JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by stratoclutter » Mon Mar 08, 2021 1:11 pm

I just found this thread, it's amazing and at the same time everything that is wrong/right about Guitar crazy people !

A whole thread dedicated to reproducing the wrong prototype, I mean I am in complete admiration of OP, you are a hero, legit a hero !

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by Maniac » Mon Mar 08, 2021 3:30 pm

No need to apologise. You've taken us on an amazing journey. Great that there are more chapters to come.

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by AcrylicSuperman » Mon Mar 08, 2021 4:35 pm

Maniac wrote:
Mon Mar 08, 2021 3:30 pm
No need to apologise. You've taken us on an amazing journey. Great that there are more chapters to come.
Well, you all are gonna be really underwhelmed with the custom humbucker, so I'm really not trying to build hype, but knowing what it is will allow someone to have one made for them if they want to be specific. Apart from that, we found the sanding sealer and clear coat likely used, but I'll save that for when I have to post about the pickup.

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by BTL » Mon Mar 08, 2021 8:43 pm

Amon 7.L wrote:
Wed Nov 25, 2020 3:49 am
- A Blue 1.0 Reissue with spot-on faithful specs would surely require Peter Buck's involvement as I wouldn't put much hope in Fender retrieving the original template nor the original body of Red 1.0.
Once all of the details have been finalized, do you plan to make a Blue 1.0 CAD drawing and a parts/resources list available? I'd guess that a lot of people would love to see that that all compiled in one place. Honestly, it would be pretty cool to see if the Custom Shop might consider replicating Blue 1.0 as a righty. Hmmm...
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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by Amon 7.L » Tue Mar 09, 2021 8:59 am

BeeTL wrote:
Mon Mar 08, 2021 8:43 pm
Amon 7.L wrote:
Wed Nov 25, 2020 3:49 am
- A Blue 1.0 Reissue with spot-on faithful specs would surely require Peter Buck's involvement as I wouldn't put much hope in Fender retrieving the original template nor the original body of Red 1.0.
Once all of the details have been finalized, do you plan to make a Blue 1.0 CAD drawing and a parts/resources list available? I'd guess that a lot of people would love to see that that all compiled in one place. Honestly, it would be pretty cool to see if the Custom Shop might consider replicating Blue 1.0 as a righty. Hmmm...


My plan for when all the details are completely gathered and put together was/is to do a complete build with me and AcrylicSuperman getting the first 2 replicas.

I don’t know if it’s worth reminding that the real issue in which this project confined is one little thing called Covid-19 and its woeful aftermath;
If it didn’t cause so much damage in my area to the point of killing for good an absurd number of business activities (including my own job and the only lumber store I reach out in my entire area) I would have redone the body itself instead of re-working the current one along with making a few extra ones for those who requested it.
As I mentioned in my previous post, as soon as the Covid-19 situations gets better and conditions will allow, I'll will get on the fully accurate replica & the rest of the aforementioned plans.

Moreover, I still have secret card I’m gonna try to play.
I’m not so positive about the outcome as for I would need to track the right people and see where it lands, yet it’s worth trying nonetheless.
I can’t/don’t want to discuss it publicly at this stage for obvious reason, but in the remote chance is gonna work out, well… let’s say we’re all going to be rather happy.

If the secret card is not gonna cut it and circumstances won’t allow me to build anything, no worries, I’ll get you guys covered in one or another once all the missing details are sorted.
All the details we’ve gathered so far are already put together in this very thread and in its latest wrap-up.



Side note:
Being Kurt’s Mustang being inaccessible due to -again- Covid-19 restrictions, we don’t get to have measurements of its neck taken, we’re trying to determinate what is the actual geometry on Mustangs of the same era.
In order to achieve that, both me & AcrylicSuperman tried to get in contact with owners of Vintage Competition Mustangs from 69-71 to try to sort out the neck profile of Larry’s and see which matches his description.
Unfortunately, no luck so far as even the couple of guys who initially were willing to help us ended up just bailing out without even saying anything.

There’s only so much we can do without cooperation, so even you Brad (and all the guys who are interested), if you can help with this task and have access to a 69-71 Competition Mustang, get in touch.

