Whats your best cheapo?

rhinofeet · May 5

2015 Gibson LP junior, less than £300 in the Amazon blowout. Or a knackered Yamaha SG1000 for about £300 in the Shanghai ishibashi.

Kurtis · May 5

stufisher said:

My 1986 Westone Spectrum DX which I picked up with a 30W amp, strap and curly cable lead for the princely sum of £100.

After a complete strip down, thorough clean, new strings and pro-setup my total outlay reached £185.

The guitar is a keeper for sure..It's so comfy to play, sounds fab and still is my only HH Superstrat ... MIJ build quality still going strong and 38 years old

That was my first electric, a dark blue one. Maybe slightly different, it had a different bridge but can't think now what it was like.

I gave it to a mate that wanted to learn. Was a pretty decent guitar really. Was solid all the time I had it.

mark123 · May 5

jdbwales said:

Yamaha Revstar RS320, first generation. Frighteningly close to my Gibson LP Custom for sub £200.

Wow !
Is that with stock pick ups ? Or major upgrades ?

simonhpieman · May 5

guitarmangler said:

My red Hondo lead ii copy. I think I paid £130 for it about 5 years ago? I almost immediately had it refretted by Bill at Corvus guitars ( who is amazing). He also gave it a new nut). It plays incredibly well and I don’t think I’ve done a gig without it since getting it?
Pickups are original and sound great. It has an out of phase switch which I use all the time to get a pseudo clean sound. Pots feel really smooth. Stays in tune. Looks cool.

I bought a white one just before lockdown for £110 to use as a spare ( also refretted by Corvus guitars ).

They are absolutely stellar guitars. I had a HH one for a while and the neck was just amazing. I genuinely considered having it refretted too but had too many HH guitars at the time.

Please keep quiet about them. I'd like the next one I find to be cheap, please!

Sarge · May 5

Funkfingers said:

I'm amazed that the Westone's vibrato sustain block has not shattered into one thousand tiny pieces.

I've had literally dozens of Westones, never once has a trem block on any of them been even close to crumbling.
Are you mistaking the "Bendmaster" seen on Encore guitars? they are different and they DO shatter.

Funkfingers · May 5

Yes. The Bendmaster is the culprit. Its cast zinc sustain block has more bubbles in it than an Aero chocolate bar.

JohnS37 · May 5

By far my best cheapo is still one of my ‘go-to’ guitars even now. I bought it on eBay for £4.32, and it’s a homemade partscaster. It has a P-Bass body (with a big cutout to reduce weight, plus I chambered it too), 2 x gold Epiphone humbuckers and a strat-copy neck with no truss rod. When I acquired it, it was wired with 2.5T&E house wiring cable!
I sprayed it with metallic blue car paint from a rattle can and re-wired it of course. It has one volume, one tone and an LP style pickup selector switch. From the description you would think it would be a disaster, but it plays really well with a nice low action. I’ll post a pic when I get a moment. Oh, and I have spent £0.00 on it, including the refurb/rebuild.

57Deluxe · May 5

99p ebay auction from China via Germany in 2007 - final price £15 - best sounding Tele I have ever come into contact with and played daily since - look at the fretboard wear! All I have done is redress the frets and played it!

Image: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/dd/24/35/dd24350ae14b02e8afe96c12d40cf886.jpg

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CountryDave · May 5

Had a Squier Simon Neil strat for a while. Sold it to put funds towards something higher up the pecking order. Regret that move.
Regularly start drafting a WTB thread for another, but then remind myself I’m on a downsize at the moment.

jdbwales · May 5

mark123 said:

jdbwales said:

Yamaha Revstar RS320, first generation. Frighteningly close to my Gibson LP Custom for sub £200.

Wow !
Is that with stock pick ups ? Or major upgrades ?

Only upgrades made were a set of Blues Engines and a push pull partial coil split - I didn’t even have to touch the frets. Plays amazingly well.

grungebob · May 5

My recent Airline Bighorn cost me £380 new. Absolutely blown away with it.

Its not a perfect guitar by any stretch of the imagination ( paint spills and lacquer crack) but it is probably the best guitar for me I’ve ever owned. I’m scared to even change the strings on it in case the magic disappears lol

TTBZ · May 5

jdbwales said:

Yamaha Revstar RS320, first generation. Frighteningly close to my Gibson LP Custom for sub £200.

