Z-TARD

Thanks man! I debated on going all "OCD" and blueprinting all the stripes, but in the end, laziness won out and I just did it by eye. I'm not entirely sure I even got all the stripes the correct size, all the masking tape starts to look the same after a while The only one that really sticks out to me as a blatant FUBAR is the diagonal black stripe that runs along the back of the bridge. The quarter should be sitting about halfway on this stripe, whereas mine sits almost entirely on it. I guess it's about 1/2" off. Thats what I get for masking and painting at almost 1:00 am on a weeknight Oh well, it's probably still closer than some of the replicas that Fender is putting out. I should have all the electronics sorted out and installed sometime this week. I'll get some more pics up once it's all done.

As requested, one 1971 quarter, drilled full of holes: Front shot showing additional relicing of red paint: Rear shot. Reflectors are all stuck in place, as close as I could get them.... There is still a ton of detail work I need to do, as well as getting the pickup and electronics installed. Now I'm just waiting on the rest of the parts to show up in the mail

I hope that guy bought his from out of state on the internet. Sales tax on $75,000 sure would suck.

Will commence with the defacing of government property ASAP I know what you mean about the wood grain. Large portions of the end on the guitar are exposed wood that looks like it has been used as a war club. The end grain is clearly visible. Sadly, most of the pictures I've seen of the Fender replica guitars show that the end grain from one guitar to the next is much different, as well as large variations in paint, holes, wear marks, etc. I would imagine that probably the first 30 or 40 in the production run were pretty close, after that they are more like "Van Halen inspired" rather than true replicas. Granted, they are still probably closer than mine, but I still wouldn't pay more than about $3000 for one. This guy bought THREE of them, sided by side, you can see quite a few differences between them. http://www.myevhfrankenstein.com/

Pulled off the tape today.... Back Side: Back side, with "BLING! BLIIIIIING!" in position: I still have to age the red paint slightly, and drill lots of random holes all over the body (Looking at the high res images reveals that his guitar is pretty much swiss cheese). More pics to follow.

It definitely adds cool points to just about any guitar, but at the same time you kind of set yourself up for failure (in my case, anyway) because people then expect you to play like Eddie. Once I belt out one of my mentally challenged versions of "Mary Had a Little Lamb" or "Row, Row, Row Your Boat", people normally walk away scratching their heads and mumbling "WTF?" under their breath I just finished painting the last coat of red paint. I found that I couldn't wait several more days for the paintto fully cure, so I broke out the files and sandpaper and tore up the body anyway. After about an hour of hacking on it, followed by another 3 1/3 hours of masking it was ready for paint. I can say with absolute certainty that the 5150 stripe job is MUCH easier to mask off than the Frankenstrat. Even after several hours of close inspection and scrutiny, I'm sure later I'll find a spot where there should have been a tiny little stripe or squiggle. I have a new found respect for the guys in the Fender Custom Shop who cranked out 300 of these things (Although I still can't get over the $25,000 price tag). I'll pull the masking tape tomorrow after work, and post pics shortly after. Right now I'm pretty much pooped.

Cadillac XLR The Origami version of the corvette. This looks like a team of Lockhead engineers were locked in a workshop with a corvette, and told to do whatever it takes to reduce the cars radar cross section. You could duplicate nearly every panel of this car using drywall.... Hideous. But still not as ugly as the Aztek (Although the family resemblance is striking)

Found a site with tons of high resolution images of the Fender replica. These are higher quality than the images on the EVH Gear or Fender websites. Supposedly, every little nick, scratch, and ding is replicated on the Fender version. Looks like I'll be pretty busy.... http://www.samedaymusic.com/product--EVH2205150

Thanks for the help guys, nowhere else on the internet would people be willing to gut parts out of their own guitars, or dig through cash registers for obscure coins to help someone else out with an odd project like this. HybridZ kicks ass! Fortunately, it looks like I finally have all the parts I need to finish this scavenger hunt of a guitar project. I won a bid for a vintage style Telecaster pickup on Ebay, it looks correct for the application, but may still need the red phenolic mod done to it. It has a big chrome cover over the coil now, hard to tell whats under there. It was pretty cheap though.... I went to the carwash yesterday to hose off all the ash that fell on my Jeep from the fires out here. I put a $5 bill into the change machine, and the first quarter I picked up out of the pile that came out of the machine was an almost mint looking 1971! I might actually have to beat it up a little bit to make it look more "Vintage" because it's in such good condition. I've been working on the paintjob over the last few days, here's what I have so far: This is after 4 coats of black rustoleum spray paint, wetsanded between every other coat. Hard to see in this pic, but the woodgrain is still visable in several locations. Copying a crappy paintjob is a lot easier than trying to make it look all perfect and stuff Front side after masking and spraying with white rustoleum. Wet sanded with 2000 grit and buffed with an old wife beater tank top (seriously) Note authentic 1971 quarter near the bridge area. This is one of only like, 12 or so 1971 quarters known to exsist on the entire planet..... Backside of paintjob. Once the white paint has had a few days to cure, I'll start beating the crap out of it to give it that "Keith Richards" look prior to masking and spraying red.

