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For all who might be interested,
I've heard comments from quite a few guitarists who like the "Strat Sound", but
prefer the look of the offset body guitars like the Jazzmaster and Jaguar.
Also, many surf guitarists prefer the sound of the 2-pickup guitar (i.e. neck
and bridge) versus the sound of the stock Strat.
With some very low-cost mods, here's a bridge between the two!
Wesley Guitar Works UK is offering a really cool offset-body in Solid Alder,
with Strat trem and Strat-style pickups and switching, called the Wesley San
Diego. It's available in Metallic Cobalt Blue and a brilliant Metallic Red.
I've uploaded 3 photos of this guitar in the "Guitars" folder in Photos, they're
the last 3 images appearing in "Guitars", last I checked.
The first is a factory photo of the San Diego, dead-stock, unmodified.
The second and third are of MY San Diego, received last Thursday, (4 days after
submitting my order paid via PayPal). At $235 US plus shipping, I bought two,
one for our other guitarist, Tyler, who fell in love with this guitar at first
sight, and after four hours of playing it during our Saturday rehearsal, he had
no hesitation plunking down $260 for the shipped price. (Tyler's mainstay guitar
for the past 15 years has been an original '62 Jaguar). The rest of our band
members think these are excellent sounding surf guitars, as good as ANY Strat,
Jazzmaster, or Jaguar any of us have played!
Tyler's was left dead stock. As I said, photos 2 & 3 are of mine after making
the following mods: In place of the stock pickups, I put in a set of Mexi Strat
'57 R/I p'ups, ($50). I used my Dremel on the pickguard, to slightly extend the
distance between the 2 original pots, to make room for a 3rd pot in between. I
then replaced the 5-position switch with a Switchcraft 3- position switch ($11),
and replaced the pots with 3 CTS 250K pots, ($25). I then wired everything up
as the wiring schematic I also posted shows. Finally I put on a set of D'Addario
12-guage nickel-plated strings. This guitar has the Fender feel, and the neck
and frets are so good, I was able to lower the string action equivalent to the
very best American Fenders I've ever played. For a total cost of about
$346.00!!
With original tuners and bridge, and only the most minor sanding of the nut
grooves, this guitar is easy to tune, and stays in tune quite well.
Played through either my original '63 Fender Reverb Unit, or the '63 R/I Reverb
Unit, feeding into my '64 Showman and a pair of EV12L speakers, the sound is
awesome, and on a par with the best Fenders I've played - No Foolin! Check out
the photos - This Wesley San Diego is a thing of beauty, and plays like buttah!
Best of all, it's a great low-buck axe, (but no one else needs to know that!).
Here's the link to see the Wesley page on the Metallic Blue San Diego:
Bruce D
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Sweet. It looks a lot like Sean's Fernandes
"Jazzocaster." There was also a Squier Jagmaster
being made along these lines shortly after the Vista
Series was discontinued that you don't see very many
of but almost every one that I saw had a cracked neck
pocket.
Richard
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Hohner had/has a similar model, as has Stagg. the Hohner being a
decent quality guitar, the stagg not so.
JM body, stratlike electronics, different headstock shape tho. How
comes all the JM copies have differnet headstocks, while there are
many strat copies with a fenderlike headstock?
WR
--- In , Richard <errant_jedi@y...>
wrote:
>
> Sweet. It looks a lot like Sean's Fernandes
> "Jazzocaster." There was also a Squier Jagmaster
> being made along these lines shortly after the Vista
> Series was discontinued that you don't see very many
> of but almost every one that I saw had a cracked neck
> pocket.
>
> Richard
>
>
>
> ____________________________________________________
> Yahoo! Sports
> Rekindle the Rivalries. Sign up for Fantasy Football
>
