NGD Epiphone ES-339 P90 PRO

gball said:
Man, have you ever gutted and rewired a semi? It is an abject nightmare. Not worth the trouble IMO, especially for minimal gain.
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Gball's right you know... and especially when it's a semi with a center block. Normal semi hollow body guitars
are hard enough when everything has to come out of the bridge p'up hole. But when that's blocked, it all
has to come out (and go back in) the F hole. Get some black enamel and keep it handy in case you nick the paint
that they use to hide the plywood of the top. *grins

Better yet, leave everything be unless something breaks. I tried to avoid doing this as long as possible, but my
selector switch began crackling about 8 months after I bought the guitar. I didn't cry any crybaby tears, just
bought a new wiring harness and made up my mind to replace it all in one weekend.

If I had it to do again, I'd only replace the faulty switch and leave everything else in there. CTS pots on an Epiphone?
That's what I pulled out of there. I'm sure the whole harness was fine, except for the one switch.

I also considered cutting a door in the back of the guitar. That's what ol' Les would have done. He's the one who
invented the back door in our Les Paul guitars and SGs. At the Epiphone factory, I believe they install the wiring
before they glue the back on. Makes a lot of sense that way. But cutting a door in a plywood back gave me the
willies... I imagined great big splinters instead of nice neat router work.

Can of worms. But it would be a nice mod to a guitar like this, for a guy who wanted to fool around
with the wiring all the time. I decided I didn't want to be messing with it at all, I just wanted to play music
on it. So I grit my teeth and got 'er done. And it works fine and is dependable and I'm glad I don't ever
have to do that again.
 
I'll probably do the hardware color switch-a-roo with the tuners, knobs, bridge and stop bar. There is one fret that has a buzz if I get the action low to where I like it. I'm gonna try to tap the offending fret very lightly and see if I get lucky. Otherwise it will need to be leveled.
 
Just being me, when I do eventually get a 339, I am sure I will redo the wiring harness. I have wired many 335's in the past so I do see this as a big on taking for myself. I prefer Bourns pots myself and would use a Switchcraft selector switch. All of these I already have on hand. Like I said though, that's just me.
 
Epiphones respond really well to upgrades IMHO...
Just be sure whatever you select will fit back in through the F-hole.
Bournes pots might be a squeeze.
 
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