Operation: Perfect Guitar

[deathbyfishstix]

I am a student in the UK partaking in a Design and Technology Product Design "A" Level course and my project for the course is a guitar.

Due to limited amounts of guitar players in my location, I am conducting my secondary research on this forum.

I want to know what makes THE PERFECT GUITAR, not for everyone, but for you. What would YOUR perfect guitar be? A fairly simple question.

I don't want to know what make and model is your absolute favourite, because, quite frankly, it doesn't matter. What matters is what it is about the guitar. Namely, the shape, hardware, design, sound, style, materials, types of neck, etc.

It's all up to you.

And thanks to anyone answering this post, your help is really appreciated as I can't do my research without you.

[strat]

My perfect guitar would be a 60s strat, in honey blonde with maple neck. ofcourse the sound will be great.

[martinedwards]

Firstly, welcome to Jam session, Hope you get all the info you need. There are a load of very knowledgeable people on here.

A bunch of muppets too of course, but you gotta decide which of us is which!!!

Good luck with the A level, I'm a technology teacher and have directed some of my pupils here too.......

well, for an electric, it would be a strat. maple neck with rosewood fingerboard. no trem. but a piezo pick up built into the bridge, like a LR Baggs X-bridge....

3 slimline humbuckers, tappable by push on, push off pots for volumes. No 5 way switch, just use the 3 volumes for control. a master tone. locking tuners. Alder body, but a nice bookmatched flame maple top.

Apart from the flamed maple top, I already have this guitar.

The top one here!!!

(the 5th knob is the piezo volume. Stereo output so I can process the magnetic & piezo pups seperately.)

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e328/gowanedwards/2strats.jpg

Acoustic?

A Lowden shaped Jumbo

http://www.gitaarnet.nl/img/magazine/gitaartests/lowden032/lowden1klein.jpg
with a sharp pointy cutaway like this......
http://www.olsonguitars.com/appt/bra_tn.jpg

Bearclaw sitka Spruce top.

Rosewood back & sides.

Rosewood fingerboard

Tapered headstock with a celtic cross trussrod cover.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e328/gowanedwards/40600100-1.jpg

wood ring rosette
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e328/gowanedwards/40600103.jpg

Sorry, the last two pics are off my last build, the first two will be amalgamated into my next!!!!

[Ogier]

I wanna be a muppet.. Nope, no knowledge here...

[fastvfr]

Me too! Me too!

Do muppets get to have their own Army? :rolleye: :cool:

[DLR Guitars]

I just need a bridge humbucker, just one volume control, a floyd-rose bridge (usually not floating but against the body like a strat bridge) and a nice thin neck. Thats my perfect guitar.

[Ogier]

Me too! Me too!

Do muppets get to have their own Army? :rolleye: :cool:

Yes, and I am Major Muppet! :toohappy: :toohappy:

[mishmannah]

Allo, Fishstix...I'm the muppet to end all muppets...

I saw your thread yesterday and gave it some thought. After building my own, I have a much clearer idea of my ideal acoustic guitar...

* Auditorium size..although the bottom needs to be more rounded...a good shape for all playing styles (I have 2 dreadnoughts which are great, but Auditoriums are more appealing, aesthetically!!)

* Slim satin finish neck: comfortable for small hands, I want a neck that's fast to play..if I can hook me thumb round to catch those bass notes, I'm happy.

* Ebony fretboard: Now I have a guitar with an ebony fretboard, I'll never go back. They're fast, responsive, slides and hammer ons-offs are more satisfying, and it looks appealing.

* Sitka spruce top: This type of wood is great for an all round tonal reponse and is the real workhorse of the spruce family. Although I would like to try building a guitar with a cedar top one day!!!

* Indian Rosewood back and sides: A lovely wood to work with, a lovely wood tonally and replaces the endangered Brazillian rosewood, which is actually seen as the holy grail of tonewoods.

Indian rosewood gives you an all round tone, alive, sparkly, with wonderful basses.

In fact, the guitar I built has my near-ideal specs, but unfortunaltely NOWHERE near built with the skill and beauty of George Lowden!!!


Appointments (Transaltion: Bling :D):-

*Kept relatively simple, natural woods with a beautiful grain (solid wooden rosettes are all the rage at the moment).

* Gotoh Tuners all the way. They are just great. I love them.

I'll post some pics later, the image hosting site has gone down...


As for electrics, I know nothing about the pups, but I have some idea what I like...

[deathbyfishstix]

Thanks, the info is really helpful, but I'm also looking for more specific information, like what type of neck is preferrable. I know perhaps the through neck, or a tenon neck is best, but it does rack the price of the guitar up quite high, whereas a well done bolt on can also be a very nice neck joint albeit the cheapest to construct.

Any technical information on what you look for in a guitar would be greatly appreciated, esspecially any regarding semi-acoustics, although not restricted to them as guitar tend to share many of the same overall attributes.

[deathmedic]

I love the PRS Soapbar guitars.. double cutaway versions.

i love either a sunburst with a really dark outer burst
i also love guitars with single colour finnishes, like a bright white or a bright red/green/purple and so on.

i like floyd rose trems and hard tail trems. (look at the PRS soapbar)
simple controls, as in a tone and a volumes knob but no more.

i like slightly obscure head stock shapes, like that of Deans guitars.

[martinedwards]

I don't care what sort of neck join it is.

I've built with glued set tenon joins & glued dovetails, and I've modded bolt on electrics all over the show and I don't really care!!

As to the electroacoustic side of things I like a bridge piezo as it is the least susceptible to feedback.

Internal mics are great in the studion but can be difficult on stage.

[FortePenance]

I considered taking D&T and building a guitar but i was too lazy. :)

Okay, so uh.

Shape: Strat shape
Hardware: Chrome or Black, DiMarzio Evolution (Hum) and DiMarzio Fred (Hum), 1 volume, 2 tone, 3 way selector
Design: ?
Sound: Bass and Treble, very little middle
style: Um, metal and rock?
materials: Mahogany body, maple neck, brazillian rosewood fretboard
neck type: Neck-thru

uh yeah, other stuff but that's the basic gist.

[wackakapow]

A parker fly, without the ugly.

[Grim]

Ebony fingerboards, speed bump frets, two humbuckers wired to give the widest variety of tones, ala PRS. Hard tail, trem doesn't matter, and the whole thing weighs less than 10 lbs.

[Shooey]

My perfect guitar?

Start with my '76 SG-rosewood fingerboard, 2 old humbuckers, a tune-o-matic bridge and stoptail, and Clapton's woman tone to boot. Then change... nothing.

[Peeb]

A parker fly, without the ugly.
Fine sounding guitar, but isn't that an oxymoron? :rotf:

[FortePenance]

A ParkerFly don't look too bad. They were selling one before for a decent price. Around 800ish US? Almost considered buying it but I was short on funds.

[wackakapow]

The single cut fly mojo by parker is actually pretty attractive, http://parkerguitars.com/code/models/models_fly_mojosc_intro.asp . I don't exactly have the $2k to throw at it though. Where'd you see them for $800? Are you sure that wasn't the Nitefly?