SG Kit - First Build Diary

[stan]

nice work around with the pup holes, looks neat

[Freakystyley]

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Pretty much finally finished. All the wiring done and it is making noise. Just the straps to screw in a a few fine details and one last buff with the wax. Very happy how it has turned out even though it isn't exactly as I planned.

Big thanks to everyone on here for all their advice and help. Certainly not good enough for a guitar of the month entry but I'm already thinking of ideas for the next build!

[wokkaboy]

looks great Freaky, how does it sound and play ?
Don't be silly that is well good enough to enter December GOTM

[Freakystyley]

Plays surprisingly well. Very happy with the neck. The guitar was pretty easy to set up the way I like.
The sound is decent enough. But still has stock Chinese pickups. I said if the build worked out well I would upgrade to tone rider or bare knuckle or something.

[andrewdosborne]

This SG looks great and as Woks previously stated this is a GOTM entry for sure. Nice job

[Andy40]

Love the black on brown, is it still finished in wax? looks great.

[Simon Barden]

A lovely looking guitar, very classy. The 'rescue' with the extra pickup surrounds haven't detracted from the overall look at all.

You might want to try a roller bridge if you find the solid saddles a bit sticky when you use the trem. I've got a Flying-V with a maestro style trem and roller saddles and that stays in tune very well (providing the strings aren't too old). Your bridge is rather high off the body (but no worse than many Gibson LP bridges since they changed their neck angle) but you'd need that to get a good string break angle with the Bigsby anyway. But as a result it may be very slightly wobbly and be able to rock back and forth by a small amount, especially when using the trem.

One thing I do to all my Tune-O-Matic bridges (and associated stop tails) is wrap some plumber's PTFE tape around the post threads going into the body (just low enough down so it doesn't show). If you use enough of it so that you can still turn the posts whilst preventing any sideways movement (most rattle about with no string tension on them), I'm convinced adds to the tuning stability and maybe helps out with the sustain. It's easily reversed if you're not convinced after trying it.

[FrankenWashie]

Oh Freaky that is NOICE! I really like the adaptation on the PUP surrounds and that Bigsby is mental! Is it a bit tail heavy?

love the wax finish, "let the Wood Speak" as the mantra goes.

Top job mate, you'll have to post a sound demo.

[WeirdBits]

Definitely worthy of entry into GOTM, very nice looking build.

[Tweaky]

Looks good, like the wiring, a LOT better than current Gibson SG's that use a circuit board like below ....try changing anything on one of these without screwing the whole board up.


IMHO, if you want the best from this guitar, search Ebay from some 2nd hand Gibson 57 PAF pickups, plenty about, as a lot of fools exchange these out of LP's with super hot wound pickup's, which are only good for thrash.

I recently bought a MIJ Tokai SG, not that their is anything wrong with a Pitbull kit of the same, it's just that I already have 3 kit's in the works.
So my recent use of a SG pulled my eyes to your build.