Phrasemaker
New member
Hi, I recently decided to do some work on a guitar I own but rarely use because it seemed a bit bland when compared to other guitars I own. It's a Washburn MG 70, I bought it around twenty years ago when I was gigging, and managed to keep it mint aside from a little wear on the frets. At the time I needed a guitar which would suit a whole range of playing styles as the band I played in covered a range of music and I couldn't afford multiple guitars. This guitar has a Floyd Rose, humbucker at the bridge and two single coils with the option to coil tap the bridge pickup.
I re profiled the frets a little and leveled them up, then used a gentle solvent to clean all the muck off the fret-board before using a light wood oil to get the rosewood looking good. After checking the neck to make sure it is good enough to invest further time on the instrument I replaced the pots for volume and tone. I bought a Seymour Duncan Invader SH-8b after a little research, as my intention was to not only make the guitar livelier, but also gain a tone option that didn't already have. The pickup has a massive output leaning very much towards the heavy end of the spectrum. The wiring in the guitar, having a five way selector with coil tap option took a while to figure in respect of getting all the options correct for the new pickup, hence half an hour with a test meter, as the original pickup had totally different colour wires and the space in which to work is very restrictive. I began with the pickup manufacturer's diagram but decided that measuring to see what each conductor did and drawing a circuit diagram of the guitar's electrics would be a better approach. The Duncan pickup has a wide field at each pole which accommodates regular and trembucker string spacing.
Having initially gone after an obscene overdrive set of tones which the pickup does deliver in abundance, I tried it through the valve head and cab and had a play with the clean sound. The result was very pleasantly surprising. It's a characterful tone that's so fat with a massive low end that does not have the over scooped out tonality that can make the bridge sound a bit garish when played virtually clean. I'm now looking to replace the two single coil pickups with two other tonally different options once I've deliberated, and I have a feeling that this guitar will become a very useful recording instrument. Over driven it sounds extremely rude and that was the intention, so no disappointment there, it has improved sustain which was never great on this bolt together instrument and I will now actually use it, having considered selling it on.
All the best
Tim
I re profiled the frets a little and leveled them up, then used a gentle solvent to clean all the muck off the fret-board before using a light wood oil to get the rosewood looking good. After checking the neck to make sure it is good enough to invest further time on the instrument I replaced the pots for volume and tone. I bought a Seymour Duncan Invader SH-8b after a little research, as my intention was to not only make the guitar livelier, but also gain a tone option that didn't already have. The pickup has a massive output leaning very much towards the heavy end of the spectrum. The wiring in the guitar, having a five way selector with coil tap option took a while to figure in respect of getting all the options correct for the new pickup, hence half an hour with a test meter, as the original pickup had totally different colour wires and the space in which to work is very restrictive. I began with the pickup manufacturer's diagram but decided that measuring to see what each conductor did and drawing a circuit diagram of the guitar's electrics would be a better approach. The Duncan pickup has a wide field at each pole which accommodates regular and trembucker string spacing.
Having initially gone after an obscene overdrive set of tones which the pickup does deliver in abundance, I tried it through the valve head and cab and had a play with the clean sound. The result was very pleasantly surprising. It's a characterful tone that's so fat with a massive low end that does not have the over scooped out tonality that can make the bridge sound a bit garish when played virtually clean. I'm now looking to replace the two single coil pickups with two other tonally different options once I've deliberated, and I have a feeling that this guitar will become a very useful recording instrument. Over driven it sounds extremely rude and that was the intention, so no disappointment there, it has improved sustain which was never great on this bolt together instrument and I will now actually use it, having considered selling it on.
All the best
Tim
