ShonKy Old Red. Retro roadworn guitar with parker pickups.

ShonKy Old Red

 

The Old red was born from an old handmade body and an Ibanez neck.

The body is made from what looks like a Mahogany type of wood but it is pretty light so not your standard mahogany. Originally It was shaped like a bloated Les Paul. The neck it came with was like a tree trunk and not very good. It was also attached with 6 bolts and the neck pocket extended out another 2 inches. All I did was reshape the upper horn to give it a more aggressive look and convert it for through body stringing.

 

 

It was stripped of it's original finish sealed and re-finished with a thin transparent cherry with a gloss poly top coat Due to the wear on the original body a nice clean finish was never going to look right so I gave it a nice road worn finish.



 

The neck is a re-furbished Ibanez neck. It came to me in a pretty molested state with the headstock cut down and lots of scratches and dents. I tidied the headstock into the sculpted shape and stripped the neck down to the bare wood sanding the dents and scratches out. There are some very light marks left as I didn't want to go too far.  It has then been sealed and lacquered with gloss poly.

 

 

The Hardware is all re-used. Standard hard tail strat style bridge with sealed Tuners

The knobs are the ones that came with the guitar and it is equipped with 100k pots

 

The scratch plate and and other front plate and truss rod cover are all custom made. (the plate under the bridge is there mainly to hide previous holes that have been filled and an odd trapezoidal inlay.

The control cavity cover is aluminium and is the original one for the guitar.

The neck plate is adapted from the original hence it looking a little untidy but it does the job fine.

 

 

I wasn't sure about the 100k pots with humbuckers but I am very pleased with the result. It's sounds like a proper garage rocker very bright and jangly especially for humbuckers.

 

I also think I have inadvertently wired them up in phase (Or out) as with both selected you get that slight nasal tone with loads of harmonics.

Very pleased with this one (I know I usually say that) It's a lot better and nicer looking than I thought it could be. It kind of has a Gibson / Burns love child thing going on.  It also plays superbly and sounds great. It's such a pity I'm so poor at the moment I have to sell it. otherwise it would be a keeper. One day I will own a guitar I have made ha ha.

Ridiculous guitar packaging part 1.

I buy a lot of guitars and have them sent to me through Ebay and privately. Most of them are packed very well and to date I have only hade one LP type arrive with a broken neck due to lack of support around the neck.
Sometimes however I do get quite laughable attempts at packing guitar so I thought I would start documenting them for a cheap laugh.
This one I received a while ago and looks like it was delivered by postman pat.

Luckily Inside was a battered Eko for spares or repair. One thing I suppose the couriers know what it is if it's packed liked this so hopefully would treat it a bit more carefully than a nondescript box but I wouldn't want to risk it.
 

Tenor Ukulele

Here is the Finished Tenor Ukulele that I mentioned a few posts ago.
Mahogany Back & Sides & Cedar Top with Rosewood binding. (the rosewood is not too noticeable but should darken with age. The neck is made from some unidentified exotic hardwood with a Wenge fingerboard. The fret markers are Weng and Aluminium. The Saddle Is made from the the same wood as the neck with a Wenge  accent The Headstock also has a Wenge accent and there is a Wenge Bump Strip and Jack plate on the Bottom. nut and saddle are hand carved from Corian. the machine heads are open faced ones with plastic buttons which I treated to make them look like bone.
The mahogany is reclaimed The neckwood and wenge is very old stock and the cedar is sustainable.
It has Aquila strings and it has been fitted with 2 Piezo discs.

Really pleased with the look and design of this build It's only the second full acoustic build I have done the first being a strumstick which is pretty simple. I found it very nice and comfortable to play. soundwise a very mellow warm sound. Not as loud as I would have liked. I think I am also getting very good results with the antique patina finish. It does look like it's very old and well played and loved.

The owner Marko who originally commissioned a cigar box Uke but due to an error on my part with the original build and the lack of a suitable cigar box to build another one. ended up with letting me build my own body. He has kindly written me a comprehensive review which is under the pics.

Hi Anthony,

 

Uke arrived yesterday. It was very nicely packed, thank you.

 

I really like it. I spend a couple of hours last night playing it.

 

Sound is very nice and rich, very suitable for blues (as well as the looks). It is not as loud as I wanted to be, but it still might get better when it matures. All the sounds come out very clearly, you can hear all the strings individually(what is not always good thing when it shows the lack of your skills J ). Sound is very balanced and it doesn’t get muddy if you strum it harder.

 

I like the aged look. Very nice.

 

The neck is a bit thicker than I originally wanted but it works well with levelled back. Very comfortably to take barre chords. So nothing to complain there. Action is spot on. Very pleased with that. Much better than any ukulele I have played. Very low and no buzz. Perfect. Feel a bit like playing an electric guitar.

 

The balance is pretty good. The headstock could be a bit lighter, but it sits nicely with the quite heavy neck joint. Very comfortable to hold even standing up.  Many ukuleles are very light to give good resonance but are many times very fiddly to hold and move easily when moving chords quickly. Overall this uke is much heavier than most of the ukes I have played (except resonator ones) but it is not a bad thing.

 

Build quality and finish is very impressive.

 

I don’t currently have an amplifier, so I couldn’t test how it would be plugged in, but hopefully soon. I am sure it would be pleasure to play it amplified.

 

It was nice touch how it stands up on the floor.

 

So overall I am very pleased with it and this beauty jumped to my number one uke straight away.

 

Thank you.