Just finished my latest project Ibanez

[Smith357]

Being a working class stiff with a family and mortgage and a few other money eating addictions like guns and knives, my musical interests sort of take a back seat. I play in the very low end of the gear spectrum as I am really not that good, although I have been trying for some 40 years. Not to mention a new Telecaster is $1200 that is like two guns for me.

I Picked up this "as new" Ibanez GAX70 for 75 bones out the door not too long ago, I found it languishing under a thick layer of dust in a pawn shop while looking for Smiths. I decided to buy it specifically to play with and upgrade. The Gio line is Ibanez's entry level or budget line of no frills guitars. Overall it is a very nice low budget guitar, the body, neck and hardware are a good stable platform to work with, but cost cutting corners are used in the electronics and adornments, with super cheap junk electronics and cheezy plastic nut the tone of this guitar sucked dead bears.

After a few weeks of noodling around with it, leveling the frets, and giving it the full spa treatment and setup I finally decided I had to do something about the muddy tone killing pickups. Keeping the budget as low as possible I searched the web and picked up a set of used Epiphone Probucker 3 PUs for $40 to replace the muddy stock Ibanez Power Sound PUs. While the Epis PUs are not high end they are good basic PAF style PUs that get overall good reviews. The pair of these cost me half of what one used Duncan or Dimarzio would cost.

I also switched out the cheap mini pots and put in new American made pots with Orange Drop caps and wired them in standard LP/SG fashion. Along with the pots and caps I added a new Switchcraft switch and jack to bring up the total investment up by $35.

I polished all the black stuff off the screws, threw on some billet knobs I had laying around, made a new truss Rod cover from an old Stratocaster pick guard, and put in a new $13 Tusq XL nut.

So I'm now into it for $163, It now plays like butta and the new tone is well worth every penny spent, and still it cost less than it cost when it was new by about 6 bucks. Not only does it sound so much better than it before, I think it looks better too, but then as they say, "Chrome don't get ya home."

Before

After

 

[billwill]

Looks like a profitable side line could be in your future! Nice job

 

[LVSteve]

You just reminded me that I still have a Ibanez Roadster bass sitting upstairs that I bought new in the spring of 1980. We used to joke that I got mine before Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy bought his.

Here is the twin to mine. Lot 102 – Ibanez Roadster bass series bass guitar << Guitar Auctions – Specialists in Fine, Rare, Antique, Vintage & Later Guitars

 

[Smith357]

You just reminded me that I still have a Ibanez Roadster bass sitting upstairs that I bought new in the spring of 1980.

Very nice. The original MIJ Roadsters are very well made guitars and well respected by players. In the 80s the Japan made Yamaha and Ibanez guitars were often considered superior to the American made Fender and Gibson guitars in all but the electronics. Both Fender and Gibson had QC issues in the 80s.

 

[DeathGrip]

Nice job.

I have a '60s Vox Hurricane that needs some attention. It has three Duncan single coils in it now that I bought in the '80s. I also got rid of the bridge and tremolo and replaced it with a Leo Quan Badass bridge.

It's a fun little Guitar. Very lite but has good sustain with the bridge change, these guitars also have a Zero Fret. Kluson tuning machines were added about 15 years ago.

I bought the guitar in about '78 and the body was beat up bad. I painted it black it was a sun burst before. The neck has one big chip on the end so I left it alone.

I paid $5 then. and probably have a little more than $160 in it now. I need to rewire it, paint it again and whittle up a new pick guard. Prices sure went up on parts though.

 

[Rustyt1953]

Nicely done.

Makes me wanna open the shop again.

PS: I have a large storage unit filled with guitars, guitar necks and bodies, parts, tools, tooling and sundry guitar stuff that wouldn't fit in my basement after I hurriedly closed the store.

Now that there is more room in my basement,(thanks to the great kaka tsunami back in August) I need to go through it and see if any of you shade-tree guitar techs could use any of it.

 

[blackdeuce]

Very nice. You've got a nice guitar for minimal investment. You saved quite a bit by doing the work yourself. My son and I have swapped out some pots, etc. but not a lot. We've purchased a couple of loaded pickguards because we could get the whole setup for a little more than just the cost of the pickups.

My son is WAAAY into guitars and music. He's in a couple of bands. He has a number of guitars and talked me into buying some as "investments". They are a pretty good investment if you buy the right ones. Some of the older Fenders and Gibson have appreciated a lot.

We have a few Ibanez models, but the most unique is the RG770 CP-P (crystal paisley) from around 1990. It was only released in Japan. When we saw this one on eBay, we did some Googling and only found 1 or 2 on the internet and they were part of large collections. The seller was from Japan which I think discouraged some bidders. Anyway, it went for a lot less than we were prepared to bid. I messaged the seller several times and he was a very nice gentleman. It's not "mint", but it's pretty nice. All original. A lot of the older Ibanez have been monkeyed with (pickups swapped out, etc.)