1960s/2020 Wildwood/Partser Special Electric Parlor Guitar

When parts begin piling-up around the workshop they start nagging at me and I need to do something with them. This pile of parts turned into a happy little electric, though, and I'm pleased they nagged at me. I'd been needing a "Jake day" for a while, now, and spent the second half of my Tuesday putting this together.

Its heart is an '80s Lawrence acoustic guitar soundhole pickup. This is a humbucker but sounds vaguely like a Strat neck pickup shacked-up with an acoustic and wound-up with a jazz-pickup changeling come birthing-time. It's lower-output like a Danelectro pickup so you've got to get your amp turned-up a little more, but boy is it sparkly-clean when you want to be clean and boy is it punchy and crunchy with a bit of drive. Of course I mounted it at the neck like a jazzer wannabe.

Next-up comes the Harmony-made Airline neck which is... basically a Harmony Rocket neck. I'd refretted this and stuck a bone nut on it previously and it's been crying-out for love.

The tailpiece/whammy is a genuine '60s or early '70s Gibson Maestro Vibrola and that is a lovely thing. Once your strings are stretched out they stay pretty well in-tune so long as you use them for Bigsby-like swells or surfy trills and don't go heavy on the dive-bombing.

Speaking of dive-bombing... the pickguard is from a Teisco headstock overlay (aluminum) and I've filled three of its tuner-post-holes with Douglas Dauntless dive-bomber spotter-card pictures. The last hole has the volume put and knob in it.

The bridge is an old parts-bin mandolin bridge I fit to the guitar archtop-style (with posts for adjustment) and compensated for modern 3-plain, 3-wound stringing. The jack plate is an old '80s partscaster Strat type.

The only new bits on the guitar are the two relic'd Gotoh strap buttons, the relic'd Gotoh neckplate and screws, and a set of relic'd Gotoh Kluson-style tuners at the headstock. Good tuners are a must when you're using a Vibrola.

Some might say the body is new, too -- but nope, it's old! The outline is traced from an 1860s parlor guitar (and thus it's a little wonky and asymmetrical if you look at it closely -- but t hat's lovely). The wood itself is 10-ish-ply maple. Each layer is 1/8" thick maple and the plank I cut it from was made right here in Rochester, VT in the '60s. I want to stress that this body functions basically like a solid maple body and resonates/sounds gorgeous because of it -- it's just made from layers of thicker ply maple. That's very different from cheap plywood (as seen on cheap import guitars) which uses nicer veneer for the outer layers and junky wood for the filler layers. This stuff's nice all the way through.

Anyhow, the proof is in the pudding -- and it was a fun project. It plays beautifully and sounds the way I wanted it -- clean, articulate, very responsive, good sustain, and with a quirky old guitar aesthetic and feel. That "old guitar" feel spreads to the body, too -- I left some of the "storage" flaws in the wood rather than sanding it down to perfetion. There are a few light scratches and tiny dings here and there on the body's top and back, though my satin/baby-butt-smooth finish minimizes them.

Setup notes: action is bang-on perfect at the 12th fret at 1/16" overall. The neck is straight, the frets are brand new medium stock, and the strings are regular 46w-10 gauges with a normal unwound G string. The bridge is compensated for an unwound G and so would need to be altered if you're a wound-G user.

Scale length: 24 1/8"

Nut width: 1 11/16"

String spacing at nut: 1 7/16"

String spacing at bridge: 1 13/16"

Body length: 17"

Lower bout width: 11 1/8"

Waist width: 6 1/4"

Upper bout width: 8"
Side depth: 1 1/4"

Body wood: all-maple ply (1/8" layers)
Neck wood: poplar

Fretboard: ebonized maple/mystery-wood

Bridge: rosewood, compensated

Neck feel: medium C-shape/fat shoulders, ~10" board radius

Condition notes: the neck is old and shows wear and tear to its fretboard, rear, headstock... everywhere. The parts all show general wear, too, save the tuners, neckplate, and strap buttons which are faux-aged. The body has light scratching and dings on the upper bout top and back -- evidence of its being stored in a barn for the last 40+ years before a friend of mine sold it to me. One thing to note is that old Harmony bolt-on electric necks feel a certain way -- they're medium-bigger on the rear and have a tight, ~10" board radius. They also don't widen-up much at the neck joint so string spacing will be more cramped up there compared to a Fender or the like. I (personally) love these necks for playing rock-n-roll chords and little fills up and down them, but don't like them as much for lead work because of this. Your mileage will definitely vary depending on your hands and tastes.