Would you say the 1st gen Revstar have a similar level weight/chunk and "push" to the sound that a LP tends to have? Been playing more recently and once again finding myself wanting more chunk than my SG provides! Not sure I want an LP again (don't like the feel of them any more) but would love something similar in sound. Revstars are great value.

jdbwales · May 5

TTBZ said:

jdbwales said:

Yamaha Revstar RS320, first generation. Frighteningly close to my Gibson LP Custom for sub £200.

Would you say the 1st gen Revstar have a similar level weight/chunk and "push" to the sound that a LP tends to have? Been playing more recently and once again finding myself wanting more chunk than my SG provides! Not sure I want an LP again (don't like the feel of them any more) but would love something similar in sound. Revstars are great value.

Yeah absolutely I would - I much prefer them to the second generation. The first gen are much heavier and denser (and not chambered like G2) and while it may be nonsense I definitely tend to feel that translates to a bigger sound. I actually find they’re the best of several worlds - chunk and big sound, scale length, balance and strap placement of a Les Paul with the interesting looks of SGs and the enhanced playability of Ibanez, as it has a 14” radius board and tall frets. I’d also definitely say to try a few though - my lowly 320 has seen off the newer ‘standard’ second gen, other 320s, a 420 and the only one that was almost as good was a 620 in sunburst, but that didn’t quite play as well. Generally they’re well made and lovely guitars, but some definitely have more of a ‘magic’ about them than others!

skullfunkerry · May 5

JohnS37 said:

By far my best cheapo is still one of my ‘go-to’ guitars even now. I bought it on eBay for £4.32, and it’s a homemade partscaster. It has a P-Bass body (with a big cutout to reduce weight, plus I chambered it too), 2 x gold Epiphone humbuckers and a strat-copy neck with no truss rod. When I acquired it, it was wired with 2.5T&E house wiring cable!
I sprayed it with metallic blue car paint from a rattle can and re-wired it of course. It has one volume, one tone and an LP style pickup selector switch. From the description you would think it would be a disaster, but it plays really well with a nice low action. I’ll post a pic when I get a moment. Oh, and I have spent £0.00 on it, including the refurb/rebuild.

I'd love to see pictures of that please @JohnS37

skullfunkerry · May 5

Funkfingers said:

That Aria could be ex-HarrySeven!

Don't be ridiculous; Harry never sells anything!

Pabcrane · May 6

My brother gave me a Strat shaped guitar he got in a starter-pack he got while he was teaching in Russia for a year.

To be fair, I have, moderately cheaply, fiddled with it a bit - Tone Rider Surfari pickups (the ones in it - SSH were really pretty awful), scratch plate, Wilko machineheads, Wilko steel block trem and pots). It plays great and sounds like a Strat - and it's a dead cheapo guitar

I got a Tokai 335-type over lockdown on Marketplace (with a very good case). The neck felt fantastic even if a few other things were a bit dodgy (the tune-o-matic was collapsing, the machineheads were a bit fucked - two were bent and the low E wound backwards, and the pickups didn't sound great). Some Wilko machineheads, Faber bridge and Creamery pickups (the pots and switch were all really good quality surprisingly). It's not a Japanese one - Chinese or Korean, I assume it was a cheapo (the label in the f hole has long since gone) but a really good guitar.

A Kramer Baretta Special - the bottom of their barrel ,- I got on eBay with a decent gigbag. Again I replaced the machineheads with Wilko's, the trem with a Wilko steel-block one and Highwood saddles. I also put in a Duncan JB as my friend gave me one, however the original pickup was absolutely fine. I did have to clip the resistor attached to the volume knob to make it usable but the neck and the frets are all really good, it's quite surprisingly good.

And a Squier Bass VI I got on eBay for an embarrassing amount. I replaced the scratchplate and put a shim in and that's it. It sounds and plays wonderfully. The stock split post machines are great - I don't use the wang bar and it stays in tune perfectly. I can't imagine needing another more expensive one

grayn · May 6

Vintage V100AFD Paradise. A really really good LP style guitar. Not changed a thing. Well, strings.

Image: https://i.postimg.cc/DZhVnxzs/D.jpg

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Adey · May 6

I've bought a few guitars which had completely worn out frets for very little money and re-fretted them. They were fantastic. I suppose if someone had a good guitar years ago, it got played a lot. Once if got to the stage of needing a re-fret maybe people had also bought another guitar or two and so avoided the cost.