The first change out on a hollow body always takes forever. It gets easier. You learn a lot the first time. I really like your content. Keep it up. Thanks
“Got an eraser in the end there , ‘cos nobody’s perfect”. That cracked me up.... I was thinking of doing the TV Jones mod to my orange 5420, so I watched the TVJones video first, then the “Dave’s world of fun stuff” video ( Canadian guitar mechanic-really knows his stuff) and then this video. Glad I watched yours because it shows you how the “simple” things can be a real p in the a. Thanks for making this, very helpful, subscribed.
I have the rat rod myself in grey. After watching this, I realized just how much I like the blacktop pickups😉 great effort though! I hope you enjoy them, it sounds great! Nice tone
Nico, I'm very impressed by your courage to make a video like this... I re-wired a Grote hollow body to mimic a Gretsch with Mad Matter non-solder electronics and there were a LOT MORE not-safe-for-RU-vid words than you used! I'd never film myself doing that... as I said, I admire your courage sir.
There was a couple of nail biting on the edge of my seat moments there! But hell, I’m just sitting in a sweatbox out in the desert. 🌵 Not a lot going on here. I’ve been building and rat rodding a couple of guitars, some my episodes have been pretty hair raising. No string winder here either. Good to take your time, learn how and less chance of a bad “event” I’m just putting a kill switch in my Old Archtop acoustic to electric rat build. The Bigsby was the last nice upgrade. Going in for the kill next.
I have the same Rat Rod, don't like the red cover of the pickups, bought black ones, they look like they could fit perfectly but I just saw the metal covers are soldered, this might be a too complicated replacement to just to change the color, maybe I'll just put a black sticker
You can get to the connectors without moving any pots or input jack. Surely you can just re-use the connectors or get new ones and just re-connect the new pickups. They use connectors for a reason.
Also, anyone know what the connectors are (make/model) … I’m wondering if it would be possible to remove the “male” connectors from the old pickups, and fix to new pickups? Save pulling all the guts out?
Looks awesome!!! Sounds awesome!!! From reading the rest of the comments, it sounds like you put a tru arc bridge on there??? Is that correct??? Any other mods to this Rat Rod??? I have a 5422 Electromatic i wouldn't mind throwing some upgrades on. Thanks.
Yes I put a tru arc on, I love it. I’m thinking about changing the tuners and maybe putting on a different bigsby on there but it’s mostly cosmetic stuff. Thanks for looking ! 🍻
Stumbled upon your channel recently and am loving it. So good. Going to buy my first Gretsch and have the option locally of this very rat Rod or a 5420 with the newer pickups. Any recommendations which is better hardware wise(ones Korean and one made in China I think). Don’t like the red pickups so would get them changed out too.
Thanks for the kind words. I have experience with Chinese and Korean gretsches and must say the build quality on both is great, especially for the money, I don’t think you would be unhappy with either choice. I haven’t looked into the new pickups though so can’t advise on that. I always say if you have chance to play them then that will inform your decision but I know that’s not always possible.
@@DEATHRAYCAT thanks mate for the reply. I’ll actually get to play both tomorrow, so will see which feels best and come home with one of them! Hopefully the Chinese build quality on the new ones is as good as the rat Rod also.
Thanks for recording and sharing this! I'm considering switching the Black Tops in my G5422 to T-Armonds for a brighter tone but am waiting to see how much difference fitting a Serpentine makes first. Presumably the new pickups set you back ~£270 or so?
If you use the original wiring harness, then why not just put the quick connect clips on the TV Jones and skip all the hassle of soldering and reinstalling the pots and output jack?
Just a question man Was the original bridge that came with your guitar rattling like crazy? Mine rattles a whole lot and ever since I put the T-Armonds in mine this super ice pick resonance happens whenever I’m in single coil mode but it’s strange as the high E string in relation to the others is quiet but the resonance is way louder than anything else I’m doing I’m wondering if my tru-arc will fix it
The original bridge on mine was actually really good! But there are no moving parts on the true arc so that won’t be a problem. I did find that the top on one of the switches was a little loose and that rattled but that was easy to fix. As for the e string, maybe you need to look at the height of the pole pieces? Or maybe wait til you get your new bridge and see what happens ? You might get a completely different sound I don’t know 😸
My main think would be to try out as many as you can in your budget! Sometimes something that looks amazing might not play how you expect it to. If it’s possible to get to a shop with lots of Gretschs in there, I would do that! You might fall in love with something you didn’t expect to!
The guys who designed this line must be blind, a white guitar with black bindings and red PU´s 😞 One other guitar in the line is matte black with red PU´s ufff 😞 It is soooo bad taste. Where I live those are keepers - because people are not able to sell them 🙂 But I have another Electromatic with Black Filtertrons and they actually sounds quite good.
