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Dowelling trem post holes on elderly basswood guitars

629 views 2 replies 2 participants last post by  Max 
#1 ·
Posting because I remember we had a thread where it was brought up a while back sort of tangentially. Drew's Suhr thread I think, of course, it wasn't the solution in that case, but on a lot of older basswood guitars from the 80s it is necessary. I've never found it a problem on other woods, but since basswood is soft, any screw holes or routes do loosen up with time.

Anyways, doing it on my Charvel Spectrum right now. Kind of cleaning that guitar up. Waiting on new sleeves and posts to arrive, so will report back. I've done it on one other guitar, but that one didn't have problems in the first place. This guitar rules, but it's not holding tune perfectly, so I figured why not.



Also, for my fellow Jackson dudes who are looking to replace oversized rings. FoTN is still the best, but since that guy almost never responds to emails anymore, these are decent. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B013TEMUYW/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1



The holes don't line up, you'll have to redrill, but it is wide enough to cover an oversized route. FotN metal ones are prefferable, but those are a pain to order, these are pickguard material and decent for the price if you need something for an oversized route. Pickguard material will end up looking good on the Spectrum, since it matches the custom black pickguard.

Or a single coil route you widened to accept a humbucker. Which always results in a somewhat unsightly result, because a slanted bridge single coil extends slightly beyond what a pickup ring will cover on the treble side.
 
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#2 ·
Also, some dude in the reviews says those rings are decent for double single pickup routes modified for humbuckers. So that's good to know, since there aren't a ton of options out there, and most of the high quality machined metal ones are semi defunct or a bitch to order from.

 
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