$300 Ibanez Gio Makeover / How to make A Cheap Guitar Feel Expensive

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In today's video I will take this $300 Ibanez Gio GRG121SP and Make it Feel and play as good if not better than a Guitar that could easily cost you $800 or more. Guitars in the lower more affordable price range seem to not have the extra steps and care taken from the factory that you would see on a more higher end expensive guitar. For Example, my Tim Henson signature has Nice polished and rounded off fret ends, and the fretboard edges are rolled. These few minor details can complete transform the feel and playability of a guitar.
DISCLAIMER- The steps and techniques I use in this video are the ones that I have found work best for me and my skill range. I am no way a professional luthier however over the years have learned a lot working on my own guitars gathering tips and techniques from people with more knowledge. There are many ways to get the same great result find which way works best for you.

Опубликовано:

6 сен 2024

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Комментарии : 43

@svarogsvarga239 7 месяцев назад

For each guitar I immediately replace the plastic nut with a bone nut. The sound is audibly better. Locking tuners and pickups is often another upgrade

@ryant3600 Год назад

I'm an Ibanez dude, have been since the late 80's. Lately, I've really gotten into buying cheaper guitars and "building them up". but I haven't done that w/ a GIO. My step son had one like 14 years ago and it was crap. But, I've been impressed w/ the looks of the newer ones. Been thinking about getting one and upgrading the heck out of it.. might have to now.

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Highly recommend it man this GRG was real good from factory but you know how it is it can always be better.

@BIGFESH 5 месяцев назад

Dude I am about to do this very soon! I just got the last of the parts today. All New ........ Gotoh locking tuners Graphtech nut Dmarzio tone zone and air norton pickups New ibanez 5 way from the real RG line New 500k pots Graphtech saddles Qi input jack FU TONE noiseless springs FU TONE tremolo stop

@BriarBeats Месяц назад

Love your process man and really what a difference, appreciate you putting this all together. Have a blessed day brother, in Jesus Name ❤ Thank you

@mikemelara9591 4 месяца назад

I love working on guitars. I’m no pro. I learned myself… but I absolutely love doing setups for my friends and family that play. The joy that it brings both myself and whoever is trusting me with their instrument is worth it in the end.

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 4 месяца назад

Heck yea man i i love it also sometimes do it and like it more then playing. especially taken a low price range guitar and making it play great.

@chrissturley823 3 месяца назад

DUDE! I did almost EXACTLY this recently. I even used almost the exact same products. I am shocked that somebody else is doing the exact same thing. It works incredibly well and it is the fastest fret polishing technique I have ever found. I was able to take some nasty old frets on my brothers busted old Epiphone bass and bring them almost back to new. Including masking taping the fretboard, it took me a total of 20 minutes to clean and polish all the frets. I could have spent another 30 minutes doing some extra fine polishing and brought them to a mirror finish, but it wasn’t necessary for that bass. That technique you showed will get frets 95% of the way to perfect in no time. It’ll save you 2 hours of mind numbing polishing over other systems. Great video. You know how to make a cheap guitar a really enjoyable guitar. Great job.

@ammostockpile Год назад

I ended up doing that razor blade method after your solar video, did it to my solar found out my fretboard was cracked ever so slightly, filled it in with the same dust from the razoring and super glue came out phenomenal, anyway thanks for the great tips!

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Awesome ! Glad to help in anyway

@MajorUpgrade 7 месяцев назад

Man I have this same guitar, and it has minor fret sprout on it. I am like you. I have bought many cheap guitars and I really enjoy fixing them up! I also have much higher priced guitars, but I feel like this could be an absolute stunner of a guitar with some love, like you have already proven. Good mod platform. It's surprising what a little bit a elbow grease, a few tools, and some patience can do to get you a great playing instrument. I still say that the difference between a $1200 Strat and a $3500 Strat is just the time someone takes to do things like this and give it a good setup. I will definitely be doing this to try to make my GIO look and play better. Thanks for taking the time to show all of the steps. Did you do anything else to it? Pickups? Bridge? Do you still have it? Keep rocking man! 🤘

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 7 месяцев назад

Yea man time spent on it is definetly the differance! I still have it i out dimarzio super distortion and an evolution in it now and the locking tuners obviously still plays great ! Thanks for the kind words

@melodicguitarist821 7 месяцев назад

Kenny, Just bougie one! Great video. 👍

@mjsteelewasabipunk6091 Месяц назад

Awesome dude!

@1RedShinobi 10 месяцев назад

scalloped frets are the best and yup nice video

@melodicguitarist821 6 месяцев назад

Hello Kenny, I was wondering if your saddle screws are sticking up past the saddles on your Ibanez GRG121SP? Thank you!🙏

@BIGFESH 5 месяцев назад

I found replacement hardware. 8mm or even 6mm for really low saddles.

@davidnoguera1470 28 дней назад

I have this same ibanez , can you install a hipshot bridge and change the input jack , pots etc ?

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 28 дней назад

@@davidnoguera1470 yea you could depending in what hipshot model ud have to redrill mounting holes and u can def change the electronics as far as the outout jack because of the style that is in there you would have to bore that hole in the body bigger for sure

@davidnoguera1470 28 дней назад

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR thank you for the reply , great video and I absolutely love this guitar , want to put fishman pups and everything, what hipshot hardtail would you recommend for this model ?

