Ulu

It’s kind of funny, but now that I’m old and I can actually afford fast cars and motorcycles, I just don’t want to race around anymore. I don’t want to be in a hurry. I want to be leisurely and take my own sweet time about everything, including driving. Where in my youth it was a luxury to have a hopped up V-8 and go fast, now it’s a luxury to take it easy.

The Ampeg Micro VR, advertising “200 Watts” it’s really amazing how Ampeg can claim this thing puts out 200 W but it only takes in 150 W from the AC line! This was a set up for sort of a oneman band operation: it makes effects and has a looper. Like the rest of them, this one burned out and was removed from the cabinet, leaving behind a pretty high-quality Chinese copy of a 10” Jensen speaker.

I did go and buy a new hydraulic line but I never installed it. As a matter of fact I haven’t touched the car in a couple weeks now because I’ve been messing around with new guitars and old amplifiers. I only spent $800 on those 4 guitars, which really is a pittance if you have priced musical instruments. emboldened by that show of frugality, I splurged $1500 on this classic Eric Clapton model fender Stratocaster. 25 years old. The case I got with it didn’t match at all so I got this matching $140 case. Shamed by that act of extravagance, I decided that, even though I desperately wanted to own a ‘50s Broadcaster style Fender Telecaster, I would have to settle for Squier, an Indonesian made under license to Fender. $189 not including the case. I like to play the Telecaster so much more, that I will probably end up selling the Clapton signature Strat. I also bought two more amplifiers and a speaker. This is a classic 1965 Sears Silvertone 55 W tube amplifier. This had new tubes and capacitors and it sounded very nice, but it needed a lot of cleanup. Also the grill cloth was totally rotten and stained. so I replaced it with this lovely Hawaiian cloth and the steel grid to protect the speaker. if you think I’ve ruined the value of a valuable antique then you must understand that the speaker had been replaced in 2002, and it did not have any of the original capacitors. I also replaced the Masonite baffleboard with a piece of modern high density furniture plywood. This is what Fender guitars used to use in their amplifiers before they got cheap and went to particleboard. Finally I bought this used Fender bass speaker and this Ampeg Micro VR mini bass amplifier. Both of them needed a bit of cleanup.

Well, I had the whole top of my frame wire brushed & nearly ready to paint, when I nicked the long hydraulic brake line with a grinder. Aaaaaaugh!!! I got a New one for only $25 yesterday, but I have to cut the zip ties, get the old one out of the tunnel, bend the new one up, put it in there, and strap it down. Today I had to work on my sister’s car. But we are having beautiful sunny warm days. I may actually paint tomorrow.

Ok….. Four guitars, but the Bass won’t arrive until Tuesday.. I think this is a Chinese copy of a Schecter. These are supposed to be well made but the pickups are second rate. The body will not be walnut, maple or mahogany. Poplar or maybe basswood. I only paid $100 for this one. Cheap! I only gave $325 cash for the Schecter with case, because it sat in a shop 5 years and had a chip in the finish on the back. New, that would have listed over $900 + $160 for the case, plus tax and shipping! So nearly $1300 list, but we are in the midst of a worldwide glut of guitars. Otherwise I would have paid much more for the antiques. I got the Bobcat for $325 and I gave $200 for the 1448. I sacrificed this $3 aluminum (metric) tri-square to make the new 1448 bridge. The baseplate was carved from a $5 stainless burger press.

Cold and damp weather has kept me indoors. To keep myself amused I bought an electric guitar. TWO electric guitars……well three actually. This 2014 Schecter is the cat’s meow. Still had the stickers on it. Pretty much unplayed. Korean made and well respected. Schecter made parts for Fender, Gibson & others, before competing with them. I bought this 1967 Harmony-made Bobcat, sold by Sears as a Silvertone. It needs knobs, a whammy bar & new strings. Still plays better than lots of new guitars. Gold pickups have tone for miles. Finally this 1965 Silvertone 1448 beater. This has a million hours on it and still works, but the tailpiece was missing. I made this more organic shape from stainless & aluminum. Look at the armpit wear on this machine and that pick guard wear. I made this tail piece for it and put some new strings on it and she plays pretty well. Not that it can match the fine action of a Schecter, but this was a budget guitar back in the day. I did this from scratch. It works great but I am sharp nearly a quarter tone at the 12th fret. The bridge needs to move 1/4” farther from the nut. Rockabilly magic with a small amp. I modified the bridge a little bit more and you can see that in the photograph above. Why did I buy this old beater? Well as it turns out this is the same model of guitar that Jimi Hendrix started out on. I can guarantee you this [i]exact[/i] one was not his though, because of the pick guard wear. It would be on the other side of the guitar, as he was left-handed

I just got out the Bombay taxi horn, and honked it in.

Happy new year Tim! I bought me a really loud electric guitar this year, and if I get drunk tonight I might open the windows and wake up my neighbors. (Think about me pretending to be Jimi Hendrix, playing the Star-Spangled Banner.)

Today I made the last gusset, and they are now welded in. It stayed warm until sundown, so I flipped the frame upside down, gave it a cleaning, and shot 5 pints of satin black. I’ll do the top later, because of the weather. It’s raining, but somehow I just barely managed to beat the rain. The finish won’t be great, but at least it won’t rust up during assembly.

That’s only my side. We also did dinner for her family on the 21st. We had 13 adults, plus 5 kids under 10 years old. Needless to say, we are pooped out from all the cleaning, cooking, shopping, wrapping, etc.

Making more frame gussets from some scrap tubing. We had a big rain, so these aren’t finished yet.

Early Christmas dinner. Merry Christmas guys!

It hit 56 today and it’s going to be warmer tomorrow. Possibly 67 and even 69 Saturday. Then 100% rain Sunday, so time is on my side. Today I got some more cleanup done on the pan and the fuel tank support and I put down about 30 more small welds. Then I rolled the chassis back over so I can finish welding the seat rails down to the pan. But I still have a couple little gussets I have never installed, and I need to get those in too.

I took another good look at the chassis today, and it wants more pan welds. Some of the spot welds are just bogus, and there aren’t enough for good edge restraint. So painting looks more remote at this point. The fog is just burning off.

A very early Good Morning from The Gateway to the Sierra. I spent several cold hours out in the boatyard, cleaning up my VW chassis, rolling it back over to hit the ugly spots with a grinder. Scraping, wire brushing sanding and feathering paint is nearly done on the bottom side. I want to put some more spot welds on the pan. About 50 more. I am praying the weather will get dry enough to paint before it all gets rusty again. I still have a bit of minor welding on the topside first. I’m not used to wearing gloves just for sanding, but I am much more sensitive to cold weather now, than when I lived on the muskeg, in Baudette, at the Northwest Quadrangle. That’s farther north than 3/4 of all Canadian people live. I didn’t realize at the time why the only TV shows we ever got were some variety show from Winnipeg, with stomping Tom Connor, and then Hockey Night in Canada. I prefer the local warm weather, hitting 54F yesterday. Here’s hoping for continued warm weather. The paint I bought wants 55 min. I will heat the paint and the metal before I try to spray, but first it gets etched.