For Sale: 1989 Fender USA Standard Stratocaster

I listed one of my guitars for sale today, check it out here.




* This guitar has been sold. One down!

1950's Gibson P13 pickup

Well, it's not every day you get to see the internals of a pickup from the 1950's. This is a Gibson made P13 single coil pickup. It came off the Harmony lap steel guitar that I received this week. Harmony and Gibson swapped parts here and there during the rough times, when they had resources that each could benefit from. This pickup features on quite a few Harmony models. (And if you look closely at a few old archtop bodies, hmmm, Harmony, or Gibson? How does THAT change your perception on construction and materials quality difference between the "cheap" and expensive brand?!)
My lap steel arrived with no noise. I opened it up, and there were no wires, at all... I wonder if that had something to do with it. There were not even any wires attached to the pickup. A quick test of my pickup had me pronouncing it DOA.
It took some opening; there was a strong weld of solder on each side of the case, and my 30W iron struggled to do the job, since the heat was being soaked up by the entire case. I got in though, and saw both ends of the copper winding loose. I soldered those to the respective terminals, and she is alive!! As you see, measures about 8.8k on the meter.

Enjoy the pictures, you will probably never have this chance again :)

Great day!

Good times today, one thing after another. I picked up this very old Harmony lap steel from the post office that I bought during the week. It has the very sought after and expensive Gibson P13 pickup. (I got his complete guitar for $10 more than a solo P13 sold for the next day!)







I seldom enjoy going into the noise at Guitar Center, but it serves a purpose, and today, Mike and I had purpose. I needed to pick up a boom stand for my microphone. Whilst there, a used and abused Epiphone Stratocaster copy was spotted. I pulled out the haggling stick, and we walked away with it for $65 plus tax. It sounds and plays great! I think our friend will adopt this one as his project Strat so it was great to seal the deal.







On the way home I ran over some carpet that had come out of someone's truck... then stopped for a piece. Nice, clean and good size, to serve as a guitar cushion while working on my desk up here.

Added 2/3/08:

Wow, I forgot there was more to yesterday. I stopped in the Hobby shop on the way home too, to pick up a craft knife to shape the styrene I bought for my H44 jack plates. I asked them about larger sheets of the 2mm styrene... and it comes in pieces large enough to make a whole scratch plate as well. So, I ordered in a couple of packs. Things are coming together!