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 28 дней назад

@@davidnoguera1470 they make an Ibanez specific bridge hipshotproducts.com/collections/guitar-bridges/products/6-string-ibby-fp-guitar-bridge

@davidnoguera1470 28 дней назад

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR thank you very much , looks like the one it comes with the guitar

@Zombie_13x33 Год назад

What do you do near the frets after rolling? The wood should have weird spots were it slopes funny due to only rolling the middle of the fret but we're the edge meets the corner of the fret I know it's gonna look weird and I wonder what you do or think about it. I've done this all to my Ibanez with the red binding like your other one

@heavenlywithhishands Год назад

Would you have any advice on turning a hard tail trem into a floating system, like a wilkinson trem? I like a lot of the Ibanez GIO lineup but most of them having hard tail systems turns me off a lot.

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Would require a decent amount of routing they make the GRGA120 that has a trem check out my latest video i just did a review on one

@melodicguitarist821 7 месяцев назад

Kenny, Do you still have your GRG121SP? I bought one a love it. What is your opinion the frets? They are medium and don't feel as good as the RG standard Jumbo frets. Do you think the GRG121SP frets will wear down quick? Thanks!! 🙏

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 7 месяцев назад

Unless your playing an insane amount and not moving around the neck or constantly playing cowboy chords i dont think you will wear frets out for a long time if its setup properly and ur not wearing groves into the frets i think the 121SP frets are absolutely fine.

@melodicguitarist821 7 месяцев назад

@@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Thanks!👍

@Zombie_13x33 Год назад

Stop using a sheetrock sponge please lol. I use a piece of hard wood about 6 or 8 inches with sand paper wrapped around it. I also used it to ghetto level a fret on my 1000 dollar soloist.. I couldn't think of anything else off hand to use and it worked lol. Finer paper the better but it will take longer. I worry the sponge is too soft and will cause the frets to slowly scallop on just the edges. I need that fret end tool.

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Its not to soft .. a lot of people use foam sanding blocks to do this I’m not the first one. U ever try sanding wood with one it sucks so it works great for taking down the frets that have sprout just a little in this case with out sanding the edge of the fretboard much if at all and even if it did again in this case we were rolling the fretboard edges anyway so it didn’t matter a lot if not all of the residue left over is mostly from the sanding block itself.

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Theres proper tools to do it but i don’t need to do that enough to justify buying it

@Zombie_13x33 10 месяцев назад

your good man i didnt mean to sound like anything when i said this. at that time i was just not loving the sponge things cus they use them at work alot and they just suck. i said to use a block of wood or even better a real fret leveling beam and run that down the sides. ive even used a sharpening stone before and that works really good but needs to be touched up after with some paper. idk how i ended up watching this video again but i did lol. have fun man. @@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR

@tonirak241 5 месяцев назад

Crazy to think that $300 is considered cheap when it is literally 3 month salary of an average dude where i live

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 5 месяцев назад

Yea that is based off of the economy and guitars where im from this is considered and lower priced guitar.

@Lif3OfAMV 5 месяцев назад

that isn’t true. if you’re making 300$ in 3 months, no matter where you’re located, 3rd world or not. ur a fucking mess😂 that’s 100$ a month. 3$ a day. can’t make any more than 3$ a day? i make that wiping my ass and i’m 20 years old. 300 is cheap as hell. 600 is also cheap. if you can hear the difference in quality and know what you’re doing 1.5k is still cheap in comparison to the professional good good stuff. you can’t be broke and a guitarist, one of the only hobby’s that you can’t settle on budget equipment. you can hear the difference between a 2k and 1k guitar, a 300$ guitar is just shit in general

@havochowl6766 Год назад

I highly suggest not to put anything on a Jatoba Fretboard. It will look cool on the first day of putting fingerboard oil but in the long run, the fretboard will look ugly and feel sluggish. If you buy a brand new GIO Ibanez, it will be 100% rough on the first day so i suggest just buy a microfiber cloth to wipe everything and just play the roughness until it goes smooth. NEVER EVER PUT ANYTHING ON A JATOBA FRETBOARD

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Your spreading false info in my comment section brother jatoba has a tendency to drie out quicker then ebony or rosewood therefor requires maintenance never once have i had an issue with discoloration or anything with jatoba fretboards. A simple google search will show its safe to maintenance jatoba.

@dannicoelet9915 Год назад

You talk to much😅

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR Год назад

Thanks man 👌🏻

@Spicyketchup04 6 месяцев назад

If he doesn't talk how are we supposed to know what to do

@allance9760 3 месяца назад

I'm thinking about how much will you pay if you let a music instrument technician from a guitar repair store handle all those processes in Canada.

@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR 3 месяца назад

For sure a couple hundred dollers alot of these production based guitars are what u call “ fast “ guitars there made fast little time as possible is spent on each process keeping cost down on manufacturing so taking the few hours to do this work if the factory did it can easily take this 300 Gio and could sell it as a higher end model for 500$ plus easily i would be confident days guitars like these theres prob less then 20 minutes spent on fret work at the factory before they noved onto the next guitar in line.

@allance9760 3 месяца назад

@@SIX1NINEGUITARSANDGEAR I just bought a Gio GRX70QA, it's on the way now. I'm not good at doing those things on my own, but I still wanna make my new GRX70 feel as good as possible, that's why I'm wondering about the cost if I bring it to the local guitar store and let their technicians do it for me. Anyway, thanks for the reply.☺