The Terrible Two (fairly long post with many pictures)

[Pursuit]

Apologies in advance for the long post and large pictures that may make loading difficult for some.

Okay, starting from the beginning.

A while back I was at my Aunty and Uncle's place up in Perth. There was this blue Strat-like guitar there, and it's been there ever since. This guitar, however, is not actually a real Strat, but I'm still wondering what could be done to fix it up.

Here are some pics:







As you can see, quite a few dings and damage. Suprisingly, the bridge is actually not that bad compared to the strings and pickups.

And here's a quick shot at the back of the neck, showing the paint all the way up the neck.



There is damage from old stickers all over it, and the strings and pickups have rusted. I've tried playing it through an amp and it sounds terrible, so I don't bother.

So you can imagine my excitement when I walked through the door a long time later and saw this next one for the first time. This is what I saw...



Obviously, my first thought was "Yes! A Strat! Finally a guitar that I can play!"

But alas, it was not to be:





Continued below...

[Pursuit]

... continued from above.



Looking at this picture of the back of the neck below, you can kinda see how I mistook it for a Strat at first glance.



As you've seen, the sunburst guitar is missing the humbucker pickup at the bridge position, and the main volume knob. With these photos it looks like that's the only problems (apart from the guitar only having two strings on it right now ), but there's more, and they can be seen in the close-ups:



The bridge is in MUCH worse condition than the one on the blue guitar.

And the tuning posts have suffered a bit as well.




What the blue guitar actually is - I still don't know. The Sunburst guitar is something called a "Profile Vintage" judging by the name on the headstock.

Two things are certain:
1. They are both Strat copies.
2. They are both in a bad way.

So, after all that, does anyone have suggestions as to what can be done with these two guitars?

Thanks in advance and again apologies for the long post and large pics.

[elcid]

Firewood.

Figure the cost alone of replacing the pickups in both of them alone would put you in the used MIM Strat range.

[IbanezFreak777]

Lets not go the way of the firewood justyet.

If your serious in restoration, and want to do this as a fun hobby project type thing, then I say go for it. But if your after trying to turn it into a dream guitar that plays like butter, then I say Firewood also....

Good luck...

[wilch]

My first guitar was a Profile strat.

http://www.notonmonday.com/images/gu...tguitar640.jpg

she even came with a Profile amplifier.

For what it was it played ok. If I ever saw her again I'd buy her back. My name is written in the neck pocket.

Back in 1994 I traded it in, and got all of $100 AUD for it. Was still in immaculate condition. Now with that in mind, is it really worth trying to do anything with that guitar?

[Clonetool]

get a dremel and practice a custom inlay or scallop. Take off the finish and learn how to swirl or fabric top. Great practice guitar if your into learning customization.

[Pursuit]

Originally Posted by IbanezFreak777

Lets not go the way of the firewood justyet.

If your serious in restoration, and want to do this as a fun hobby project type thing, then I say go for it. But if your after trying to turn it into a dream guitar that plays like butter, then I say Firewood also....

I'm not expecting to get a dream guitar out of EITHER of these. If I do get a chance to do a fix, it will probably be on just one of them (in which case I would choose the sunburst Profile and replace the bridge with the one from the blue guitar ).

The idea would not be to change and customise the guitar, but mainly just to get it back in playable condition (although I admit I'd like to put a black pickguard on it).

[nickcoumbe]

sand the finish of the necks for a start, that stuff just looks poisonous.

No guitar is totally useless, you just have to improve or remove the bad bits to let the good stuff shine

I kinda like the blue guitar actually, it looks just crap enough to be cool. I would sand down the neck, maybe look at a scallop, buy a graphtec replacement bridge and nut and change the tuners to something better, I would probably buy a second hand hotrail for the bridge position and leave it at that for pickups (unless oyu can find something cheap and 2nd hand again). Give it a set up, and a chrome scratchplate and it could be fun.

[Pursuit]

Originally Posted by nickcoumbe

sand the finish of the necks for a start, that stuff just looks poisonous.

Something about the camera caused the neck on the sunburst guitar to appear very yellow. In reality it looks like the neck you would find on a normal Strat.

The blue neck... well yeah that's blue lol.

[nickcoumbe]

Well either way I think that the finish should come off, ut I prefer oiled necks and would be syaing this if it was a jem!

[kaizzen]

That blue neck nearly made me choke on my coffe. Absolutely awful tase IMO.

Like mentioned above practicing scalloping on the fret boards wouldn't be a bad idea if that interests you.

You could give them to the OP shop if you decide with the firewood option.

[Pursuit]

Haha now I'm imagining a blue guitar flying through the air in slow-motion and landing in a massive bonfire.