"One last project" - should I break up this guitar to use the neck?

Megii

I have a much-modded Ibanez AH10 (Allan Holdsworth) model guitar, which I bought in about 1985 or 86. I never use it - partly because it looks a bit wrong for the kind of jazz/bands I play in now, but mainly because tbh I have guitars that sound better for my style of playing - which is straight ahead jazz, with the odd bit of bluesy stuff or funk thrown in occasionally. When I got the guitar, the much younger me was pretty much under the spell of Allan Holdsworth, however, much as I still admire the man, I long ago ceased wanting to sound like him (which I never managed anyhow). When I bought it, the guitar had a single bridge humbucker, but now has a neck pickup added, and a mad switching system. In original condition I guess it might be worth something to a collector, but I doubt it now.

Re the guitar, Holdsworth himself does not seem to have liked it - he said several derogatory things about it, and only used it for about a year, before going on to a headless Steinberger IIRC. And the "Ibanez" models that he did use were apparently actually made for Allan by Valley Arts, so not the japanese-made guitar you see below. Ibanez had that done to try and keep AH happy I think. For my taste, there are certainly a few things less than ideal about the AH10 - for one thing, the trem has an aluminium alloy block - this was an experiment by Ibanez, to get a certain kind of tone, but to my thinking, it's not really successful - they should have just gone with a decent steel block. Another thing is the basswood body wood - nothing wrong with basswood, but on this guitar, it seems to give a certain thin-ness to the tone. The wood is certainly very soft, and the guitar has numerous bashes and dings - which I patched up to some extent with one of those car paint touch-in things. Not very obvious in the pics, but if you looked at the guitar in the flesh, you'd see them. And the body has a massive swimming pool rout under the scratchplate, done in an attempt to give the guitar some kind of acoustic resonance to the tone - IMO it didn't work, it just robs the guitar of sustain, and adds to the thin tone.

But, all that said - the neck is a real belter - lovely slab of ebony, big frets, very nice profile to it, and made to typical mid 80s Japanese standards. So what I'm thinking is that in it's current modded and bashed about state the guitar is not worth a huge amount, but I would have to pay quite a bit to buy a neck of equivalent quality. So could I use the neck to make a guitar of more use to me? - I could send it to Phil at www.guitarbuild.co.uk, and have him make a tele style body for it, possibly a thinline (which I notice they've started doing now). And then a nice humbucker/P90/Charlie Christian type pickup in the neck position, and I do already have a Mojo broadcaster alnico 3 pickup I bought on this forum, so could use that for the bridge position. Obviously I'd have to buy a few bits, such as a tele bridge unit. I think I might well go with black chrome hardware, so I could keep the original machine heads, which are high quality. I guess I would be sanding the metallic green finish off the front of the headstock, and refinishing - actually I might re-finish the whole neck with Tru Oil. I suppose I might re-shape the headstock in a tele style, but I'd probably be happy to leave the Ibanez Roadstar profile as a tribute to the necks origins.

Well - so what do you reckon...? Sacrilege to contemplate doing this with a mid-80s Japanese-made Ibanez? Or I should stop being sentimental, and at least use the neck to make a guitar that I will use and enjoy? I admit I'm only toying with the idea... Thanks for reading, and opinions welcome

Megii

Aaagh, forgot the pics!

ADP

I think you should either just sell it as it is or get a scratchplate made to return it to its original spec and then sell it on. That way you can buy or build a Telecaster exactly the way you want it.

Megii

You're probably right @ADP - I guess I kind of expected someone to say that too. Thanks for being honest though. Although the body really is pretty bashed about - I realise that doesn't show in the pics, - but I might be spending money getting the scratchplate done, for not a lot of return. Hmm...

HarrySeven

Sell it to me!

steamabacus

Sounds like a perfectly good plan to me. Go for it, I say.

ADP

You might just find there's someone out there looking for that very guitar and is happy to spend the money to get a new scratchplate. I wouldn't worry about the bumps and dents; if it were a Strat, it'd be a relic. A 1980s guitar that doesn't show any kind of wear is a pretty rare commodity.

You might even consider parting it out and selling it. You'd be surprised what you might get for it.

sweepy

Desirable guitars for us Holdsworth fanbois

Megii

HarrySeven said:

Sell it to me!

What sort of price are we looking at, do you reckon @HarrySeven?

steamabacus said:

Sounds like a perfectly good plan to me. Go for it, I say.

Cheers @steamabacus - it may not be the most financially sensible option (although I'm not so sure re that) but I do think I'd end up with a guitar I'd like a lot. I really do like the neck very much for one thing. And another build would be a lot of fun. I know Guitarbuild would do me proud with making a body to suit. It's tempting I must say.

ADP said:

You might just find there's someone out there looking for that very guitar and is happy to spend the money to get a new scratchplate. I wouldn't worry about the bumps and dents; if it were a Strat, it'd be a relic. A 1980s guitar that doesn't show any kind of wear is a pretty rare commodity.

You might even consider parting it out and selling it. You'd be surprised what you might get for it.

It's maybe worth advertising at the sort of price I'd like, just to see if there is some response - good point. Hadn't considered breaking it up to sell -  but that is ruthlessly sensible in a way. Of course, if I did that, I'd end up keeping the neck, and then it's really just doing what I've suggested. I wouldn't have thought the body on it's own is worth very much though - there are a couple of huge dents on the sides, plus loads of smaller dings, and it's not the "proper" strat shape most people want for a project. But still, hmm...

sweepy said:

Desirable guitars for us Holdsworth fanbois

Really? Even though AH himself didn't like the guitar? I remember the younger me buying into the whole thing when the Ibby AH10 was first publiscised, and then feeling a bit pissed-off when Allan Holdsworth hardly used it, said bad things about it, and then was seen with the Steinberger. If I was currently interested in playing in a Holdsworth influenced kind of way, I doubt I'd be searching for one of these guitars tbh. But I guess there is some historical kind of interest to the guitar all the same. My own view is that it is a flawed design, unfortunately.

