zenmindbeginner Posted February 18, 2014 Posted February 18, 2014 Mindblowing awesomeness Jeff!Your pickup ring is a tick short though... other than that, total perfection.
LordOfTheThighs Posted February 18, 2014 Posted February 18, 2014 You don't see one of those everyday.Awesomeness!!!
hamerhead Posted February 18, 2014 Posted February 18, 2014 Nice one Jeff and co., but I'm sick today and it hurts my eyes. Can you shoot some black over that?
svl Posted February 19, 2014 Posted February 19, 2014 Genius, Jeff. I absolutely love her.Kudos to all involved on a definite masterpiece!
ArnieZ Posted February 19, 2014 Posted February 19, 2014 I love it when a plan comes together, Fantastic, enjoyArnieZ
T-51Fred Posted February 19, 2014 Posted February 19, 2014 Wow! It pays to be anal! Incredible guitar.
LordOfTheThighs Posted February 19, 2014 Posted February 19, 2014 Wow! It pays to be anal! Thats what she said!
Hamerica Posted February 19, 2014 Posted February 19, 2014 Damn I'm a sucker for a good story. Then make it a guitar or car story and I am all in. You have to love Reeshard, "Match Dorothy's Slippers." Fantastic! As soon as I saw "Ruby" I thought of Dirty Looks "Oh Ruby"! I don't own a sparky, guitar like that. That is awesome. Hamerica
FrettyMcgee Posted February 19, 2014 Posted February 19, 2014 Pure, pure, awesomeness. AND you stole my thunder on that exact color....thank you very much! That is pretty much the exact finish I'm looking for to do a Jack Butler tribute sometime this year. I've been wanting one of those old Jackson's since I saw that damn movie in 1986. "Yo, Karate Kid, karate chop your way out of this...."
silentman Posted February 20, 2014 Posted February 20, 2014 Awesome. I'm a sucka for sparkled guitars too
Jeff R Posted February 21, 2014 Author Posted February 21, 2014 Thanks for all the compliments. Here's some follow up from comments in the thread and some through PMs: What's so special about the neck?: Outside of good luck finding another factory logo'ed ESP strat head, it's a MEATY neck by ESP standards. This is from back in the day when they were in the business of making strat parts that were better than Fender parts. The contour is somewhere between an American Standard and a 70s "C" feel. Not baseball bat, just meaty. Contour aside, the RESONANCE under your left hand and the huge frets make it simply a sick player. The neck was the green light for making "Ruby" happen. Tone Report: As incredible of a Stike sparkly job this thing has, it's a player and tone generator first. My OCD and the contributions of all involved paid off. I honestly walked into this project with the expectations that I would have a "decent" guitar with a bitchin' finish. I had no clue I would walk away with my dream guitar that happened to be wrapped in my dream finish. I have had somewhere in excess of 200 guitars go through my stable over the years and very, very few stayed, and this is the best guitar I've ever played or heard in my life. I shit you all not. I cannot wait for Ben, Murkat, Bobby Marshall and all the contributors to play this thing because it is simply incredible. Beyond the "oohs" from the paint (and they are so frequent), all my buddies who play practically shit their pants when they play this guitar and feel it resonate under their hands. And the tone, the (pardon my Cajun French again) but the FUCKING TONE of this guitar is simply off the scale good. FYI, Cajun Boy's already played it and he called "dibs" so Mitch, even though it will never happen you are still so damn hung out to dry LOL. Shallow-height humbucker ring: Zen, that was intentional and a lesson learned from my early 90s Special FMs. Shallow rings are not susceptible to getting the bass side bridge pickup height screw inadvertently turned by the heel of the right hand (more OCD insight). Between the height of the cosmetically proper rings and the reduced tension of the springs on the pickup height screws, my screws on the Special FMs were spinning all the time on the bass side of my bridge pickup. Ruby will never have that problem. The shallow ring also reinforced the spring tention on the JB's height screws - aka, we dialed the height in, we set and forget, she stays where I want her. I love my attention to detail. Inspiration, Fretty McGee: Let's look at this picture and talk context ... This pic is me in 1989. My first really NICE guitar, the one I "learned" how to play guitar on. Shame I only have this shot in black and white - the guitar was a candy metal-flake grape soda purple. She was originally only a bridge humbucker and a volume knob, I routed and installed her neck pickup and put the mini three-way toggle in myself on my Dad's picnic table. Steve Vai was a HUGE inspiration to me - I could probably still play some of those licks from "Eugene's Trick Bag" if someone twisted my arm, even though it's been years since I tried. I had to move this Jackson strat because of an unexpected speed bump in life (hint: he'll be 23 this year). The owner behind me stripped and reshot her a hideous gun-metal grey color. He made a "modification" to the neck that rendered it veritably useless - which sucked because this was an unusual Jackson in that it had a MEATY neck, not a shredder profile. The guitar ended up parted out as salvage. She ain't coming back. With "Ruby" I kinda put my teacher back together and made the updates that come from a guy who's been playing a few years versus a guy that's been playing a few decades. Little did I know she would both kinda recapture my youth and take care of me where I've been, where I'm at now and where I'm going as a player. I love my guitar.
FrettyMcgee Posted February 21, 2014 Posted February 21, 2014 ^^^^ Love stories like that, thanks for sharing Jeff. ^^^^
coolfeel Posted February 22, 2014 Posted February 22, 2014 Awesomeness Jeff - what a wonderful story and guitar! Can you record a tone clip for us?
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