Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Pickups => Topic started by: Lucifuge on December 26, 2009, 05:55:11 PM
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I seem to have acquired an ultra-cheap plywood Strat body. I think that if I put a reasonable quality neck on it I could end up with a playable guitar, (assuming the neck pocket dimensions are correct and the neck + body match up.)
I'm just wondering if it would be worth putting good pickups on it or will it always sound terrible with such a cheap body?
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I'm all for pimping cheap guitars - but I would advise to leave plywood well alone.
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I think you'd probably be throwing good money after bad. Even the best pickups in the world won't make a piece of plywood sound good.
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Dunno about that, ask Jimmy Page, but then that was a chipboard (masonite) Danelectro and not plywood...
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like what gwEm said, im all for hooking up low end guitars but you have to take into consideration...
for EXAMPLE: For a nice set of EMG's and professional installation its going to cost,
half the price of Jackson Dinky with active EMG's.
You have to think twice before installing expensive pickups on an "ok" guitar
it may not be cost effective and theres no guarantee the guitar will sound better.
This is just an EXAMPLE by the way, Im not saying this is your setup or trying to persuade you into getting this set up.
was just simply trying to say think twice and think if its really worth going through the trouble and cash
to try to make it(plywood) sound better.
Personally, If your going to spend $200+ I would buy a new/used guitar.
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The thing is, all that the parts that you're going to pimp that body with could just as easily be moved to another donor body if it sounds sh!te.
What have you got to lose?
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I would always put my money into a better guitar in the situation you're in. You will get a guitar that plays better and pickups that will be half decent. Even if you didn't immediately upgrade to BKPs, you could go a long way towards tonal nirvana by getting some cheap used Duncans or DiMarzios.
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Bottom line is you never *really* know what youre gonna get. Its just educated guesses based on aggregated experience of the user group here on the behaviour of certain pickups in certain woods, and how they combine with wood species archetypal sounds. Two pieces of wood from the same tree can sound very different, and with plywood and the various cheap woods and poor cuts of wood used that are marketed under 'name' wood banners YMMV, a lot.
Some of the worst tones I've had have been from trying to pimp cheap guitars with BKs. The very same pickups I got those horrible tones with sounded outstanding in better guitars. They let a lot of the guitars acoustic sound through and let the shiteeness through with it. I'd err on the side of caution and put less transparent pickups in a cheaper guitar, ideally EMGs, followed, imo, by dimarzio, then duncan, then kent armstrong, then swinsehead (the main pickup types I've sample seem to me to stamp their own sound on the guitar in that desending order). I use BKs for guitars that have strong acoustic performance, in which they utterly slay and cant be beat.
That doesnt mean expensive guitars or guitars made from highest class woods - it just means trust your ears when youre assessing the guitars acoustic performance. Your plywood body might sound great, it might not; we cant tell you that from across the internet.
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no.
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no.
:lol:
Shouldve just said that.