Jalapeno

That's a lot (8!!!) of switches for 2 pickups

I'd sell it as it is and get the Tele you want (Charlie Christian you say, I am about to start building one myself )

GuyBoden

Jalapeno said:

That's a lot (8!!!) of switches for 2 pickups

I'd sell it as it is and get the Tele you want (Charlie Christian you say, I am about to start building one myself )

Yes, I agree, sell it and make a Tele-bits-o-caster with the Jazz neck pickup you like.

Good luck

(Edit: You don't need a bridge pickup in a Tele for Jazz, I don't have one in my Tele-bits-o-caster)

DrBob

I say pull it to pieces & do.

Mind you if I'm being honest that is at least in part because I've got a lovely maple board Strat neck that was very kindly gifted to me by @woody of this very parish and an ASL Eruption humbucker that are both sitting around doing nowt and I'd love to make a dastardly lowball offer on the remains of the AH10 to stick it all onto/in..

Probably shouldn't reveal my dastardly plans, tends to ruin the effectiveness...

Sassafras

I quite like that with all it's switches. Might be a problem playing live though.

Obviously not much help to you, sorry.

Andyjr1515

Hi @Megii

If it was me, I would try to sell it at the price I would want for it and if there are no takers or major interest, then I would use the neck...

Nice, by the way, but may or may not have a huge market value...only one way of finding out...

Andy

ADP

Since the only modification you've made to the guitar is the scratchplate, price getting one made online. A new plate is a minor modification compared to an extra pickup and eight new switches.

Megii

Cheers for the comments chaps, all good food for thought, and appreciated. I have to admit there is a bit of me that's just itching to take the neck off, and start talking to Guitarbuild about possibilities for the body. If that is the way I decide to go, I'll let you know @DrBob

@GuyBoden you make a good point re the lack of need for a bridge pup - of course for pure jazz use, you're spot on there. But I might want, very occasionally, to have a more cutting tone for blues use, for example. Also, I already have a tele partscaster I made, and my impression is that the tele ashtray bridge does have some impact on the tone - not essential at all, but I happen to like the effect myself. So might as well put a pickup in it!

@Andyjr1515 - I suppose you're right I should at least see what the guitar might fetch. In the past I've occasionally seen them for sale, and despite various bits of internet/forum chat I read about them and what great/interesting guitars they are etc., they don't actually seem to fetch very much money in practice. Especially in today's market, with prices for decent new guitars so low, I suspect I'd struggle.

Re the 8 switches, in case anyone's interested - first there is a pair for each pickup, which control the wiring for the pickup coils:

-both switches one way gives the coils in series, both switches the other way gives the coils in parallel. And then just pushing one of the switches forward allows you to select either coil on it's own. So 4 possible wiring arrangements for each individual pickup. And then there is another set of 2 switches which control how the 2 pickups are combined, in a similar way - so you can have the pickups combined in series or parallel, or either pickup on it's own. In addition, there is another switch which reverses the phase of one of the pickups. I believe I calculated there are 72 possible pickup wiring configurations in total... There is also an 8th switch which bypasses the volume control (but not the tone) - I really just put that one on for the sake of adding another switch... It's actually all quite intuitive to use, and was an interesting exercise to do, but I have since come to the conclusion that guitars are better with a simpler setup - a few good tones are all you need.

Anyway, re this guitar and it's possible fate, I'll give it a bit of time and thought, not rushing into any decision, and thanks again for your thoughts guys!

DrBob

I await your decision with interest

impmann

Why not take the neck off and have the new body made. Keep the original body.

If in the future you fall out of love with it again, you could put it back together as it was originally retaining any 'value' in it being an AH signature.

Ultimately, if the neck is the best bit, then it makes sense to use the neck on a guitar that you'll play.

Megii

impmann said:

Why not take the neck off and have the new body made. Keep the original body.

If in the future you fall out of love with it again, you could put it back together as it was originally retaining any 'value' in it being an AH signature.

Ultimately, if the neck is the best bit, then it makes sense to use the neck on a guitar that you'll play.

@impmann - that is good thinking there, although if I was using the neck with a new guitar, I'd want to get rid of the metallic green finish on the headstock, which would then prevent me returning it to original condition.

I'm really in a very indecisive state at the moment, so perhaps best if I don't make any rash decisions. I think I'll see what kind of off the shelf necks are available for the kind of money I might be able to sell the guitar for - I do like the neck on the AH-10, but maybe I can find something as good. @DrBob - given my unsure state about the whole thing, I'd say please don't expect any kind of decision soon - probably not worth waiting around for to be honest - just don't want to mess you around mate.

impmann

Megii said:

impmann said:

Why not take the neck off and have the new body made. Keep the original body.

If in the future you fall out of love with it again, you could put it back together as it was originally retaining any 'value' in it being an AH signature.

Ultimately, if the neck is the best bit, then it makes sense to use the neck on a guitar that you'll play.

@impmann - that is good thinking there, although if I was using the neck with a new guitar, I'd want to get rid of the metallic green finish on the headstock, which would then prevent me returning it to original condition.

Why not finish the new guitar in metallic green. :-)

DrBob

@Megii, mate don't sweat it, you don't owe me a damn thing :-)
If I'm being honest I think @Impmann's plan sounds like a much better & less destructive plan