Musicologyee

Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Step 5: Restringing

Now that the pickups and electronics are back in, I’m itching to get back to playing! But calm down a moment and sober up cause we have to restring first.

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Step 4: Electronics

It’s good to be back posting regularly. Per the previous post, the next thing to do is wire up tho pickups and the electronics. 

Here we go!

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Step 3: Pickup Prep and Installation

Alright, back at it.

I had originally planned to Dremel out the Jackson pickup routs for the mounting tabs of the BKP. This would require a steady hand and would be fairly obvious. I figured there was just too much room for error. Instead, I followed Marty Searing’s approach after all.

Let’s carry on…

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Step 2: Tremol-no

I felt bad that the previous post didn’t amount to much except pictures. I thought I’d go forward and provide another step. This is largely relying on the official installation video provided by Tremol-no. No reason to repeat what they already have shown, so I recommend you just watch the video.

There’s really not much to this. Seriously. And it confirms that there is not incompatibility with the 7-string version or the type of bridge (if using the pin type). Once you have everything ready, you should only take about half an hour to get this going, assuming you don’t need to much work done with the action/intonation. If you haven’t seen my last post about disassembly, please check it out.

I’ve also had some knee issues recently, so my posts may be sporadic this week as I find to get things done and/or manage the discomfort of sitting in certain chairs.

Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod: Sustain Block Upgrade

Alright, this is going to sound lame, but the mod isn’t actually happening (Hence not assigning this an actual step number.)

In the process of disassembling the bridge, I learned that the mounting screws for the sustain block of the 7-string Floyd do not align the same as the 6-string version. Needless to say, you CANNOT currently swap the sustain block with an aftermarket tungsten version. The brass block offered by Floyd Upgrades does come in a 7-string version which I will be researching.

I still wanted to provide something here for the very least that this is a learning experience and cautionary tale. The pics below should clarify the construction of the bridge a little bit and compare the two blocks.

Tungsten top, stock bottom:

[edit] The OFR-1000 series is the version installed on this guitar and it is NOT compatible, but supposedly it is on the other series. This is still a genuine Floyd Rose, but made in Korea. It is not the licensed version either. Unless I get a Schaller (made in Germany) version, I will have to live with the old zinc version. [/edit]

I’m hoping that the use of the Tremol-no will compensate somewhat for the inferior sustain. In hardtail mode, I don’t expect to be able to tell the difference.

Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Step 1: Disassembly

A real step!!! YEAH! DOING STUFF!!! No, but seriously, I will finally present some pics and get things done instead of just musing on them. I have most of the goodies I need to get started. I have steadily been receiving parts—electronics, strings, Tremol-no, pickups, etc. This should be a nice change of pace from the previous, purely academic discussions and the pics should mostly speak for themselves, though there aren’t ones for every step because it was just not feasible. [Bear with me as I am not a studied photographer.]

Lots of the tricks I learned from observing the Floyd Upgrades videos and the Ultimate-Guitar forum setup threads. But I didn’t follow everything to the letter. Don’t know if my way is the best, but it seemed to more sense to me.

One last playtime before I move on. I was just playing unplugged in these photos, in case you’re wondering.

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Assessments pt. 2

As promised, here is part 2, the follow up to part 1.

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Assessments pt. 1

Hoping to update with further progress on the as yet unnamed Jackson, I thought I’d discuss the reasons for modifying each aspect, the thought process behind choosing components, tonal impressions before changes and my overall comments on the design of the guitar. I’ll probably throw in budgetary concerns as well. I try to discuss things categorically from top to bottom of the guitar, but also in logical order of priority, just as I methodically think through it myself. (I know, I know, “pics or it didn’t happen”.)

This ties in with the shopping I’ve been doing to get all these aspects “fixed”. I’m still waiting on some parts, so this should tide you over until I have a free weekend or at the least, a couple evenings. I’m a regular weekday worker so my progress on such projects is either in bursts or long and drawn out over what is probably months.

I’m splitting this up into a couple parts due to length. Here’s part 1…

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Step 0: Strap Buttons

Let’s start with something simple. Step 0: strap buttons…

Why:

• Because you don’t want to drop your guitar that is insecurely strapped on. Have you ever bounced around until *shwam!* your guitar is taking a dive dead-first to the ground? Or perhaps you’re now playing and holding the guitar only in one hand? Or at best you did not catch it in time and the tuning is way out of whack? I think this speaks for itself.

When:

• The other night, predating this post. Took 5 minutes with the right tools.

Who:

• Me—fortunately this “mod” doesn’t require any help. These don’t have anything to do with messing up the guitar unless you are an absolute terror with a screwdriver. They’re fairly easy to change and can be upgraded asynchronously to everything else. You shouldn’t have to take this to a shop.

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Jackson SLAT3-7 Mod Overview

I decided before purchase that I would probably change up some things with the Jackson depending on what I noticed after receiving the guitar. (I guess if I spent all these years just playing the darn things I’d be better than I am.) But this requires evaluation of the instrument in question. Rather than just doing stuff for the sake of messing around, I tend to mentally comb over the guitar that I want to mod. That itself begs the question of whether or not the modding is necessary. Let’s assume for the time being that it just is and as I walk through what I tend to inspect, it will become clearer whether this is a necessity or not to you.

I decided to move “step 0” to a separate post here to fit pics better and to be a bit more descriptive.

A few things of note are:

• there are no comprehensive discussions of the SLAT3-7 model to begin with (or most guitars, really) besides Marty Searing’s blog focusing on the electronics tinkering and minor wood alteration. I knew I needed to do a bit of research/shopping for my guitar and the findings are detailed here. But certainly the majority of info is scattered around the web if you know what & how to search. Probably most others don’t bother to discuss or have no compelling reason to mod.
• a quality guitar is not required to be modified or changed in any way unless by preference/opinion—that is, your opinion that the guitar is not the quality as you’d prefer. Things to keep in mind when modding are resale value, look, effort, reversibility, playability, and cost. The Jackson is no exception; I’m just difficult to satisfy. But as they say, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Disclaimer: many of these mods will invalidate your warranty. Be forewarned. This is subsumed by the line item, “Any damage to an instrument resulting from customization or modification.”

Intro: Mods

What is modding? Modification, or “modding”, is the process of changing some aspect of an item to make it better. “Better” is a relative thing and requires further examination.

No guitar is ever “perfect” really. While a guitar can be made to extremely exacting standards, there is always going to be something that bugs you (usually unless you pay a lot of money for it up front). This is a sweeping generalization that draws the best analogy with those who hot rod their cars or PCs. Certainly some people have gotten very lucky with finding exactly their fit, but that tends not to be me. (Or perhaps this is a lesson in contentment?)

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