I have finally achieved peak One-ness

[garrett]

Have I finally reached the end of the mods to my SE One? It took nearly five years, but I think so.

The guitar already came to me as a beater with a couple mods of questionable quality. My original idea was to do some electronics mods on the cheap, but things got out of hand. Way out of hand.

 

[garrett]

2018
Hacked out some wood to make more room for a second pot
Modded the pickup rout and fitted a Brent Mason Treble pickup, Jim (bodia) shall live forever as a legend for scoring the pickup and passing it to me
Core PRS volume, push/pull CTS tone for taps; 0.033uF cap
Lampshades (of course)
Schaller strap locks
Grover mini locking tuners, with buttons from an SE Custom 7-String

 

[garrett]

2019
MannMade USA metric studs
Changed electronics to Core PRS volume, mini toggle for taps, CTS tone with 0.01uF cap
SE locking tuners

Also, this...

 

[garrett]

2020
Stainless steel refret
New properly fitting bone nut

 

[garrett]

The guitar then made it three whole years with no mods, but the urge was building as a few little things bugged me.

Until 2023...

PRS adjustable stoptail, thanks to Mark
Changed electonics to Mojotone CTS push/pull for volume and taps, Mojotone CTS tone, 0.01uF cap, Pure Tone jack
Ditched the treble bleed. Interestingly, it wasn't needed anymore. Even a cap that measured 192pF was way too much and sounded terrible.
Black football jack w/black screws. Stole this idea from Mark. Looks so slick.
Custom pickguard, five-ply black/cream, deletes the pickguard screw by the high E string that I'd sometimes hit with my knuckle.

 

[Moondog Wily]

Looks fantastic and I am sure it sounds incredible! Congrats on completing the journey!!

 

[garrett]

Just for fun, the evolution of the wiring...


Version 1: Volume, Push/Pull Tone

Version 2: Volume, Mini-toggle, Tone

Version 3: Push/Pull Volume, Tone

 

[Black Plaid]

That looks like a Paul's pickup, I didn't know that shape got used in anything other than Paul's / ME V!

Looks amazing.

 

[deepender]

The guitar then made it three whole years with no mods, but the urge was building as a few little things bugged me.

Until 2023...

PRS adjustable stoptail, thanks to Mark
Changed electonics to Mojotone CTS push/pull for volume and taps, Mojotone CTS tone, 0.01uF cap, Pure Tone jack
Ditched the treble bleed. Interestingly, it wasn't needed anymore. Even a cap that measured 192pF was way too much and sounded terrible.
Black football jack w/black screws. Stole this idea from Mark. Looks so slick.
Custom pickguard, five-ply black/cream, deletes the pickguard screw by the high E string that I'd sometimes hit with my knuckle.

Nice.
Huge improvement

 

[Lewguitar]

Wow! I'll bet it sounds great,

I've been looking for a good deal on a Korina one of those.

I'd put a great P90 in it and use it for slide.

 

[Chuck_P]

I would rather see one of these posts than ten "I bought two more MEs and a Private Stock" posts. Fantastic.

 

[garrett]

That looks like a Paul's pickup, I didn't know that shape got used in anything other than Paul's / ME V!

Looks amazing.

The form factor was originally used for the neck pickup of the 408 model. Then Paul used it for both positions of his guitar. It then ended up in neck/bridge of the Brent Mason signature and then into a few other models over time.

The SE One is supposed to look like this:

But that narrow humbucker design almost fits into a P90 rout. When Hans here on the forum pioneered this mod several years ago, he had PTC install the pickup and they plugged the original rout and recut with the appropriate template.

If you're a go-getter you can get it done with a drill, a 3/8" dowel, and some wood glue.

The almost part of the fit is the mounting tabs of the pickup are slightly too long. So you can either rout a little bit of length in the body, or what I did is use a hack saw to trim the pickup

 

[bodia]

Man, Garrett, that guitar is so bad-a$$. I am happy to have played a part in making it so rad!

 

[László]

Man, that's some serious dedication and effort!

Very cool.

 

[toothace]

Love all of this!!

 

[Lewguitar]

I would rather see one of these posts than ten "I bought two more MEs and a Private Stock" posts. Fantastic.

Yep. I like the "I made it my own" posts.

Those SE Ones are cool guitars.

I wonder what one with a Gold Foil neck pickup and a great P90 bridge pickup would sound like?

Great for rootsy Americana kinda stuff I'd think.

 

[dmatthews]

My Korina SE One bows to the complete awesomeness (as do I).
Monster mods, congrats!

 

[aamefford]

Nice! I like the duration and focus over the long term that went into this.

But are you really “done?”

 

[garrett]

Yep. I like the "I made it my own" posts.

Those SE Ones are cool guitars.

I wonder what one with a Gold Foil neck pickup and a great P90 bridge pickup would sound like?

Great for rootsy Americana kinda stuff I'd think.

Hans put a Tele neck pickup in one, and a slanted lipstick pickup in another. At least one of those also got a Bigsby. Talk about a cool Americana guitar!

 

[DreamTheaterRules]

Nice! I like the duration and focus over the long term that went into this.

But are you really “done?”

Zenmaster @ScottR once said "a donut without a hole, is a danish. On your deathbed, you will achieve peak one-ness."

So going by that, I'm thinking that there could be more changes coming. Or breakfast