Ernie Ball Music Man JP6 Restoration Project!

[Morbid]

I tried to get that guy to sell me just the bridge pickuup. Do you want to sell it?

At this particular moment, I haven't had the opportunity to try the bridge pickup for myself. As a result, I'd prefer to keep it right now. However, I'll keep you in mind should I find the pickup to not be my taste

Hey Morbid - good job!!
Regarding the piezo switch cavity that's bubbling away nicely - consider drilling a few small pilot holes through the gloop and let the stripper really go to town?

Thank you sir! I actually thought of that before work, and intend on doing that the next opportunity I get. I just have to be careful not to accidentally go too deep and right through the body. Just thinking of that makes me cringe.

Isn't it usually the opposite -- that one would go to town for strippers?

LOL- that's all that needs to be said.

Very interesting thread! I look forward to the next instalment!

Well, ask and you shall receive!

Only a small update, but an update nevertheless. I had a really crappy night at work. All I could keep thinking was how it was supposed to be my night off, and how I was supposed to be at home working on my guitar. Needless to say, I was bent to go into work, just for hell to break loose.
I work with my mom, who is my manager, and as a result my dad had gotten wind of my crappy night. Out of the goodness of his heart, he proceeded to sand the guitar while I was at work. There's still plenty of work left to be done on the guitar, as it was only a rough sand to get most of the remaining paint off. All of the cavities still need to be done, and the guitar will need to be done in fien detail after the body work has been completed, but it's great to see light at the end of the tonal.

I'm really blown away by how attractive the natural wood is! It's almost tempting to clearcoat it and call it done with the natural finish, especially given the fact that my neck has a natural headstock, but I'm already set on a paintjob idea, so I'm going to force myself to stick with that.

While trying to dig out some of the piezo cavity, I guess I did a little bit of damage.

Here is booboo #2.

It would appear I accidentally broke the wood off by the screw hole But as you can see AROUND the piezo cavity, there's need for wood putty all over. Like I said earlier, whoever filled it felt the need to bevel the edge some, too. So after I've got all that dug out, I'll lay some putty in there and sand it to a nice flat surface, and just redrill the hole. Simple.
But hey, could be worse...at least that'll be covered!

My next day off will be spent at the local home depot and wal-mart, searching for my needed glue and putty, as well as some wooden dowels. An update will follow with that

 

[luv]

that is beautiful

 

[buckethead777]

Goddamn that wood looks cool naked

 

[Luc]

One of the most interesting threads I've seen in a while....keep up the good work!

 

[Lou]

I say try a dremmel to help remove that stuff from the switch location

 

[Morbid]

Lou, I've actually ended up going with a mix of the dremmel and the chemical stripper. You'll see it here a little ways down.

Today felt like somewhat of a 'cleanup' day, so I started by doing a little bit of sanding. Mostly noticeable in the electronics cavity. I figured I'd sand down the walls some to make them look a little nicer.

Sanded next to Unsanded

All nice and smooth

Now unfortunately, I'm not yet comfortable enough with a dremmel to do the work myself on this particular project, so I had my dad take his hands to it.

That allowed me to get some cool pictures at least...

Getting deeper...

Unfortunately, the piezo cavity began to seem like a bottomless pit. Eventually we ran out of depth that the dremmel could go (the tool was too short...that's what she said, right?). So now the guitar sits with some chemicals in the cavity, waiting for them to soak in some so I can try and scrape the remainder away.

Until those chemicals set and I get some real work done, that's it for now

 

[Morbid]

Oh, I almost forgot to mention;

I received some pictures in my email this morning with an attached note saying "It's ready to ship man!"

Ooooh...rosewoody...

Mmmm...birdseye goodness...

 

[Ernieballplayer]

sweet!

 

[ScoobySteve]

If only we all possessed such skill......

and time!

 

[Morbid]

Small update...

Well, that's a good sign! Pieces of the wood putty seem to be floating to the top.

I broke up a piece of plexiglass so I could scoop out the chemical stripper.

After which, I took a knife took it. It was the only object I had strong enough, small enough and sharp enough.

Unfortunately, the 'game' was called off due to pouring rain. So let's go dowel shopping...

I already know I'm not gonna find a perfect fit, but let's see how close I can get.

