Guitar Conundrum

[JD01]

I don't really want more than 3. Just don't have enough time to keep 3 guitars played regularly... does anyone else find that strings age far quicker when guitars are left unplayed?

I really want a LP Jr/Special but I think something has to go.

G1 - Crimson. 2 humbuckers, sounds great, dream to play and it means a lot to me. I'll be keeping this although it's probably worth about £3k now.

G2 - Mexican tele. Was junk when I got it, but it had a good fret job and setup, plays lovely now. Pickups upgraded by @muttley sounds lovely. I love recording this along with my Crimson. Doesn't half feedback though.
Reckon it's about £400 quids worth.

G3 - Japanese '65 reissue Mustang. This is beautifully setup and feels nicer in my hands than pretty much anything I've ever played. It also has a whammy bar. Think I could get £1000 for it.

My "rainy day fund" (we have a lot of rainy days in Wales) sits at £2k obviously I don't want to blitz the lot, but it does mean I can buy before I sell. I'm not having to sell to fund a purchase.

Broadly speaking a LP Jr/Special will cost me £13-1600.

The Crimson is staying.
Options

flog the Mustang, buy a Jr. Easy and cheap option.

Flog the tele and upgrade the Mustang, put a tele style bridge pickup and strat style neck pickup in it.

Option 1 means I can pretty much buy anything
Option 2 limits me to cheaper Jr, around the 1300 mark.

What would you do? Any other options? I'd like to end up with about a grand in the rainy day fund when this all shakes out.

I think new Rick Beato Les Paul is a bit too expensive and I feel dirty buying a youtubers sig. Fucking nice guitar though.

I like that red one from London but it will be a 2nd hand guitar totally unseen.

[Armistice]

I'd flog the Tele after putting the stock pickups back in and keep the MuttPups for the future - plus, whilst they may be great, you're probably not going to be able to get more for the guitar with them on - would depend upon the player, of course - so keep them. Although given your dislike of soddering, this will probably add more $ into the equation.

Buy the purty blue Special and change the truss rod cover. It is expensive though - it appears you're paying ~200 quid for the paint job and truss rod cover. As Greg pointed out, it probably will hold its value over time because of the name.

You can do your Mustang upgrades later on, perhaps, after a few more occasional contributions to the rainy day fund... you don't have to do everything at once.


I am, of course, following the long standing bulletin board tradition of not choosing either of the options you've outlined and suggesting something different...

Easy to pick up another Tele in the future if you want one, Mustangs probably not so much. If you can get the sounds you need from those three, you don't need a Tele - although "basic electric single coil sound" is what Teles do better than anything else around.

Besides, JD02 will be all over that Mustang as he gets bigger - ideal starter guitar for him.

[muttley]

I think Lt and myself will shudder when you say only 3....

How about I ship that junior I made to you on loan while you give your head a wobble.

TBH I would but I don't think you'd like the neck profile as it was built for me so has quite a bit of meat on it.

[muttley]

On the string thing, they will age over time regardless of whether they are played or not. The major things that knacker strings are...

Playing them, that both wears the coating and introduces all sorts of corrosive gunk into the windings.

Tuning and tension, will always work harden them. The metal is under tension and the crystalline structure will microscopically change over time. Better alloys will resist that to some extent so the better brand strings will normally stand up better.

Exposure to humidity. This also goes without saying really. Moisture will act as a carrier for all sorts of things that will corrode or settle on the string.

If you aren't going to play a guitar for a while and saving a tenner on a set of strings is important then slack them off and keep the guitar in a humidified case where you control whats in there or better still take them off, clean them with a silver cloth and stick them in a tight sealed bag or tub.

For a string to sound true it has to have the same uniform mass and composition along it's entire length. All those things above will mess with that. The first two will mess with the intonation ultimately and all three will dull them off.

[Lt. Bob]

I think Lt and myself will shudder when you say only 3....

lol .......... I have 22 .............. seems about right.

And yeah strings die whether you play them or not BUT no way they go faster if you don't play them.
Finger oils and npushing them down against frets definitely adds to the dying of strings

[muttley]

I think Lt and myself will shudder when you say only 3....

lol .......... I have 22 .............. seems about right.

And yeah strings die whether you play them or not BUT no way they go faster if you don't play them.
Finger oils and npushing them down against frets definitely adds to the dying of strings

Wifey often remarks that I have more guitars than friends. I have no idea how many guitars I actually have. Some I have forgotten about, I was rooting around in my workshop loft space the other day looking for something and opened a case that had an old Hofner Committee in it. I have no idea when I got it but I have no recollection of it. It's definitley mine cos the notes and lists in the case were of old stuff of mine. The set lists and stuff dated it from the 90's.

