can you give me advice on guitar modification?

Question

here is my guitar:
http://images.music123.com/products/original/Baja/228731.jpg
its a cheap one, i know. thats why im taking it apart.
has 1 volume, 2 tones, 5 way pickup selector, 3 single coils.

i bought two humbuckers taken from an ibanez rg320 on ebay.
also got soldering iron.

here are my questions:
1. can i cut a humbucker hole where the bridge is and fit my bridge humbucker there? if so how? approx measurements? (no fancy tools)
2. if i fail with number 1 and have to buy a pickguard, will the strat style with 2 humbucker holes pickguard fit this guitar?
3. if #2 works do you recommend i use the 5way pickup selector to go with my 2 humbuckers or i just buy a 3 way selector?

thank you for reading. i just don't know electric guitars but i want to know. please don't tell me to buy another guitar, would take a year.

Answer 1

Guitars like that tend to play out of tune.
I don't mean to rain on your parade. But, no matter how you modify it to make it sound good, if it plays out of tune it won't matter. See if you can get credit at a music store, give them the money you are using to buy the humbuckers as a down payment, and get a better guitar, one with the pick-up set up you have in mind.

You said it will take a year to get a new guitar. Why save when you can have a new guitar today. Just make a down payment and pay a little each month.

Answer 2

My honest answer is I wouldn't try to do any of this work myself. It sounds , by the questions you're asking, that you've never done any mods similar to this.
If you're planning on blues playing, DON'T change the bridge pickup to a humbucker. You'll lose a lot of screaming single coil tone, dude.
The basic setup of a 5 way pickup selector and 3 single coils should give you a good variety of tone, especially w/the 5 way pickup selector. This way you can catch pickups in phase or out of phase.
Humbuckers are great noisless, fuller sounding pickups than single coils, but are you looking for a more bluesy sound, or more hard rock/metal?
It's a hard choice, but if you really are looking for a tone monster, I'd suggest having coil taps installed on the humbuckers. That way you get your choice of sounds from single coils to humbuckers, even though it might take more work.
You're not gonna end up with a Strat or a Les Paul sound, more of a Frankenstein......you won't know until you plug in and play w/the pickups and knob adjustments for a while. I hope it works for you, but remember, you're in uncharted territory and there's no telling how it's gonna sound.

Answer 3

There are a LOT of good answers here, but here's my tips.

Add a set of Tom Anderson pickups and "beef up" the circuitry FIRST. Most of the sound of an electric guitar comes from the pickups and the circuitry, and Tom Anderson pickups are excellent - they aren't cheap though, so SAVE them for when you get your next guitar. You can buy guitar kits with pre-made parts that are quite good - the Warmoth necks are really good. I wouldn't go too far with this guitar in regards to upgrades with the pickguard or anything like that, but you can put a little graphite in the nut slots (where the strings go to the tuning heads) to help with the tuning and ALWAYS make sure that there is a least two "wraps" of string wire around the post of the tuning heads. Make sure that the tuning heads are properly adjusted - it is possible to have them be too tight - they should be "finger tight". If you don't know how to do this, DON'T - let someone who knows show you how (if it can be done on your ax). Its more important to learn your chops, but having a guitar that plays great can help you practice longer, and that can improve your skills.

Answer 4

That's actually a slick lookin axe, i like the wider horns and the headstock. Ok, here's what you do:

1. Some "strat" style guitars may have the wood chambered out to accomodate humbuckers, but that will be revealed only after taking the whole pickgaurd assembly out (you can take out the pickgaurd screws and lift the whole assembly up - still intact - to check this).
2. If there is no humbucker compatible routing done you'll have to do that yourself (lots of work) , or you can install some hotter single coils?
3. If you have the wood already routed out in anticipation, the pickgard will still need some cutting work , and unless you have THAT all figured out in advance, it may be cheaper and less stressfull to find another pickgaurd for what you want.
4. as far as the wiring, you'd have to do a search (it's out there...) on rewiring the new pickups, but good luck in all. Cheers!

Answer 5

The Strat pick guard should fit it and would be by far the easiest fix. The wiring is already done. The big issue with changing just the single coil with humbuckers is trying to wire it properly. Go the easy route. Buy the pick guard, change it and just wire up the jack. Simple and effective

Answer 6

Take it to somebody who knows what they are doing. Even if it's a cheap fuitar, you don't wanna mess up the sound, because when you go to cutting on guitars, it can totally mess them up, and you will not be able to ever get a decent sound out of them again.

Answer 7

I wouldn't put too much time and money into that one. Get ya an instrument that will stay in tune (has good "intonation"). But since you can't get one for a year, just play this one as-is and save your dough for the new one.