Putting them pieces together... (Superstrat content)

[GuitarIv]

Cheers everyone,

so I just finished some exams and finally had the time to toy around with a few guitars I had lying around. Story goes like this: friend of mine picked up a used Jackson Dinky for 150 bucks and asked me to make her playable again. The problem with the guitar was the licensed Jackson 580LP trem, those units although sturdy are made out of really cheap metal so they tend to wear out fast. One of the saddles was messed up to the point were it wouldn't clamp down the string anymore. Due to the fact that you can't get any parts for those trems the only options I had left was either to get a replacement like a Schaller or a Gotoh or find a way to get another 580LP.

Lucky as I am another friend of mine gave me an old messed up Kramer as a gift. The original owner totally butchered the poor thing, scalloping the fretboard, refinishing the body and carving an Iron Cross onto the body with a knife. I made a dedicated thread about the Kramer some time ago making her playable, but considering the new situation with the Dinky I decided to salvage the parts upgrading my personal DK2M with the OFR the Kramer came with and solving the situation with my friends Dinky.

I decided I'll post pics and comment my progress 

So first we have the guitars, a close up of the poor Kramer, testing the OFR in the DK2M and the two Jackson 580LPs

[GuitarIv]

Next up is another pic of the 1984 MIG OFR in the DK2M with both E-Strings attached as reference and the Schaller tuners the Kramer came with compared to the DK2M Jackson tuners

[GuitarIv]

Here we have the stripped Kramer, the Schaller tuners on my Dinky (perfect fit!) and some pics I took as a reference to transfer the allen wrench holder onto the DK2M headstock

[GuitarIv]

Punching the holes into the headstock (a little something died inside of me while doing this  ), the installed wrench holder and the battleworn Painkiller/Coldsweat going into the DK2M

[GuitarIv]

The Floyd in it's new home (note the original Jackson studs the guitar came with and the mash up of saddles I used for the OFR), the Tremol-No along the 4 spring setup, some foam to protect the finish from too long Floyd screws and the guitar strung up for a quick test run

[GuitarIv]

Finally the twins side by side on my bed (didn't take any pictures whilst working on the DKMG) with their respective trems installed

[GuitarIv]

The electronic cavities (was too lazy and the hour was too late to do the soldering, gonna finish that tomorrow) and some shots of the action on my DK2M

[GuitarIv]

And finally some more shots of the action on the DK2M.

So here's the conclusion: out of the 2 guitars my friends Dinky is the better one. The neck is thinner, smoother and more comfortable to play. The biggest problem with my DK2M is that the neck pocket is cut too deep, therefore there is little space left to heighten the pickups and the tremolo eliminating most of the upward pull the Floyd should have. There is a solution to this: shiming the neck pocket to heighten the neck so I gain some space. Story for another day I guess.

Regarding the sound I noticed quite a difference (unplugged that is since I'll finish the electronics, the setup and the intonation tomorrow). Whereas I always felt that my Dinky was somewhat bloated sounding on the lower end of the frequency spectrum, strumming some chords with the OFR installed I noticed the guitar gained quite some brilliance and top end sparkle. Everything resonates better and the guitar seems to sustain a lot longer even though I only played it unplugged. I will give you my final conclusions as soon as everything is done, so far I'm satisfied with the results. I will need to order parts for the Floyd such as shorter string locking screws and original stud inserts as well as shiming the neck pocket but both instruments are in good playing condition again so my goal is achieved. I hope all the picture posting wasn't too much, I'll report back with results as soon as I'm done, cheers! 

[GuitarIv]

Dinky number one is all finished and ready to go to her new home. Now it's time to open up a beer, put on some Guns N Roses and finish the second one 

[GuitarIv]

Success, Dinky number two is finished! (for now) 

To summarize the upgrades: Schaller Tuners instead of the generic Jackson ones, Allen Key holder on the headstock, Bareknuckle Painkiller/Coldsweat in black battleworn instead of EMGs and a Original Made in Germany 1984 Floyd Rose instead of the generic Jackson JT580LP tremolo.

Soldering took me abit longer than expected as I managed to wreck the import switch the guitar came with originaly so I yanked the 3 way mini toggle out of the Kramer and wired the whole thing into a simple master volume layout. Works well!

As already said the guitar is gonna remain the way it is for now, as soon as I have the cash I'll order new pots and a 3 way blade switch, new saddles, original pivot point studs and shorter clamping screws to acommodate the rout of the trem cavity.

Shimming the neck is gonna be necessary as pointed out earlier, I have veeery little space for pull ups and raising the pickups any further is impossible. I might just sell the guitar but hell I love fixing things so it's a fun project to turn it into a perfect axe 

The guitar stays perfectly in tune no matter how much I abuse the Floyd and clarity has improved a hundredfold. It was really the cr@ppy licensed Floyd causing the low end flub and muddiness after all. The Painkiller sounds even better now. Grinding, in your face and perfect for high gain riffing. Hard tailed the bridge with the Tremol-No for now so I don't cause any damage to the knife edges of the OFR as long as the licensed pivot studs are still installed. Gonna do a quick demo tomorrow so you can hear what this baby sounds like now 

All in all a fun little project, hope you liked it,

Cheers!

[GuitarIv]

misclick

[GuitarIv]

wrong button again, don't drink and post children *facepalm*

[Dave Sloven]

Good project.  Yeah with a floating trem the quality of the trem and its springs and mounting make a huge difference.

I look forward to hearing how you get on with shimming the neck.  Hopefully it all works out

[GuitarIv]

As promised a quick demo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=146qGFx_jcE

My laptop is wrecked right now so I couldn't mic the amp and record it. Lots of the aggression you hear in the room is actually lost in the recording but you get the idea