Cheers,
Amon

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by AcrylicSuperman » Tue Mar 09, 2021 11:00 am

BeeTL wrote:
Mon Mar 08, 2021 8:43 pm
Amon 7.L wrote:
Wed Nov 25, 2020 3:49 am
- A Blue 1.0 Reissue with spot-on faithful specs would surely require Peter Buck's involvement as I wouldn't put much hope in Fender retrieving the original template nor the original body of Red 1.0.
Once all of the details have been finalized, do you plan to make a Blue 1.0 CAD drawing and a parts/resources list available? I'd guess that a lot of people would love to see that that all compiled in one place. Honestly, it would be pretty cool to see if the Custom Shop might consider replicating Blue 1.0 as a righty. Hmmm...
I can compile a parts list for those interested. Give me a couple days and I'll post it. You can get most of the parts direct from Fender with the exception of the body, neck and switches.

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by BTL » Tue Mar 09, 2021 11:24 am

Amon 7.L wrote:
Tue Mar 09, 2021 8:59 am
[...] I don’t know if it’s worth reminding that the real issue in which this project confined is one little thing called Covid-19 and its woeful aftermath;
If it didn’t cause so much damage in my area to the point of killing for good an absurd number of business activities (including my own job and the only lumber store I reach out in my entire area) I would have redone the body itself instead of re-working the current one along with making a few extra ones for those who requested it.

As I mentioned in my previous post, as soon as the Covid-19 situations gets better and conditions will allow, I'll will get on the fully accurate replica & the rest of the aforementioned plans.

Moreover, I still have secret card I’m gonna try to play. [...]

[...] There’s only so much we can do without cooperation, so even you Brad (and all the guys who are interested), if you can help with this task and have access to a 69-71 Competition Mustang, get in touch.

Cheers,
Amon
Understood on Covid 19 completely, and thank you! I'm certainly intrigued by the "secret card".

My only potential to assist here might be to engage with an FMIC contact I made during Summer NAMM 2019. That said, I'm happy to engage and support in any way possible. This project has captured my imagination like no other.

Thanks again!
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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by Amon 7.L » Wed Mar 10, 2021 4:44 am

Thanks to you Brad for your availability.
I'm gonna send you a pm later today, let's see if we can move things forward :ph34r:

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by BTL » Thu Mar 11, 2021 7:26 pm

I have no silver bullet, but I’d love to see an official Blue 1.0 replica see the light of day. I’ll see what I can do to move the project along.
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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by BTL » Tue Mar 23, 2021 10:20 am

@Amon 7.L and @AcrylicSuperman I'm probably naïve with respect to what it might take to move this project forward, but I'd love to see the fruits of your labor come to harvest. :)
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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by AcrylicSuperman » Tue Mar 23, 2021 1:45 pm

BeeTL wrote:
Tue Mar 23, 2021 10:20 am
@Amon 7.L and @AcrylicSuperman I'm probably naïve with respect to what it might take to move this project forward, but I'd love to see the fruits of your labor come to harvest. :)
Honestly, I can't wait to build one. And when I eventually do, I'll be sure to post a build thread, even if you all already know what the outcome is going to be. Lol

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by AcrylicSuperman » Sun Apr 04, 2021 12:51 pm

Alright folks, I promised you that if I didn't have any further answers on Blue's pickup, then I would reveal to you the answers to Red's, which is supposed to be the exact same as Blue's. While right now, I can't confirm that, I have no reason to disbelieve that information as it came directly from Larry Brooks. But I don't want to just touch on the Seymour Duncan, I want to touch on the Texas Special as well because this is going to be important to all of you who want to replicate your Jagstangs. So today, we are gonna touch on the pickups and wiring.

