NGD - you guess

[jlebre]

SOOOOO.... I almost feel bad for this

After months of pondering on the cost of a MM, etc.
Drove to knighton (WALES! I FOUND OUT I DROVE TO ANOTHER COUNTRY) for hours.
Steve was the man! He let me play every single EBMM (except the gold roller eurgh!).
Then he let me play the really nice carvins, PRS, ESPs and Parkers.

Got back to the EBMM and I reallize there was definetly something there.

Pretty much spent the whole afternoon, specially focusing on JPXI, JPX, BFR and JP6.

Which one you think I brought home?

 

[Adam_D]

If you tried out some PRS and Carvins... I'd maybe guess you went for the JPX, at least I would have... In fact, I did

 

[Arctic11]

All of those are great guitars, but my guess is ... BFR!

 

[Jackson2112]

I give!

 

[ozzyrules]

I give!

Ditto.....

 

[jlebre]

Alright

Apologise for the delays wanted to do a short practical joke but got distracted meanwhile

So, I went for the JPXI. JPX followed with JPXI, is like "ok". Then you go back to JPX and go "WHOOAAA what happened to the neck here?"

Also, I suck a bit as rhythm player so I hit the 5 way on the first 2 positions :S

So pics




Took me a bit to get used to the wood. Almost went for a Luke BFR or the Steve Morse as the wood felt really really nice.

@EBMM guys, january 11th 2012, great job with this guitar.

Cool thing was, he actually had one boxed in! So we removed the plastic, tuned it, and noticed the bridge screws were in to tightly so bridge was "locked". Steve man at Knighton Music Centre loosen that and had to adjust the truss rod a tick. Half an hour later, played like a dream, about 100times better than the other 2 JPXI in there.
Stocked!

Just wandering if this was common to other JPX/JPXI/BFR?

THe BFR model was an old "walnut burst" Loved it. My girlfriend said it looked like poo...
It kinda made me give up on that one. Also, it was rosewood and I really wanted ebony (all my other guys are rosewood)

 

[BartB]

Amazing!! great choice!! Enjoy!

 

[threeminutesboy]

great choice!

Congrats and this nice piece but it's definitely time for you to have a baby with your girlfriend so she realizes that this BFR is miles away from poo

 

[jlebre]

Congrats and this nice piece but it's definitely time for you to have a baby with your girlfriend so she realizes that this BFR is miles away from poo

hehe laughed my ass off at that!
The one she thought it was poo was the BFR walnut:
http://www.johnpetrucci.com/images/bfr_walnut1.jpg

I've been playing with it, then when back to my old ibanez and schecters and MAN OH MAN what I've been missing.

Anyone else had to unscrew the floating bridge screws slighty and get the neck a thick back when you first received it? that got me a bit worried. But opening the crate that came straight from California was awesome (in a little village in Wales, UK)

 

[dannymusic]

I hear the XI are the bomb, thats why I bought a XII

They say the tone block really kicks in those and certainly the necks are one of a kind.

 

[jlebre]

neck feel is great. Took me a while to get used to the paint (couple of hours or so) as all guitar ever owned were wood.
The piezo was a stunning surprise. How unbealivable!

How are you liking your XII?

 

[TSHOW]

Congrats!!! Very nice...

 

[guitarp77]

Nice score indeed!!

 

[jlebre]

I think tomorrow is moment of truth.
I don't know if you guys read, but I posted here http://forums.ernieball.com/music-man-guitars/50187-question-string-buzzing.html about the string buzzing I'm having

Guitar plays nicely but it buzzes like hell on 5th string 7th to 9th fret, and to a lesser degree on other strings. Truss rod adjuments did barely any difference.

The guys at the premier dealer said they could fix it. I guess if they can't I'm grabbing another guitar off the wall as I'm still under my 7 working days return policy (I picked it up last saturday).

I saw the action specs on the website "Factory string setting for standard tuning starts at the bass side 2/32" (1.59 mm) to 5/64" (1.98 mm) and the treble side is 3/64" (1.19 mm) to 2/32" (1.59 mm) measured from the 12th fret to the bottom of the strings." guess I'll ask them to start from there.

Anyone has action this low? I think I have it at about 2mm high from top of 12th fret to bottom of the strings and it feels REALLY good. Just the annoying buzz 5th string.

