Got my new toy today

[metalchurch]

I put in my order with RickW @ the Music Emporium about 3 months ago for this, and I was finally able to bring her home today.
It's an '08 Jackson DK2 lefty
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Some of the specs include an alder body, bound maple neck and headstock. It's loaded with a Seymour JB in the bridge and a Seymour Duncan STK-1 in the middle and the neck positions.
It actually had a really nice factory setup on it right out of the box. A slight fine tuning and it was ready to rip.

After I brought it home that's where I was able to really dial it in to my liking.
First I removed the trem cover and re-positioned the trem springs, then I tore the cavity cover off and removed the tone knob.
I re-located the volume knob to the tone knobs' location to get it out of my picking area.

I oiled the fretboard, removed the truss cover and adjusted the neck relief. Then I strung it with D'Addario 8-38's and tuned it down 1/2 step to Eb and did a minor tweak with the intonation.

Initially I was planning an EMG'81 swap for this, but for now, the JB is sounding extremely well in this guitar for some reason.
I may just keep it passive, and throw in a reverse zebra Seymour Duncan Screamin Demon. It seems to me that this guitar would do very well with a passive system with minimal adjusting to my amp's eq section.

I'm extremely happy with this, and I'd like to thank Rick once again for putting in this order for me with zero money down. Very cool of you brother! Thanks!
Also, the pricing was very competitive with the online stores, which was cool, but even so I would rather take my business to the local guys who keep us afloat and take care of me.

It was funny, when I picked this up today, he said "what mods are you doing to this one?"
For now, I might leave it alone, but the left over hole where the volume knob was originally will eventually get to me and I'll have to fill it in and re paint it.....
maybe white...

[mjb]

congrats on you purchase joe. shes a beaut!

[metalchurch]

Thank you, I was going to get a red one, but I ultimately decided on black.

[bassist_25]

Get a red one and a black one. That way you could pick whatever guitar matches your outfit for the day.

That's a sweet looking git-fiddle. Congrats on a new axe, Joe. Nothing refreshes your desire to play than a new instrument.

[onegunguitar]

Looks good Joe-and it's a real left handed axe,dang!!! Congrats bro!!

[metalchurch]

Hahaha, yeah that would work also! I always wear black band t-shirts so either one would match I guess.
I actually found a really nice Kramer Pacer lefty on ebay, i'd say it's about an '87 maybe an '88?


It looks like a really nice guitar for it's age, and finding a left handed Kramer is hard, especially a good one like a Pacer or Baretta.
I might just end up getting this one, I talked to the guy just a little bit ago about it, it's in a little guitar shop in Florida.

[Banned]

That's a nice girlfrie....I mean guitar. LOL!!

[lonewolf]

Geez, I looked at the title and thought you were going to post that "toy", lol.

That sure is nice and with a great pup config too--zebra pickups belong on black & white checkered guitars.

[old Skool]

It's a Jackson. 'Nuff said.

[metalchurch]

Geez, I looked at the title and thought you were going to post that "toy", lol.

That sure is nice and with a great pup config too--zebra pickups belong on black & white checkered guitars.

No Jeff, I haven't unveiled that yet, I'm still thinkin on what I want to do to it.

Thanks for the kind words guys!

[metalchurch]

Well, this didn't stay bone stock for too long either.
As I said, I ripped the tone knob out of it as soon as I got it home.

I liked the JB at first, but I swapped that out for a Seymour Duncan TB-5 Custom. Liked it for a little bit, but wanted something with a different EQ.

Then I swapped that out for a TB-11 Custom-Custom, didn't like that either. It just didn't have enough balls to it, but it was a good pickup.

I then put in a Seymour Duncan SH-13 Dimebucker, but the high end on that thing is too much, coupled with the scooped mid of the pickups' EQ section spelled disaster.


So, I have a TB-12 Screamin' Demon, and a Bill Lawrence L500 on the way to see which one if any, will be the 'one' to keep.

This is getting kind of monotonous and I haven't put the control cavity cover back on it yet.

I'm also removing the Seymour Duncan STK-1 single coils, cause they are too warm, and are kind of wimpy.
I don't use a middle pickup, and rarely use a neck pickup, so I might just put in some dummy covers to take up the space for now.

I have a new Lawrence XL500 on order as well, and I have an extra EMG '81 with an 18v wiring, that's beggin' for a home, and it's very tempting, but I'm trying very hard to keep this guitar passive.

Anyone else have a guitar that just didn't cooperate?

Well I guess it's more of the fact that I'm used to running actives, and my amp's EQ is setup as such, so the passives don't have a fighting chance against that when compared cause they are different animals so to speak.

I had a feeling that this guitar wouldn't last long bone stock.

[metalchurch]

I threw in the Bill Lawrence L-500 today and I think this is the one.
It has a really smooth almost transparent sound to it, yet it retains the low end and smooth mids that I like in my guitars.
The JB was too bright for my liking, and the Dimebucker was way too bright with no mids.

I disconnected the middle single coil, cause I dont use that one anyway.

I'm gonna mess around with a few other things like a Treble Bleed with a .002 capasitor and a 100k resistor to see what results I get from that.

Another thing on the list is an EMG PA-2 20db boost. I would like to have maybe 5db of boost. Just enough to push the Lawrence a little more.
I wanted an XL500, but for now I had to settle for an L500.