Ok I have an Ibanez EX160. Which for all cases is the bastard korean child of the RG series. Since It's worth practically nothing I can't justify trying to sell it as is. And just junking it isnt an option. So my plan is as follows.

Sand the entire body down and stain/oil it or give it a nice painted finish. The black finish on it is still in good condition with no chips, only light scratches, but I think it looks plain, i'm guessing it's basswood.

New neck, Wizard 1-2? Something else? Something faster is what I want, I find this neck to be chunky and the fret inserts to be too high for my taste, granted the action is set incredibly high right now so a proper setup might fix that problem I have, but the neck seems to be warmed/twisted when looking down at it, Dont know if a truss rod adjustment could fix this.

Cheap pickup upgrade from Guitarfetish.com, Probably the Crunchy Rails series.

Lastly new hardware all around, locking tuners, new tremolo with roller saddles, or a floyd rose? New electronics, shielding and so on.

I like building things, so I see this as a learning experiance. Money isn't that much of an issue but I will probably take my time. After pricing things out I see that I'll end up spending around $200 everything above except the neck if I do infact change it.

Anyways, questions? comments? I Could always just gut it and turn it into a guitar hero/rockband controller.

Pics!




As you can see, the fretboard is dry and needs love


Look at that awesome high action!


Neck shot


more pics of her here
http://s20.photobucket.com/albums/b2.../Guitars-Gear/

My first real guitar was an Ibanez EX360. The store I bought it from charged me almost double list price and the thing was a bigger piece of garbage than the Harmony it was replacing.

i cut my teeth on an ex160. i ended up doing a ton of work on it before finally letting it go. mine was an 88, before they put ex on the headstock and mine had an angled head as well, no trees.
word of advice, leave it alone, a pickup swap would be good, but as far as the other bigger mods, just spend you money on a used rg5XX. you'll be better off.

rich

actually just purchased a S470DXQM

If it's not overly worth it, I might just sand it down/stain. It will cost me nothing.

What does basswood look like stained (or natural) anyways? Anybody here done that? I might consider doing that to one of my RGs sometime, but not before I hear some stories!

Havent a clue but when I do it I'll definitely post a thousand pics of it

also arent ex's maple? Searching for ex i've come across one that was maple and oiled.

edit : yep they're maple

http://www.ibanezrules.com/catalogs/us/1993/ex_2.jpg

don't strip it!!!! those are plywood guitars and are extremely ugly when stripped. have a buddy that stripped an ex120 and it was horrendous. just do a pickup swap and call it good. i am begging you. put 5 springs in the back and make it a drop d axe. ex160(ex in general) are $100-200 guitars and aren't really worth the upgrade. more for sentimental value. back in the day i got mine for $150 and spent about $250-300 in mods, when i traded it, the place thought it was an rg560. that was the only way i got more out of it. mine i kept for about 8 years before deciding to part with it. just a bit of advice from a guy who has been to hell and back with his ex.


rich

basswood is ugly when used natural. it is a very white wood will almost no grain. sometimes has ugly light green streaks in it as well. the only way to make that finish nice is to burn before a stain: BSB or RB, still the grain is not very prominent. i did a RB on an alder body that turned out fantastic, but would never do that with basswood.

rich

according to ibanezrules, the older ex's were plywood, then they moved to maple

So if it's maple. I might burn then varnish. as I still want to strip it.