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New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 2:31 pm
by DrGonzo
Hi guys

i've stumbled across this forum last year when i was building my first guitar (Guild Thunderbird Replica, see pics below) but found help in another forum. I was using all vintage original parts and the best wires i could find and that thing turned out 1000 times better than i ever thought. Nails that juicy, blooming and haunting Surrealistic Pillow tones just perfectly right.

The other day i watched some Rolling Stones clips and suddenly i got hooked on another psychedelic guitar shape. Brian Jones' Mk III... I can't get this thing off my mind and it's the same story with the thunderbird: the original is too expensive (or more like non-existent in this case) and the reissues are too different from the original. I already bought some more or less correct 60's Vox pickups so i guess i'm really doing this :fp:

So, first question:

Is there any way to get a routing template for the overall body shape? Or at least length, width and thickness. I think the body of Brian's was longer than the production model. I could more or less determine the measurements from photos, but if anyone has some data please hit me up!


Here's my Thunderbird Replica

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Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 2:42 am
by CorporateDisguise
I'm going to be no of no help here, but that thunderbird build is beautiful. Good job! I hope it plays as nicely as it looks.

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 10:41 am
by andy
Looks great!

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sat Jun 08, 2019 7:35 am
by Musjagjazz
There was a forumite who visited Brandoni Guitars in the UK who have new old stock of Vox, Eko, etc..

They should be able to get you the parts you need.

Thread
http://www.offsetguitars.com/forums/vie ... t=Brandoni

Brandoni Guitars Website

http://www.brandoniguitars.co.uk/vox.asp

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 2:56 am
by DrGonzo
thanks guys! it does indeed play like butter. the neck turned out a lot bigger than i wanted, but it’s actually pretty good for simple blues licks and psychedelic lead lines.
Musjagjazz wrote:
Sat Jun 08, 2019 7:35 am
There was a forumite who visited Brandoni Guitars in the UK who have new old stock of Vox, Eko, etc..

They should be able to get you the parts you need.

Thread
http://www.offsetguitars.com/forums/vie ... t=Brandoni

Brandoni Guitars Website

http://www.brandoniguitars.co.uk/vox.asp
that is an excellent link thanks a lot! i actually wanted to build the body to keep costs low, but i have no idea what the routing looks like on the brian jones model. maybe they can provide me photo.

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 3:56 am
by DrGonzo
I tried to send them an email but the server is inactive. does anyone know how to get in touch with them by mail?

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 5:02 am
by epizootics
Welcome to the board!

It might be worth it giving them a phone call, that website looks pretty old...

In the meantime I made you this from a photograph of the actual guitar Brian Jones used - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1p8pfA ... _7ddsxNbWa

As always with templates made from photographs, the headstock & neck pocket need some tweaking to adjust to the actual neck you will use :) Same with the stainless steel / aluminium pickugard that'll need cutting around the plastic part of the pickup covers.

I am not exactly sure regarding the thickness of the body, but looking at those pictures (https://reverb.com/item/2371573-vox-mar ... 1997-white) of what looks like a much more accurate reproduction than the recent Vox versions, I'd say it looks like a standard 1 3/4" body.

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 5:41 am
by DrGonzo
epizootics wrote:
Sun Jun 09, 2019 5:02 am
Welcome to the board!

It might be worth it giving them a phone call, that website looks pretty old...

In the meantime I made you this from a photograph of the actual guitar Brian Jones used - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1WEvTg ... ZI_4OamO6u

As always with templates made from photographs, the headstock & neck pocket need some tweaking to adjust to the actual neck you will use :) Same with the stainless steel / aluminium pickugard that'll need cutting around the plastic part of the pickup covers.

I am not exactly sure regarding the thickness of the body, but looking at those pictures (https://reverb.com/item/2371573-vox-mar ... 1997-white) of what looks like a much more accurate reproduction than the recent Vox versions, I'd say it looks like a standard 1 3/4" body.
Wow very nice thank you so much! i must admit i'm surprised by the measurements! the body is shorter and narrower than i expected. also i had no idea about the 24" scale length. are you sure about that? i thought it was more or less a stratocaster knock off construction wise! to get an original neck would be even better if it's such a special scale lenght..

yeah i thought about giving them a call, but i live in switzerland and international phone calls can be pretty expensive. they probably wouldn't be too happy about picking up the phone when i call them..