Hrm...little small.

Well, it's a little big, but better too big than too small (another "that's what she said' joke, haha). I'll sand it down until it fits.

I got an oak dowel since it's stronger than the crappy pine they had. I feel like I can redrill through this safely, but the pine, not so much.

And for tonight, that's all she wrote.
I work tomorrow morning. With any luck I'll have some spare time after work to finish the piezo cavitiy and possibly start the dowel work.

 

[the24thfret]

Awesome, awesome updates! I have a few things:

1) If GHWelles doesn't want the pickup and you want to unload it, keep me in mind!
2) The woody body looks really great! I'm partial to natty guitar bodies and I really think it'd go great with the natty headstock you have rolling in.
3) I'm lost on the dowel part. Why would you redrill that? Wouldn't you just fill in the hole that they drilled? Maybe I need to reread parts of your posts...

Great work!!!

 

[the24thfret]

Oh, 4) You're a master of macro-photography.

 

[Morbid]

Haha, thank you fret! I appreciate the compliments.
If I end up selling the pickup I'll keep you in mind as well.
As much as I like the guitar in it's natural color, and agree, it would look great with the natural headstock, there's too much body work for me to do and there would be no way for me to hide it.

As far as the dowel part and redrilling goes, I need to fill in both the pickup selector hole, and the modified piezo hole. I'll keep the modified piezo hole filled, but I'm going to redrill the pickup selector hole, because it was filled and moved about a half an inch off center. I would much prefer it be centered where it belongs. After all, my intention is to restore the guitar to as close to it's original form as humanly possible

Much to my surprise, I have tomorrow off, so I'll start the filling process then

 

[TwAn]

Very interesting literature, Morbid... And some great pictures too! Keep up the good work, I'm sure she'll turn out to be a real beauty!

 

[buckethead777]

I'm just loving your entries mate!
Great write up with every photo.
Keep up the good work
Vuk,Australia

 

[Morbid]

Update Time!
Happy Happy Joy Joy!

This guitar has been giving me absolute HELL with this Rerouting process! I can't believe it has taken me so long to make the piezo cavity show up again.

Alas, after two days of scraping away with the aid of chemicals, I finally see light at the end of the tunnel!

See the paint at the top right?? WOOHOO! That means I'm finally down to WOOD. Time to get rid of the rest of that crappy pain in the butt filler.
NOTE: The white thing in the center is a paper towel rolled up and pressed in to stop the chemicals from leaking out, as the chemicals seem to be more forgiving towards paper, rather than tape.

Finally! Now all I see is wood and a little bit of filler left around the hole! One more setting with chemicals oughtta do it.

Now that I'm down to the hole, I can't use paper towels anymore...I need something to plug up the hole, but not get in the way.

I decided to fold up a piece of news paper 5 or 6 times, and then tape it on.

It worked like a charm!

After I let it sit for a bit, I took my pocket knife to it once again, and finally...

SALVATION!

Ladies and Gentlemen...we have Piezo Cavity!

Here's the guitar somewhat put together...
Keep in mind, the pickup switch still needs to be filled and redrilled a half an inch over. But hey, this gives me something nice to look at and something to look forward to!

I'm not afraid to say, I feel really accomplished with this now.

With any luck, this also means I'm done with the chemicals now. I'll be thrilled about that...so will my hands.

 

[the24thfret]

Wow. Continues to look great. Can't wait for paint!

 

[Ricman]

Great thread. How sweet would a butterscotch JP look?

 

[Clonexx]

You are doing an amazing job man. I wish I was as talented at things like this as you are, unfortunately all my talent went into computer related jobs rather then working with my hands.

Best of luck with getting this done, I know I will be following it all the way to the end

 

[Spudmurphy]

It's looking good.- but I'm still not 100% convinced you are doing the right thing in using a different wood for the dowel and also using a dowel that is cut "end grain on" ?

Regarding the Piezo cavity where the previous guy "feathered" the cavity to help in losing the witness mark when the top coat of paint is sprayed on, you may consider routing the top lip out to the perimeter of the feathering and making a larger plastic cover to go on the back - a lot more work I guess.

Still it's only suggestions on my part - which I guess is what yer after?