NGD Charvel San Dimas in Pharaohs Gold...... Smaug/The Hobbit Vibes *_*

  • Thread starter Thread starter The~Kid
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Motorboat McCooter said:
Enjoy! It looks awesome... As far as gold can. It turned out pretty great.
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Honestly yeah it looks better than I thought it would as I was expecting satin and wanted a satin finish vs gloss but it turned out better given the overall aestethic and added reflective quality.


With a 10% discount at Zzounds offered and an old 50$ gift certificate I had plus the fact that they are listed there with a gig bag and other places don't list one it was an easy buy overall and like 759.99 before taxes. Great help from Andy, Adam and Andrew too there.


Stupid good deal and so much damn guitar for the money, I feel guilty that I can get such a sick guitar for such a damn good price but nvm the money it's just a sick player and would be hard not to please most.
 
Also if you order one from Zzounds as it's listed with a Gig Bag they gave me a few options like a regular Gator or SKB gig bag but they also offered a Someone Somewhere/Gator bag. I think they offered a Gator 4G gig bag which is similar but this just seemed nicer as it is handmade.


I figure SweetWater or Musicians Friend and others could match per price match policy of equal or lesser value deal too if you get a San Dimas from them.


Definitely a lot nicer than I expected and ample protection and more than a Fender type gig bag, I hate those things and it's made much better too. Once had a guitar drop from my back due to the cheap metal parts they use for those Fender gig bags that just broke and I said no more to gig bags after that. But these are a different story and much better built with no cheap metal parts holding it together like some other cheap gig bags. It's just a nice quality gig bag.



Made by hand using wooden weaving looms and super sturdy and the guitar fits nice and snug in there too and has padding and a rest for the neck too inside so it fits like a glove. Great price on these as said before if you buy direct from Gator on Ebay and they come in Core models like this one with 1/2 an inch of padding or a Lux version with a full inch of padding. Just so much damn nicer than the garbage Fender gig bags I used in college and much appreciated.


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Also another thing most don't know about hard cases or gig bags is that the foam is the most expensive part. It's not the plastic molded part and that is actually the least costly material. There are cheap plastics, bad manufacturing methods and cheap methods or bad designs but for the most part the plastic part of a hard case is the least expensive.

For the most part if you have good manufacturing methods and good plastics you get a great case but the plastic in most cases and the cases themselves are not as expensive to manufacture as most would think.

The plastic offers protection for when your traveling on planes or have other heavy gear and equipment in transport but most of the protection actually comes from the foam/padding and it's not cheap either and actually cost a lot more than most plastics used to make most cases on average.

So unless you have rowdy children running around don't recommend most but would recommend these and especially the Lux one as it is thicker with a full inch of foam/padding. If your in college or going to a local gig these are pretty solid. Would probably say hard cases are mainly just for transport or tours but for home or going around town with stuff like this, they are just solid. Just so much better than the cheap gig bags I had growing up.


I mean again not a big gig bag dude but these things are so damn nice and pretty affordable too and quality ^_^
 
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Okay so I brought the volume way down and used a different cellphone to record this time. Played a bit slower and just dug in.....


Calling this one Eternal Sunset ^_^


 
MetalHeart said:
Man, you take pretty good pics (y)

Is that a ebony fretboard?
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Yeah ebony on the Burgundy Mist, got it for 850$ at full price at Orange GC in March of 2021, didn't even feel like hagling and that's what they went for new and I felt guilty buying it because it was way better than any Fender I've played short of an Ultra for the money....... when I read "ebony" board and all the other specs I was sold and paid full price no questions asked ^_^


Honestly its pretty sick and that ebony board is fantastic. I have Daddario NYXL on it still going strong after 2 years plus now. Play good as new still and no indentations under the strings and I play hard on them. I always clean the strings with the Dunlop stuff when I play and it helps for faster play too, it's sort of like cheating.