Let's start with the custom Seymour Duncan 59. If you want the sound, I encourage you to just buy an off the shelf '59. If you want the details, you're going to over pay for it. I'm not here to tell you how to spend your money, I just want you to be aware. The custom '59 started it's life as any other '59 model. So what changed? Well, first, in 1993, if you wanted a '59 model to fit in a Fender, such as Kurt's vandalism strat, you had to order the neck version because the bridge came stock with long legged plates meant for Les Paul guitars. Kurt's custom '59 recieved short legs so that it could be mounted to the pickguard. Second, the '59 in 1993 did not have the Seymour Duncan logo as a stock option. Kurt's custom '59 recieved a logo in silver on the white bobbin. The third and more significant detail of Kurt's custom '59 is an unusual one and I had to actually ask several big name pickup makers their consensus as to why it was done. Kurt's custom '59 was not wax potted, but rather, lacquer dipped like an old Fender single coil. This right here is the most significant piece of information regarding the pickup. It had the same number of winds per coil as the stock '59 and featured a 4 conductor wire.

So right now, you have questions about potting. What is the difference between wax and lacquer? Well, the general consensus among pickup builders was not much. Lacquer was commonly used on the vintage fender single coils of old because the coils were hand wound and not as tight as a machine wound coil, therefore, the lacquer stiffened up the coil and created a slight barrier between coil and magnets. Clearly, a humbucker is constructed differently, so what would be the bennefit of doing it this way? Well, as far as the pickup builders could guess, because the pickups were wound by Seymour, he didn't use a conventional machine. He hand wound it, perhaps on one of the old machines from the Gibson Kalamazoo factory. Gibson didn't pot their old humbuckers, but knowing who the pickup was built for, Seymour gave it some potting to make it usable with the amount of gain and distortion Kurt was using. Over time, the lacquer would have degraded slowly and the pickup would have become more microphonic as time went on. Wax or lacquer, it's doing the same job. We have all heard this pickup in it's prime, not an aged 50 year old version of it. So if you want the in it's prime sound, just buy a wax potted '59 bridge pickup. If you want to go the useless extra mile, I wont stop you.

So, the Texas Special. So, we all know that the jagstang used a bridge Texas Special in the neck. What nobody does tell you is that the Texas Special in 1993 is not the same Texas Special that you can get from the custom shop today. As a matter of fact, the current version is more mellow than the pickup Kurt had recieved. Kurt's original Texas Special would have ended up being in the 7.4-7.6k range, using 43 guage wire, alnico v rods. The current version uses 42 guage wire, alnico v rods and reads around 6.6k. Again, if you want to fork out for an old one, I'm not going to tell you no. I am going to tell you that there is another option. What does still exist is the Tex Mex set. Where the Texas Special was made for SRV, the Tex Mex was made for Jimmy. Both sets were practically identical and so they changed the Texas Special. So if you were buying everything new to replicate the build, you'd want to use the bridge of the Tex Mex set. It's cheaper than the Texas Specials.

Having said all that, with wiring, if you want to go with the way Kurt recieved it, follow the standard Mustang wiring diagram. If you want to go with the way he modded it, follow the KC signature Mustang diagram.

I suppose that when I know for sure the two pickups are identical (I have no doubt that they are), I'll confirm it. Just know that the SD 59 above was the one made for Red. I was told by Larry that these two pickups were ordered identical. I take him at face value. You can too.

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by K2Ri » Sun Apr 18, 2021 1:40 am

Thanks for sharing the information - super interesting!

This is slightly off-topic but since you have managed to source all these nerdy details regarding the JS pick-ups, maybe here's another one to add to the mix: We all know that Kurt had 3 Sonic Blue Mustangs built for him in 1993 (and 1 Fiesta Red.. and supposedly 6 other stock Mustangs). It seems Kurt definitely favoured the one with the white humbucker - which is supposed to be a JB. Is it possible that this pickup was a custom made as well? Did SD even make white JBs at that time? At least I haven't managed to found any vintage, second hand white JB with SD texts on them. This is purely just speculation, but since you have managed to build your contacts to right people, maybe it's worth trying to find out if there were any other custom pickups made for him?

Once again, thanks guys for your hard work and sharing it with us!

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by AcrylicSuperman » Sun Apr 18, 2021 2:13 am

K2Ri wrote:
Sun Apr 18, 2021 1:40 am
Thanks for sharing the information - super interesting!

