actually scratched the fret board on the EX-5 when I first started on it! I have tried the boiling water before with no success and best effort previously was to leave it out in a sunny spot for half a day or so to soften up. As this was an after 2.00pm job not enough daylight left so it had a go in the zapper and that only just softened a bit in the centre.

Wouldn't go any more than a minute as it was quite warm in that centre and any longer and it could have been as hot as molten lava like plastic.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by wazkelly

As this was an after 2.00pm job not enough daylight left so it had a go in the zapper and that only just softened a bit in the centre.

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You guys up north need Daylight Savings!
Being dark at like 6pm is ridiculous coming up to summer!
Down here in Tassie, at the height of summer, the sun has only just gone at 9pm!!! You could still be playing backyard cricket at that time with no assistance from lights!

Great job Waz and a nice score, looks like a nice axe especially after your TLC

Sent from my Moto G (4) using Tapatalk

@ Zandit.....Daylight Saving has had a strong political element attached to it up here for so long that most school aged kids would never have experienced it in this state. Can understand the issues way up north as at present the sun sets 18 minutes behind Brisbane in Townsville and 20 minutes behind Brisbane in Cairns, and as we progress through summer the times elongate even further as southern parts of the country enjoy more time between sunrise and sunset. Personally I think we should have it, particularly from doing business with other East Coast corporations plus the added benefits that come with more daylight hours after work during the week. Mt Isa should probably be on SA time zone as it is that far west but cannot see that ever happening.

@ Ponch....thanks for your comments. After doing several builds it is easy to spot all these other little jobs, mods, or upgrades required on just about everything you touch or come into contact with, so basically if you don't have a current build on the go there is probably something in everyone's collection that could do with a few minor tweaks to take things to a whole new better place. This Axe has convinced me no need for another LP in this house as there are too many other varieties yet to build or own and add to the collection.