[Greg_L]

Without even realizing it I'm now up to around 17 guitars.


JD keep the Crimson, keep the Stang, sell the Tele because it's the weak link of the three. Then buy whatever guitar you actually want instead of trying to find a way to make it all work out with "lesser" stuff because you'll still not be happy. Buy the guitar you want. Just do it already.

[muttley]

I love a Telecaster. The Stradavari of Rock n Roll.

[Greg_L]

@JD01
https://reverb.com/item/64606389-gibson ... 20-present

[JD01]

@JD01
https://reverb.com/item/64606389-gibson ... 20-present

Ergh. The price you guys can get things for!

[JD01]

Hmmm, I'm leaning towards Armis idea but maybe with the red Special.

Deciding whether I trust modern Gibson build quality more than a Pakistani guy in West London. Leaning towards the red one.

[rayc]

If you're prepared to Tele the Mustang then dump the Mustang because the "as is" isn't good enough for you.
Personally I'd do as David suggested and roll the tele after returning the stock PUs.
Then again I've only sold one guitar and have regretted it every day since so I'm not a good example - I've ten cheap guitars, (apart from the Sheraton II which is still cheap at AUS$1100 in 2002), and five basses. Mind you almost all of the guitars get a recording run during the year.

[Armistice]

If you're prepared to Tele the Mustang then dump the Mustang because the "as is" isn't good enough for you.
Personally I'd do as David suggested and roll the tele after returning the stock PUs.
Then again I've only sold one guitar and have regretted it every day since so I'm not a good example - I've ten cheap guitars, (apart from the Sheraton II which is still cheap at AUS$1100 in 2002), and five basses. Mind you almost all of the guitars get a recording run during the year.

I'm reasonably confident that all 6 of my electrics got a run somewhere on the album - Duesenberg mostly, then Tele and LP, but I'm sure I saw the Burns on a track list somewhere and the Blade strat is all over Rockets. The PRS is there somewhere I suspect, but if there's one that's not, it'll be that one.

I used all my basses (1 ) on the album too...

[vomitHatSteve]

And yeah strings die whether you play them or not BUT no way they go faster if you don't play them.
Finger oils and npushing them down against frets definitely adds to the dying of strings

It probably just feels like strings die too fast when you don't play the instrument "I've only played this instrument for 30 minutes in the past 6 months; why are the strings already dead?" vs "I played 3 outdoor summer gigs this week. I'm glad my strings lasted through them!"

I'm a little surprised to discover that I'm up to 4 guitars, 7 if you count electrics. JD's right tho that I barely play them. I try to at least keep them in mostly different tunings so that there's some sense of purpose to each of them.

[JD01]

Genuine opinion. What you guys reckon the chances are that this is fake?
https://www.fenderfever.com/gibson-les- ... n-cherry-1

[rayc]

No idea but the different coloured slabs make it seem almost offset...eyes are weird things.

[Greg_L]

Genuine opinion. What you guys reckon the chances are that this is fake?
https://www.fenderfever.com/gibson-les- ... n-cherry-1

Why would you think it's fake but not any of the other ones?

[JD01]

Genuine opinion. What you guys reckon the chances are that this is fake?
https://www.fenderfever.com/gibson-les- ... n-cherry-1

Why would you think it's fake but not any of the other ones?

I don't, it looks pretty tidy to me.
Just a lot of horror stories about Chibsons

[Greg_L]

I don't, it looks pretty tidy to me.
Just a lot of horror stories about Chibsons

Well more pics would be great, but just from that one pic I don't see any reason to believe it's fake. It's a two piece body, maybe three, and Gibson has never been one to give a fuck about seam lines or shades matching. Only the finely finished figured maple tops get the good treatments. Anything else is just glued together however it will work. Looks like a standard Nashville bridge, which most Chibsons don't have. They typically have the metric Epiphone bridge. The seam lines and bridge looking correct are things in your favor. Not really much else to go by.

[JD01]

I don't, it looks pretty tidy to me.
Just a lot of horror stories about Chibsons

Well more pics would be great, but just from that one pic I don't see any reason to believe it's fake. It's a two piece body, maybe three, and Gibson has never been one to give a fuck about seam lines or shades matching. Only the finely finished figured maple tops get the good treatments. Anything else is just glued together however it will work. Looks like a standard Nashville bridge, which most Chibsons don't have. They typically have the metric Epiphone bridge. The seam lines and bridge looking correct are things in your favor. Not really much else to go by.

There are 18 pics there if you flick through them.