This is slightly off-topic but since you have managed to source all these nerdy details regarding the JS pick-ups, maybe here's another one to add to the mix: We all know that Kurt had 3 Sonic Blue Mustangs built for him in 1993 (and 1 Fiesta Red.. and supposedly 6 other stock Mustangs). It seems Kurt definitely favoured the one with the white humbucker - which is supposed to be a JB. Is it possible that this pickup was a custom made as well? Did SD even make white JBs at that time? At least I haven't managed to found any vintage, second hand white JB with SD texts on them. This is purely just speculation, but since you have managed to build your contacts to right people, maybe it's worth trying to find out if there were any other custom pickups made for him?

Once again, thanks guys for your hard work and sharing it with us!
Good question. It's definitely a question that I don't have a direct answer to. I do know that Skystang II and III got their JB models directly from American Musical Supply. I am unsure about the origins of the fiesta red or skystang I. I do know that some were pickguard mounted and some were routed and mounted directly to the wood. I would almost imagine two things are possible here:

1) if it's custom, then maybe it was initially meant for a different guitar. The reason I say this is because the Red mustang starts off as his main guitar but it doesn't initially get a full sized humbucker, it gets a JB jr. Despite the fact that the two guitars were shipped together, we don't see Skystang 1 until it gets it's full sized humbucker. I believe single coil sized humbuckers were the initial plan because that is how his 69 Competition was set up. I think Kurt had other plans, which lead to the switch. I'm unsure about how many JB models that Earnie bought from American Musical Supply, but I know he bought at aleast 3, as two wound up in the following blue mustangs and one wound up in Pat's stratocaster (which was previously Kurt's). I imagine that the JB in the red mustang may have been a local music store purchase on tour. The first shipment of mustangs were in June and the second in october.

2) second possibility is that it's not a JB at all. Would it surprise me if it wasn't? Not really. Only thing we can say for sure is that it is a Seymour Duncan pickup. I'd be curious to see what models were available at the time with long legs. The obvious two that come to mind are the JB and the 59.

I'll look into this for you and see if I can come up with an answer.

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Re: JAG-STANG Prototype - Reverse Engineering

Post by AcrylicSuperman » Sun Apr 18, 2021 3:41 am

K2Ri wrote:
Sun Apr 18, 2021 1:40 am
Reguarding the white JB
I did some serious digging tonight because I was curious. I have a friend who has a large collection of old pickups (not a collector, just likes to swap a lot and has been doing it for years) and I asked him if he had any old JB's laying around and if he had any old white SD pickups from the 80s or early 90s. All of his old JB's (3 of them: The JB Model, JB-J and JB-L) were long legged and black, but he did have a Jazz model that was white from 1991. He stated that the bobbins on the Jazz were different than the JB.

So with this knowledge in hand, I began looking for a transition period and I found one. The transition is debated as either 87 or 89, but from what I am seeing, my guess is the changes started occurring in 89. This is important for the JB as this transition ends up becoming the JB as we know it today. Before this transition, long legs were common, rough cast alnico v magnets were used, as were butyrate bobbins. These bobbins only came in cream and black. With the transition came bobbins made of a poly material, polish alnico v magnets and a combination of short and long legs. Logo began popping up on the bobbins as well. These would have been rolling out by 1990. The thing with the poly bobbins is that they could come in other colors, and this includes white.

White, however, was not an extremely popular bobbin color. Majority of humbuckers made in this transition were black or zebra, because that's what the metal guys and vintage purists wanted. It appears that white models did make their way to stores but were probably very limited stock due to lack of popularity. If you order it directly from SD, the pickup could have been requested with long or short legs and in whatever colors were available at that time. Being that Kurt's was a long legged version, it is possible that the first two full sized JB models were bought at a local music store or two while Nirvana was on tour. One just happened to be black and short legged, one happened to be white and long. We do know where the future JB's came from.

It is likely that Skystang I does contain a JB. He just happens to have a very rare for the time pickup in it. There is always a possibility that Kurt himself picked it out because it was unique.

But this does explain why there are no white vintage examples. Hope that helps.

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