Pups are amazing, neck feels great, and I love the way how the whole guitar sings when unplugged. I feel like I've improved a year worth of playing just by having this. I hope they have another XI around if this beauty is not fixed as I can't go back to the JPX or BFR necks too chunky for me now

 

[jlebre]

Hey guys

Den @knighton music centre managed to get action down to spec.this thing plays even better.
Aparently the buzz is me. No one else did it (Steve is a bloody amazing player) and I only did it on the JPXI's lol

Luke was playing great, BFR was playing great.

I guess it's up to me to figure out what I'm doing wrong

Somepics below. PLease don't kill me on the pic of the JPX as that chord was a dud (my gf took the pic so she had no idea, but it's the only pic that is not blurred.

Den and his awesome stock of EBMM


Steve and his awesome stock of EBMM


Trying out a JPX


Very helpful, and defo the best place in the UK and maybe europe if you really want to try out stuff before buying. Nick (strings and things UK) is a very helpful guy as well and offered to ship guitars you might be interested to Knighton if they don't have it.

Bit of a drive, but well worth it!

 

[Spudmurphy]

Great post - I love Knighton guitars, So where did you end up when you went to the "Wrong Country".

Next time you're in touch with him, tell him to get a Game changer demo organised lol

 

[jlebre]

They had a Game Changer there

I come from London. So start seeing welsh and then the signs "welcome to wales" when you are looking for Knighton and "welcome to england" when all you want is to get home with your new toy make you go WHAAAA????

 

[DrKev]

Den @knighton music centre managed to get action down to spec.this thing plays even better.
Aparently the buzz is me. No one else did it (Steve is a bloody amazing player) and I only did it on the JPXI's lol

I guess it's up to me to figure out what I'm doing wrong

That buzz-free low action is always possible is something of myth. There are plenty of examples on YT of ultra low action guys (like Petrucci) where string buzz is actually quite obvious!

Ya know, it's a funny thing. If I play with my fingers (no pick) I'll need Petrucci-ridiculous-insanity-low-action to get string buzz. With a pick, it's a totally different story. My bass side is usually about 2 mm (14th fret, 0.2 mm relief) and treble side at about 1.8 mm and that's about as low as I can go before string buzz bothers me (which is not to say that there isn't any, it's just not intrusive).

Strings don't vibrate in nice simple back and forth patterns. There are weird complex vibrations at a bewildering array of different frequencies and times it all depends on the exact forces, motions, and angles of the pick on the strings, and that's assuming that magnetic pull from the pickups doesn't do anything and we haven't even thought about frets, action, and relief. I've seen a few cases where the fret buzz only starts a second or two after the note is struck. It really is weird butterfly effect stuff. A seemingly small change in one thing at the outset can lead to unexpected differences later down the line.

The fact is that every person picks differently. No two people have the same hands, fingers, muscles, many of us use different picks of different materials and thicknesses, and we naturally pick at different points along the string. We can sometimes hear that very clearly when people play so it's obvious that vibration patterns of the strings are different. That we can each get differing amounts of fret buzz too is pretty normal. Again, obviously our six strings have different physical properties and tensions, so it's logical that some strings can buzz more for one player than for others.

Just like me, you're not doing anything wrong. We're just being us.

And then we have the particular human condition of becoming ultra-sensitive to something when we pay close attention to it. (Any one remember the Irish group "The Coors" years ago? Listen to the breath between the vocal lines. Yes, if ever you liked that music, I've just ruined it for you.) It's a sickness that afflicts guitar players most when doing set ups. The buzz can seem magnified in our heads and drives us to distraction. When you focus on actually playing, it'll be far less of an issue and possibly not an issue at all.

As an example, I remember doing a big string change, clean, and setup for a gig a few months back and I was annoyed at the string buzz. I had to leave for the gig and couldn't spend much more time on it but it never bothered me once I had left the house. The thought struck me in the taxi home and when I got back I re-measured everything. The guitar was just as I had set it up before leaving the house.

Congrats on your new guitar!

 

[Spudmurphy]

^
... and that's why he's DOCTOR Kev lol.

I totally agree with DK - perhaps the one time that string buzz gets me down is when I play Piezo only - it can sound "buzzy" whereas you wouldn't notice it with the mags

 

[threeminutesboy]

well said DrKev and so true, I think you spotted it right