Conference napalm::guitar

Sounds like fun.

BTW, somebody else will let you know I'm sure: Typing in all caps in VaxNotes
is understood to be yelling.  You might want to go to lower case.

Will

re:.1

Maybe he wanted to yell ?

Never know...

:*)

Yeh I've done it...check the for sale note :-)

dbii

    
    
    	WHAT?  WHAT??

	PIPE Down before we have to wet sand yer tonsils!

I obviously need to expand my original reply...

You can put together a pretty good guitar for about $300-400. However, you can
buy a pretty good used guitar for the same or even less. You could build it
for less but you're gonna sacrafice on the quality of the pickups as that's
the most probable place to cut costs...

I built a tele using a warmouth body, duncan pickups, stewart mcd's hardware
and a local finish job, oh yeah a fender neck. It came out pretty good. It plays
as well as any $300-400 guitar I've seen in the shops. The fact that I'm selling
it has more to do with me than the guitar.

If you're willing to buy higher quality parts, for more money, I think that
warmouth's compound radius necks are the absolute balls...the one I put
on my heavily modified fender lead one is about as good as a neck can get. But
that neck retailed for $275 (I got lucky and got it used for much less).

rolling your own has one big advantage: other guitar players will come up and
say "what the heck is that thing anyway?". You can make it the way you want it.
Lately (until I got the ESP I just bought) I had been desiring a 24 fret
with a floyd rose...I was looking at Honsono as they make both bodies that
are designed to handle 24 fret necks as well as the necks...I was looking at
about $400-450 just for the neck and body. Obviuosly this can get a bit pricy.
But it would have been exactly what I wanted, and just the way I wanted it.
Luckily I got asuch a steal on the ESP that I was able to table this effort.

dbii

      I've considered building my own, but after checking with other
    players that have done it I realize that it probably would take
    a couple tries to get it right. A "build your own" may give you some
    uniqueness and pride, but you'll lose out in quality and resale value
    (IMHO).
      Hmmmmm- Stratocaster Plus Ultra in Crimsonburst? Let the pros at
    Fender build me a NICE guitar!
    
    							--B()()M--

    I'm building my own acoustic guitars (Martin copies) and I'm also in
    the process of starting with an electric bass. To .7:
    You will not lose out in quality! It all depends on your patience. Most
    people are too eager (so was I!) once they get their first kit. Take
    your time (my first guitar took me a year, including the re-build of
    the cracked soundboard!) and you will have a fine instrument. Resale
    value? A custom built guitar usually sells for more.
    I look forward to hearing some more.
    
    \roland

Re: .-1 "Resale of "custom" guitars"

I'm not so sure I agree that custom guitars (re)sell for more. I agree that
a custom guitar by a *recognized* builder will sell for more, but not 
any old homebuilt instrument, no matter the quality.

    re: Resale of custom guitars
    
    I'd agree with Tom, in fact I'd go further to say that most custom
    built guitars (not made by a recognized luthier) sell for far less then
    they are worth.  I can't imagine a custom built noname acoustic guitar
    going for the price that a Martin would, regardless of it's quality.
    
    Here's a perfect example (close to home);  I recently bought a custom
    built Strat style guitar which has a Warmoth birdseye maple neck, a
    full set of EMG active pickups, nice sealed tuners, and a Fender style
    bridge for the equivalant of about $200.  This was not from an
    individual desperate for money either, but from a store which is known
    for their high prices and generally poor deals!  The guitar plays like
    a dream and I couldn't have touched the parts necessary to build it for
    twice the price...
    
    Greg (who loves that guitar too!)
                      

    I really can't figgure out why anyone who takes the time to put one to-
    gether, and it turns out to be a nice playing/sounding instrument,
    would want to get rid of it for what ever the price. True, it wouldn't
    bring the same return in money as would a "name brand", but it isn't
    be the money that would determine its worth. If it's a good guitar and
    you've used it for a period of time and it served you well, it would be
    like selling a part of you...a bit of your sweat or even the memory of
    a burnt finger while you were soldering your electronics in. And esp-
    ecially a certain amount of pride in your work. 
      I quess it's really a matter of value placement..probably the inst-
    rument falls far short of anything that you would use on a gig...Even
    then, for me, it would be hard to do because I would want to compare
    my improvements over the first if I were to attempt to build another.
      No-body asked....just my opionion.
    
     Bill 

    Bill, you said it!
    Maybe I was exaggerating on the "a custom built will sell for more...",
    I guess I wanted to say the same as Bill: My own built guitar would 
    definitely sell for VERY MUCH, not because of its physical value but 
    because I couldn't sell it due to all the good times that are bound to it!
    
    \roland

    That's the catch - you'd *ask* more, but you wouldn't necessarily *get*
    more ... it's hard to sell someone one of your memories !  8^)
    
    
    Scary