Monthly Archives: March 2021

My poor neighbours…

Thought I might as well replace the really rusty pickguard screws though these will rust out just the same in no time.

Knob Puller… I impulse bought this cool volume/tone knob remover as I was going to replace the knobs with really offensive neon green and pink ones. I impulse bought those too from eBay China and they were the first thing I purchased, and most likely will be the last thing to arrive!

Since one of the Fender saddles came fucked from factory I got a whole new set of Gotoh saddles instead. Made in Japan vs Made in USA? I’d go Japan every time! These were perfect.

I bought a set of understring radius gauges to tell what radius my neck is.

The gauge helped to set the string action and saddle heights too.

Intonation all set.

And she’s all done!

The new locking tuners makes putting on a fresh set of strings such a pleasure. String action is now lower than ever, and man, after playing the Japanese made upside down Squier Strat, and the Chinese made Artist Telecaster, and the Dillion Phoenix for the past 2 weeks it’s SO damn good to be back on this guitar. The neck is just so ridiculously thin, you’d think it was a metal shredder if you were blindfolded.

PS: I’m running a set of Ernie Ball 8 gauge strings now too. Have always been curious, so far so good. I’m at standard tuning right now though, not sure how the strings would feel if I tuned down a half step, or a full step (maybe they’ll buzz as my action is lower now?). Will have to try soon.

PPS: The DeoxIT spray is magic spray! The crunchy crackles are completely gone now from the volume and tone knobs. 100% recommend every guitarist buy some of this stuff.

One last jam on the Artist TC59.

I put it up on eBay and Facebook the other day, got a couple of offers from a couple of older guys but stood firm. Today I sold it to a guy who’s a beginner, but not in the traditional sense. He’s lost mobility in his left hand and can’t play guitar anymore so he’s going to learn left hand! What a legend!

Goodbye Metal Zone, hello JH-1. I found this vintage pedal on eBay Japan. Tone is meant to be in the fingers, but damn this pedal packs a lot of glorious tone!

Fender Voodoo Child coil lead came in the mail today. It’s damn heavy but so perfect for my Izabella guitar.

I bought this left-handed Dillion USA Phoenix back in 2016 off an American guy who brought it to Sydney from the States. Check out the blog post from when I bought it here.

The frets were feeling pretty gritty so I taped up the neck and gave the frets a polish.

Came out real nice.

Turns out the guitar has Grover tuners. Quality stuff that suggests it was worth much more new than what I paid for it in 2016.

At first I thought it was corrosion, but then I picked at it and holy crap! The original plastic protecting the chrome pickup covers was never taken off!

So shiny. As good as new!

These guitars were made in Korea.

As much as I don’t like painted necks this sculpted set neck is beautiful.

So unique. I love it.

Babes.

Having just sold off 2 guitars I considered selling more. I thought about selling my Westone Thunder IA Bass guitar, which I never play, but as soon as I picked it up and glanced “Made in Japan” stamped into the neck plate I just put it back down again. Nope! Not selling it! I then thought about selling my Dillion USA Phoenix. I dug up the blog post which I made when I first bought the guitar and realised there wasn’t much info there on the guitar so I did a bit of research on it and wow, it turns out it’s actually quite a decent guitar. I updated the old blog post with specs. I’ve also sent an email to Dillion USA with the serial number in hope that they’ll reply with the date of manufacture.

In doing some research I found out that it could be as old as 2010, and back then I found a whole lot of Americans on guitar forums fighting over Dillion guitars. Those who owned and played them praised them, but those who owned Gibsons seemed to discount these guitars for being overpriced and made in Korea not the USA. At some stage Dillion went through ownership issues and the company split in 2. Dillion Canada and Dillion USA. Dillion USA made their guitars in Korea but have accused Dillion Canada of making their guitars in China. The Dillion USA owner seems to have changed his actual name to Dillion at some point too. Very interesting right?! Seems like there was a war and might still be a war today between the 2 companies.

I found one video of a very unsatisfied Dillion USA customer who returned his Dillion guitar. In one part of the video he read out an email he received from Dillion USA suggesting that they were unhappy that he had removed protective plastics off the returned guitar, but the guy in the video then suggested that Dillion USA made a big deal about making sure he remove the plastic from the humbuckers before using the guitar. To my surprise this thick plastic protection over the chrome humbucker covers was still on my guitar!

I thought I’d service it and put some new strings on it and now I can’t bring myself to sell it! I’ve instead put the Artist TC59 Telecaster I bought 2 weeks ago up for sale. It was only $289 new and I’ve got it up at $200. I’ve had a couple of offers at $180 but I’ll hold out at $200 for now and see how I go as I’m not too fussed if it sells, or not (it’s damn heavy but still a really solid practise guitar in that it has heavier strings, never goes out of tune and it’s got a thicker fatter neck too).

EDIT! John Dillion got back to me via email and let me know my guitar was made in June 2009! Good to know!