It's been a while, new-ish build

[Eric Schmitt]

Hello all.

It's been a while since I've posted here. For the last 3 years I've been repairing all of my guitars that were damaged in the 2016 floods in Louisiana. Except for a few small things here & there I'm finally done with the major repair jobs. Now I'm moving back to some new projects. I completed this one a few weeks ago. It's not a complete new build but it was a major overhaul of the guitar.

This one started out as a weird Iceman/Explorer/Tele hybrid made of solid purpleheart. The front had the shape of an Iceman, the back was the Explorer and it had the controls & pickups of a Telecaster. Oh yeah... and it had a Bigsby trem. I honestly don't know what I was thinking at the time. On top of it being weird looking, being a large body made of purpleheart it was a beast. I don't remember the exact weight but it was over 15 lbs.

I reworked the shape of the body where it resembled more of the Paul Gilbert Iceman/Destroyer hybrid. I hollowed it out to remove all that weight, put on a douglas fir top and stained it a redish-purple to match the natural purpleheart. I reworked the pickup config to be 3 humbuckers with individual on/off switches and a tone & volume knob. The pickups are some Ibanez V-5's I had in the parts box & the bridge is a Schaller roller bridge. Neck is dyed maple to match the body & rosewood fingerboard. Don't let the inlay's fool you, they are just some vinyl inlay decals.

Overall it's a major improvement from where it started. The weight isn't too bad in the 7 lb range and it plays and sounds really well. For now I only have one pic but I'll post more when I get a chance to take some more.

[Barry Daniels]

Looks great. Love the inlay.

Great to see you back, Eric.

[Bob Francis]

Nice Eric!