...well, "crazy" by my conservative standards, at least.
There are two guitars that have always held a fascination for me - Gilmour's black Strat because of how it looks, and the Washburn N4 because of its pure practicality.
So...why not combine the two?
My idea sits thusly:
- Grab a knockoff N4 from AliExpress (~£200) because there's an enormous chance of me fucking it up
- Sand off the decals, 'cos it ain't a Washburn or a real SEC
- Use a router to change it from HH to "swimming pool"
- Expand the control cavity a bit to acommodate a 5-way switch
- Make a black scratchplate in roughly a Strat shape (accounting for the much smaller N4 body)
- Stain the body really dark (don't like lacquer finishes)
- Get 3 x white Lace Sensors
- Assemble
- Admire handiwork
Anybody spot any flaws in my plan?
<space for hire>
Comments
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/FREE-shipping-Hot-wholesale-Top-quality-WASHBURN-N4-Nuno-Betancourt-STEPHENS-EXTENDEN-CUTAWAY-Black-electric-guitar/32792732476.html?spm=2114.01010208.3.113.mR1u6Y&ws_ab_test=searchweb0_0,searchweb201602_1_10152_10065_10151_10130_10068_5210015_10192_10190_10301_10136_10137_10303_10060_10155_10062_437_10154_10056_10055_10054_5340016_10059_303_100031_10099_10103_10102_5290015_10096_5220016_10052_5320016_10053_10050_10107_10142_5350016_10051_5280015_10084_10083_5250016_10080_10082_10081_10110_10111_519_5240016_10112_10113_10114_10179_5230016_10182_10184_10078_10079_5260015_10073_10123_10189_5270016_142,searchweb201603_16,ppcSwitch_4&btsid=b0b819c7-ee09-42bd-b009-979477403ed6&algo_expid=2bd7de99-27c9-4d71-8baa-975744905f6f-16&algo_pvid=2bd7de99-27c9-4d71-8baa-975744905f6f
That's great because it ostensibly saves me the job of staining it; however, it also means I have to replace all of the gold hardware 'cos I can't stand it.
I don't think theres a huge cock up factor involved, most tedious would be designing and cutting the scratchplate
A few flaws in the plan might be :
- the tremolo which is probably a piece of junk that doesn't stay in tune ?
So you'll have to find a replacement, which could be expensive and / or difficult if the dimensions are non standard.
- What are the neck specs - are they anything like the real N4 ? The site has no details, personally if it turned up to be a 40mm nut with a 7.5" radius I'd be well pissed off - unlikely but you never know.
It's probably for the best that I get the black one with gold hardware, because you're right: the hardware's almost guaranteed to be junk. I'd imagine that a certain amount of work will also be necessary to get the stuff to fit, too.
Really, the point of the project is for me to get a little bit of experience with woodworking tools and sorting out dodgy fretwork. My budget goes something like this:
£200 - Guitar
£130-ish - Lace Sensors (second hand)
£150 - hardware
£100 - tools (probably a Dremel-esque thing and a plunge router thingy for it, and a set of files)
So about £500-600. I'll guarantee that the guitar won't be worth that much when I'm done with it, but the skills will be.
I would budget £200-300 for that - IMO the very last tool you want to be cheap and nasty is a hand held router.
Smeg.
Or you could buy a Washburn N5.
If you still want to go the DIY route, I have a couple of brand-new N5 scratchplates - one silver and one gold.