Pickups too big for cavity in body?

JudasVigilante · January 2015

Hi everyone,

I have this old 'rubbish' Encore strat copy. I bought from my brother in law to give him beer money one night many years ago when he was going out! But enough of that.

Recently I decided to mod it a little. Oh and by the way. It plays lovely normally.

I bought some Entwistle ASN57's for the N and M positions and an Entwistle Dark Star for Humbucker for the Bridge. Problem is the pickups are a bit on the deep side compared to the original ones. I've marked their rough positions with marker in the cavity and I reckon I need to remove about 3mm of the remaining 1 cm of wood. Is this doable and with what? I don't have a router, but I can get my hand on some very sharp chisels. I'm not worried what the inside of the cavity looks like as I doubt I'll ever take it apart again, unless for maintenance.

The wood is super-crap and so I decided (I hear groans of disapproval already) with stickers and then cover with Mod Podge and Lacquer.

There are lots of very talented people on the Making and Modding forum here who achieve wonderful results with inks, stains, varnishes etc and I aim to do the same with another project Andyjr1515 has been advising me on. But I'm a child of the 90's and grew up on Grunge and Alternative stuff. I'm 39 now and know I'm not really ruining any already unamazing tone it had. Please don't frown on me!

Here are some picks and the black pen shows where I need to remove the 3mm.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Kind regards and Happy, rockin' 2015 to everyone.

ecc83 · January 2015

If you can get that under a drill press you can make a good job of the wood chomping with an end mill.

I had a 1/2 horse rig and a keyslotting mill that would have made short work of that job.

Dave.

JudasVigilante · January 2015

Thanks Dave,

My Dad has a vertical drill, could I get a bit for it to do that?

Nomad · January 2015

Use a slot drill rather than an end mill. Slot drills look like end mills but are designed for plunge cutting, which end mills aren't. Bigger diameters will remove material more quickly, but the corners of the cavities won't be as sharp. For example a 10mm cutter would get it done quickly and leave rounded corners with a radius of 5mm (which may well be fine).

Something like these...

http://chronos.ltd.uk/acatalog/Metric_HSS_Slot_Drills.html

The idea is to plunge it into the material and then work the piece sideways to cut out the cavity. (That means spinning the cuter fast and keeping a good grip on the piece.) There may be woodworking cutters that will do it as well, and cost less. Forstner bits wouldn't cut sideways, but would make the clearance with a series of plunge cuts, albeit with a dimple in the middle of each plunge...

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=forstner+bit&biw=1222&bih=916&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=n5aoVMiwA4KyUYSmhLAL&sqi=2&ved=0CAYQ_AUoAQ

Andyjr1515 · January 2015

^ would be a very neat way but for 3 mm you could also certainly just use the chisels. As long as you don't break through it is all hidden so doesn't have to look particularly pretty!

JudasVigilante · January 2015

Thankyou Nomad and Andy. Much, much appreciated.

Nomad · January 2015

Before you rush out and spend money on a cutter, take the guitar body to the drill press and check that the intended cavities can be positioned under the chuck. Or at least find out the distance from the chuck to the column, and compare that to the distances on the body from the cavities to the nearest body edges. (Better to take it there and stick a decent-sized drill bit in an eyeball whether it will reach all intended bits to be cut.)

JudasVigilante · January 2015

Cheers once again Nomad, in the end I went with the chisel route. I hadn't as much to take out in the end and also cut a couple mm off of the humbucker screws which in the end the main problem. It was horrible (like plywood) wood to work and I think a forstner bit might have just shredded the whole thing. I didn't take into account the cavity at the back of the body for the tremolo springs etc and nearly went through, but didn't! (by luck) The good news is that the scratchplate now fits like a dream and all I need now is for Maplins to get me a decent soldering station in stock at a local store!

Thanks once again for all your help and advice. Really, really appreciated. I've been playing 22 yrs, but never done any modding etc. So starting all that from scratch.

Take care, Paul.

steamabacus · January 2015

JudasVigilante said:

The good news is that the scratchplate now fits like a dream and all I need now is for Maplins to get me a decent soldering station in stock at a local store!

I'd beware of the Maplins 'solder stations' - I've heard they can be less-than-reliable. I'd recommend a basic Antex 25W iron like this one. Get a soldering stand as well.

For heavier jobs like humbucker covers, etc just get a powerful (50W +) cheapie iron.

Nunogilberto · January 2015

Do these Encores have swimming pool routing then? If so, I might just mod mine to HSH...

Nunogilberto · January 2015

Actually, I just dismantled mine to find it was routed for HSS...

OilCityPickups · January 2015

steamabacus said:

JudasVigilante said:

The good news is that the scratchplate now fits like a dream and all I need now is for Maplins to get me a decent soldering station in stock at a local store!

I'd beware of the Maplins 'solder stations' - I've heard they can be less-than-reliable. I'd recommend a basic Antex 25W iron like this one. Get a soldering stand as well.

For heavier jobs like humbucker covers, etc just get a powerful (50W +) cheapie iron.

We use the Maplins 60w solder stations at Oil City Pickups all the working day ... every day... and they work fine

steamabacus · January 2015

TheGuitarWeasel said:

steamabacus said:

JudasVigilante said:

The good news is that the scratchplate now fits like a dream and all I need now is for Maplins to get me a decent soldering station in stock at a local store!

I'd beware of the Maplins 'solder stations' - I've heard they can be less-than-reliable. I'd recommend a basic Antex 25W iron like this one. Get a soldering stand as well.

For heavier jobs like humbucker covers, etc just get a powerful (50W +) cheapie iron.

We use the Maplins 60w solder stations at Oil City Pickups all the working day ... every day... and they work fine

Good to know - although that looks somewhat more substantial than their 'cheapie' version.

JudasVigilante · January 2015

Nunogilberto said:

Do these Encores have swimming pool routing then? If so, I might just mod mine to HSH...

Yes Nuno, mine does anyway. The wood is very poor, not even sure if it's basswood. But the neck plays great and if I don't make a mess of the soldering this week I'm gonna get new machineheads. I also have to check Intonation etc. Normally plays great. And I wanted a little project gtr to cover in stickers and not one of my expensive guitars.

JudasVigilante · January 2015

Thanks for all the help on soldering irons/stations guys.

In the end I pumped for a Silverline 48w with suitable iron stand/sponge etc and 100g of Draper 60/40 solder.

I just watched a tutorial vid on Youtube to refresh my soldering technique and lo and behold Americans call it Soddering!

Unless my ears are playing up!

Thanks everyone. When finished I'll post some pics. Will solder it this week.

Paul

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Pickups too big for cavity in body?

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