I'm right off the west side of the SDSU campus, seriously only about a block or two from Cox Arena. I'm still hoping I can hear the concert from there Thanks for the offer on the pickup! I still have a few bids in on Ebay, so depending on how those go I might take you up on it. I found an electronics store in El Cajon that has a bin full of old scraps of red linen phonelic, like fiberglass but brownish-red in color. This is what the bobbins are made from on the real version. I'm thinking I can probably butcher a newer pickup and replace the black plastic bobbin with this stuff. Another idea I had was to use a single coil driver for a Fernandes sustainer unit in the neck position, hidden under a cover made from the red phonelic. That would kill two birds with one stone really, I'd get the single coil look, and I'd finally have a guitar with a sustainer unit. Hmmmmm....... Cool sustainer demo from Youtube:

African, of course. I seem to remember the African swallow having a slightly higher average airspeed velocity, in addition to the increased payload carrying ability...

Heh Heh, no thread is complete without at least a reference to either Spinal Tap or Monty Python Now that you mention it, I might have to go look for one that does go all the way to "11"

Kick Ass! They're going to be at Cox Arena out here in November, which is only about a block away from my house. My wife and I were all set to get tickets as soon as they went on sale on the 15th of September. As luck would have it, she decided to go into labor the morning of the 15th. Naturally we spent all day in the hospital, and were too busy to get the tickets I remember distinctly between contractions she looked up at me and said "Honey, we're missing Van Halen tickets right now...." We did eventually get around to looking up the tickets, there were a few seats still available several days later on Ticketmaster. They wer $150 a ticket, and to the faaaaaaar right of the stage and all the way in the back row nose bleed section. They were far enough to the side so that you would probably be able to see the backside of the stage. Needless to say, we skipped it. Hopefully my house is close enough so that I'll be able to just sit in my back yard and hear them Here's a picture of my sons face when I told him we missed Van Halen:

Like this? I've been looking for a 1971 quarter for the better part of a month now. I'm begining to think they just didn't make any at all in '71. Either that or Fender bought the entire supply.... I found an old style 3 way switch on ebay to stuff in the center cavity, it's a newer production part for just under $10.00. The vintage switches from the 50's and 60's go for several hundred dollars themselves. Just for a switch. Vintage Fender parts are insanely priced. I'm starting to see how they feel the justification to charge $25,000 for this replica guitar.... They're nuts. I still need to find a single coil pickup to use for the neck position. I keep getting consistently outbid for them on ebay because I'm too cheap

Yeah, the one in the background probably makes things a little confusing, It's actually a copy of another guitar used by Eddie, commonly refered to as the "5150". At first glance it looks a lot like the Frankenstein, but is actually quite a bit different. Here's a better picture of mine: Compared with the original: My 5150 isn't aged at all, apart from an area on the headstock that is missing some paint because I let some bonehead borrow it one time and he returned it with a nice ding in it

I'm not even really sure how this project started, like most of my other projects it was probably spawned from a surplus of parts left over from yet another project ("Hmmm... I got this extra valve cover lying around, guess I need ANOTHER Z to put it on"...etc.) The goal with this one is to create a replica of this guitar: Without of course spending this: http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/EVH-Eddie-Van-Halen-Frankenstein-Replica-Electric-Guitar?sku=513703 About $300.00, a couple of hours on Ebay and a few other online guitar parts stores, along with a few weeks to wait for all the parts to come in and I have this: I'm in the process of painting it now, which will be followed by a lot of meticulous relic treatment to give it that aged, beat to hell look of the original. Thankfully Eddie wasn't that great at painting, so I'm not too worried about screwing it up and making it look bad, although it will be a pain to get all the stripes and wear spots located correctly. I have pretty much the whole week off of work due to the fires out here. So years from now, when the grandkids ask about what I did to survive the fires, I can just haul this thing out of the closet....

Dear Sir, I am still most pateintly awaiting the arrival of my carbon fibre tyres with whale skin hubcaps. Pleese send items at once to my address in Nirobi, or I will be forced to send squad of attack hyena's to your hut. My great uncle is not quite of death yet, and would still very much enjoy visitations to Chili's. With current exchange rate fluctuate, you will now send me the Chili's gift certificate in the amount of $17,652.93 in addition to the tyres and carbon fibre half shafts. Additionally I will require you to send me 4 pound of moon rocks from your National Aeronautics and Space Administration to compensate me for my aggrevation at you delayed shipping. Making ready starving hyena's, Sir Malcolm Reginald Dook-Dook III, from Nirobi

I will send you $8,000 of your American dollars for 4 wheels with tyres and carbon fibre hubcaps sir. Please send the remaining money back in the form of a Chili's gift certificate. My great uncle Festivus Nak-Nook in Nirobi is die from cancer and would very hopefully like to have his last meal at Chili's. He is great lover of Baby Back Ribs. Thank you for your consideration, Sir Malcolm Reginald Dook-Dook III, from Nirobi

I think every thread is a little better with Monty Python added to the mix. Either that or Spinal Tap Mike

"Tis a silly place, anyway"

If we must......