How to Make an Electric Guitar Unique
Many people like to turn their boring, stock factory-made guitar into a guitar that speaks to their personal tastes and personality. Custom hardware and electronics services are plentiful and just about any modification can be done to a guitar to give it that eye-catching uniqueness that would make any musician stand out on stage. If you're interested in hot-rodding your electronics, paint job or hardware you'll quickly find that anything is possible in the world of guitar customizing. If you're interested in learning how to customize your own guitar, there are several great options that can make your guitar stand out.
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Things You'll Need
- Soldering iron
- Solder
- Phillip's screwdriver
- Flat head screwdriver
- Box wrench
- Guitar pickups
- Vinyl skins or decals
- Razor blade
- Polyurethane hard coat
- Air compressor
- Paint gun
- Upgraded guitar hardware
Instructions
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Replace the guitar's electronic pickups with aftermarket pickups. A stock (unmodified) guitar uses the standard pickups that come on all of the manufacturer's guitars. They are usually lackluster and do not enhance the guitar's overall electrified tone. One of the first things most guitarists do when modifying a guitar is a pickup change. Changing the pickups can add more power to the guitar's signal output and can completely change the tonal capabilities of the instrument. The pickups are located on the front of the guitar, under the guitar strings and can be removed using a screwdriver and a soldering iron.
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Install a vinyl guitar skin. If you've always wanted guitar with a high-end custom graphic similar to those made famous by manufacturers like ESP Guitars, Fender Guitars and Jackson Guitars but you cannot pay thousands to have one painted or you don't have the artistic skills to do it yourself, there is an option. You can purchase a vinyl skin that is glued onto the guitar's existing finish and then a new hard coat is then applied on top of the vinyl. This will give the appearance of a high-end air brushed graphic finish. The only tools needed to complete this modification are a razor blade to trim the vinyl, air compressor and a paint gun.
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Upgrade your guitar's hardware. Unfortunately, guitar manufacturers cut cost by installing slightly lower quality hardware such as guitar tuning pegs, plastic pickup rings and guitar bridges. Fortunately, however, there are countless upgrades available for all guitar hardware and in most cases, these upgrades retro fit or install without any permanent or extensive modifications. This makes upgrading guitar hardware a great way to learn more about customizing a guitar. In general, a box wrench, Phillips screwdriver and straight edge screwdriver will enable the removal of a guitar's hardware.
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References
- Photo Credit electric guitar image by Jeffrey Zalesny from Fotolia.com