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 5:42 am
by DrGonzo
that one in the reverb link is the one i was going to use as reference. best photos i could find so far.

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 5:58 am
by epizootics
Well, that's where things cloud up - I have seen three scale lengths on three different Mk IIIs reissues so far - 24", 25" and 25.5". Shame there are no measurements on the patent (https://patentimages.storage.googleapis ... 208949.pdf)

I went with the Vox re-issue for that, but there might be some more diggin' to do...

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 6:28 am
by DrGonzo
so is it unknown what scale length Brian's actual guitar has?

man that would be a real bummer if the Brandonis had a ton of necks and stuff and i'm unable to contact them. maybe i'll try to call them next week.

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 9:24 am
by epizootics
Well, that's kind of interesting actually. If you look at the Vox guitars sold by RetroFret here - https://www.retrofret.com/search.asp?so ... eSold=true - it seems the Mk. VI was available in both 25.5" and 25". No Mk. 3 unfortunately. My guess is the discrepancies between the reissues starts with the originals having varied over time.

I wanted to give Brandoni Guitars a call next week anyway, and it's pretty much the same for me as calling a French line (I seem to give phone calls to England a lot these days). I can ask them and keep you posted. I'm pretty sure they'll have something to say about scale length too...if they are still in business!

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 11:03 am
by Musjagjazz
I think the 50th anniversary reissue MkIII in 2007 was more faithful to the original Brian Jones model than the 1998-2001 reissues. It had a 25.5" scale length with a zero fret neck. There is also the pickup output, body length and width, etc. mentioned as well as the type of tuners used for the reissue listed below:

This 12 1/4 inch wide, 1 3/4 inch thick Northern Hardwood solid body guitar is a limited edition of just 100 guitars produced by the Vox Custom Shop in 2007 and weighs 7.30 lbs. The unique teardrop shaped body has rounded edges and a black padded cloth pad on the back secured by eight fasteners. One-piece, four-bolt maple neck with a nice fat nut width of just under 1 11/16 inches, a scale length of 25 1/2 inches and a wonderful thick profile. Rosewood fretboard with zero and 22 original medium-jumbo frets and pearloid dot position markers with a pearloid inlay "57 - 07" at the twenty-first fret. The face of the headstock has a "VOX" decal in black. On the back of the headstock  is a black decal with "Vox / 50 Years of Golden Tone / Since 1957". There is also a black circular label with "Custom / Vox / Shop". Individual Kluson Deluxe style tuners with oval metal buttons. Single 'Butterfly' string-tree across E & B strings. Serial number "570778" stamped in black on the back of the headstock. Two single-coil Vox Alnico magnet pickups with six pole-pieces set in white plastic with metal surrounds with nicely balanced outputs of 5.90k and 5.88k.v

https://www.frettedamericana.com/produc ... y-teardrop

http://www.voxshowroom.com/us/guitar/57-07_guitar.html


Found the parts list for the Italian made Mark VI but maybe the MkIII used the same pots and caps?

http://www.voxshowroom.com/us/guitar/mark6_1.html

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 2:04 pm
by DrGonzo
that parts list is very interesting thanks! i‘ve never heard of a 100k pot in a guitar before. should this compensate dark pickups? i already bought a pair of the original pickups. 5/6ish and 7.8k output. i‘m thinking about using the weaker one in the bridge position and crank that sucker way up to the strings. i think low output pickups are key to authentic vintage tone.

for the scale length i‘ll probably go with whatever neck i can get. unbound dot marker rosewood fretboard is preferred for cosmetic reasons.

what does „northern hardwood body“ mean? different species or is it a secret? i was thinking about a swamp ash body for some tele jangle..


@epizootics

that would be incredibly nice

Re: New Guy building Vox Mk III

Posted: Mon Jun 10, 2019 12:08 am
by DrGonzo
what do you guys think of a 1/2 tele bridge instead of the strat bridge? i think it would look cool and i can hear a little tele twang in Brian‘s Teardrop tone