Anyways it sounded so damn good it kind of put the Pharaohs Gold to shame at first and didn't want to but I figured it was because the Burgundy Mist was in D#/E flat. The Pharaohs Gold in E Standard tuning on its own sounds killer but compared to the Burgundy Mist in D#/Flat it felt stiffer and sluggish, not as tight or as fast attack.


Put slack on the trem claw some, unlocked, retuned, relocked....... anyways the secret here is your never going to get the guitar intonated that great or in the best tuning just doing that..... so after locking I went on to adjust the trem claw with ever so small turn in either direction needed on the screws to further tune and intonate the Pharaohs Gold to D#/Flat..... and yeah the guitar came to life using the handy dandy Turbo-Tuner of course offering only some of the best tuning to get the job done.......


It became tighter, punchier, faster and easier to play and just more dynamic in general IMO like the Burgundy Mist and just had more "soul" for lack of a better term.


I really wanted one in E Standard and another in E flat/D# but yeah they are both staying in E flat/D#.


I have a Snow White in maple and that sounds good in E Standard but when it comes to rosewood or ebony E flat/D# is where it's at IMO.


Overall feel the Rosewood is a bit warmer and offers more mids. Ebony is more mid cut and has more top end but overall both offer solid attack and tight bass response when tuned the same with plenty of mojo and soul.
 
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Probably the only mod or upgrade I plan on doing to it and the rest of my San Dimas really isn't an upgrade but more of an adjustment......


So we have the 6 pack of tone with a 3 way switch but imagine a 5 way switch..... with the coil splitting.....


You'd be able to get 2 to 4 other tones out of sucker like a Super Stock H/S tone or a Tele BluesBoy S/H tone from bridge to neck and variations on it if you wanted to with inner and outer coils..... that would be sick and kind of soup up the Pro Mod even more with some rewiring and a 5 way. Hypothetically it would allow for 8-10 different tones vs the 6 tones available now.


Anyone else thought of this or done it?
 
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The~Kid said:
Probably the only mod or upgrade I plan on doing to it and the rest of my San Dimas really isn't an upgrade but more of an adjustment......


So we have the 6 pack of tone with a 3 way switch but imagine a 5 way switch..... with the coil splitting.....


You'd be able to get 2 to 4 other tones out of sucker like a Super Stock H/S tone or a Tele BluesBoy S/H tone from bridge to neck and variations on it if you wanted to with inner and outer coils..... that would be sick and kind of soup up the Pro Mod even more with some rewiring and a 5 way. Hypothetically it would allow for 8-10 different tones vs the 6 tones available now.


Anyone else thought of this or done it?
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I never liked the 5 way switch on my strats cause they have less detent to the positions and I'd knock it into the RWRP position during rhythm/chord strumming. I never cared for 2 and 4 positions anyways, I mostly used just neck or just bridge.
 
VonBonfire said:
I never liked the 5 way switch on my strats cause they have less detent to the positions and I'd knock it into the RWRP position during rhythm/chord strumming. I never cared for 2 and 4 positions anyways, I mostly used just neck or just bridge.
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True, have to be honest here and only when I'm thinking deep in my loafers and robe smoking the finest cigars am I in position 2 and 4....... contemplating life..... but for the most part yeah it's straight up position 1 or 5.

But for some stuff I do find the Tele tones useful or the position 2 tone you can get with the 59/JB combo. And with a 5 way vs the 3 way here you would be able to get the Super Stock H-S tone or BluesBoy Tele S-H tone and variations on them..... so like adding two different guitars in there aside from the standard Tele and Strat tones available.

I may or may not do it to my Snow White to test it out first but I hit up a local tech at 13th Street Guitars and they said they could do it for 50-100 bucks. Also the No Load Tone Knob kind of offers another tone if you just dial it back a bit to bring the load back. Pretty damn apparent and with it turned up all the way it's brighter and more airy, with the No Load dialed back a bit the guitar is warmer and more compressed.


But yeah for 50-100 bucks it seems like a pretty cool mod to consider for those BluesBoy and SuperStock tones and just kind of want to give it a try on my Snow White to see what's up and go from there.
 
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