RG 520 QS

[dipstick]

Snagged one today while pawn shop browsing.Trans black A little rough around the edges but not that bad.Plays killer.V pickups don't seem to like the mahogony to well but with some tweaking it may be OK.

[bdk]

Originally Posted by dipstick

Snagged one today while pawn shop browsing.Trans black A little rough around the edges but not that bad.Plays killer.V pickups don't seem to like the mahogony to well but with some tweaking it may be OK.

Great guitars, Im not a huge RG fan, but those are really special. congrats!!! pics?

[Ferrous Lepidoptera]

520QS kills. I bought two of them, and I own 9 RGs, but that's the only one I have two of. Just wish the finish was a bit lighter, the "quilt" a bit more prominent. The RG520QS theme song is "painted black" by the Rolling Stones, on account of the fact that from a distance of more than 5 feet, they look like they're painted black. Quilted? Under the right lighting, maybe. But who the hell cares what they look like. They sound and play great.

[dipstick]

It kind of threw me I picked it up and it was quite heavy for an RG and I noticed a chip and the wood looked like mahogony.Well it ws a no-brainer for me so it followed me home.It has a hairline crack between the locking nut screw holes so I bled some thin super glue in the crack and put a clamp on it so it should be good as new,a little sanding and the crack should be invisable

[Wolfram]

Congrats. These are, as many have already said, great guitars. I also agree that it would be great if the finish was a tad lighter.

I have three of these - two are original a (TB and TK) and one (a TB) with a FRED and a PAF Pro.

The necks are perfect (for me) and I love the tone of the Mahogany body, all this coupled with a great tremelo makes for a great guitar. This is my main workhorse guitar. If anybody wants to sell one let me know ;-)

- Wolfram

[dipstick]

I think I'll just drop fill the nicks and fix the clear coat issues and play the snot out of it.The wiring is all wrong as is but thats an easy fix.The V7and 8 sound killer together I can't get over the bite of the V8 in the bridge with the mahogony body.I guess using alnico's makes sense with mahogony.
I am going to swap the pots and caps with an RS guitarworks upgrade kit. I thinks these pickups will rock just fine.
A great candidate for tuning to "D"because its pretty dark sounding the way it is now.Best $125.00 guitar ever.

[moebius]

I have one in blue. I did not even realize it was quilted until I put a flashlight on it. Nice think neck though.

[Wolfram]

$125.00. That is a great buy! One day these will be found out for what they really are. Until then buy up guys!

[psychoshredder]

put some duncans, she'll be evil.
I put SH5 and SH2N on mine, one of the best sounding guitar i ever have.

[rty13ibz98]

Originally Posted by dipstick

I think I'll just drop fill the nicks and fix the clear coat issues and play the snot out of it.The wiring is all wrong as is but thats an easy fix.The V7and 8 sound killer together I can't get over the bite of the V8 in the bridge with the mahogony body.I guess using alnico's makes sense with mahogony.
I am going to swap the pots and caps with an RS guitarworks upgrade kit. I thinks these pickups will rock just fine.
A great candidate for tuning to "D"because its pretty dark sounding the way it is now.Best $125.00 guitar ever.

i just recently took my rg520qstbk down to dropped d as well. i hesistated doing this in the past because it was my workhorse and main backup for my rgt3120. since i got my rg3120dr, i returned it back to d after 3 years. i love my guitar, it has an air norton/tone zone. an absolutely great guitar especially for the price. i wish ibanez would release a model to the same specs with the prestige upgrades: prestige neck/direct mounted pickups.


rich

[jim777]

Beautiful guitars, absolutely. Really nice with a Jazz/JB combo or PAF Pro/SuperD combo.

[dipstick]

Just for the heck of it I'm going to try a WCR/RS shredder in the bridge and a WCR crossroads in the neck and see what happens.
Once in a while you find a magical guitar that just does everything well.This one vibrates so hard from the body thru the neck it begs you to play hard.Very dark tone wise but still has nice high end clear tones as well.
I have a 72 super D and a very early DiMarzio PAF clone that may find there way in too I love a guitar that makes you want to try different combinations.

[GregCrowe]

I've had 3, currently own 2, one in each color, brown and blue. The browns show the quilt much better and are really beautiful. The blues are too dark as everyone has mentioned and don't let you see the beautiful quilt top very well.

These are really great guitars. The mahogany bodies are much heavier than the other basswood RG's and sound great, even with the stock pickups. In fact, I see no need whatsoever to change the pickups.

[Ferrous Lepidoptera]

GregCrowe (and anybody else with more than one 520qs) do you notice any difference in weight between the two 520QS you have? One of mine is really heavy, and one is about the normal RG. weight. Also, I have other mahogany bodied RGs (3120, 8670) and they aren't heavy like that one 520QS is. Just wondering, as, for a time, that really heavy 520QS was my best sounding guitar, but then took it in to fix a scratchy volume pot, and it came back with the magic tone removed. (which I had been avoiding fixing the volume pot for a long time for fear of losing the magic tone... d'oh.) It's still ok, still better than most of my RGs, (but now my 3120 beats it out, which previously, it didn't) It's just not awesome like it was. Wondering if they changed a capacitor out on me or something.

[dipstick]

I just fixed the wiring back to stock config at it smokes as is. I think I'll put the V7 and V8 back in.The WCR crossroads was just too dark for the neck position and the shredder is way too hot in the bridge.