Hofner 449 project, FINALLY!!!!

Update: The seller did answer and said I can return the pickup, so maybe I can raise my bid again.

Thing is. I get nothing on the multimeter, but I did get a sound once just touching the wires directly to a cable. It's strange. Maybe for 20 bones I should just keep it and try later. They need it back by this week for a refund because of the holidays, and I really don't have the time tomorrow.

Multimeter works with other pickups. :shrug:
 
Oh I also tapped down a few frets that were slightly rocking and polished them all. Should play pretty well once I file the bridge down just a tad. It was playable with the bridge at its lowest setting with a couple of sitar type buzzes. We'll have to break out the Dremel tomorrow.
 
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Update: The seller did answer and said I can return the pickup, so maybe I can raise my bid again.

Thing is. I get nothing on the multimeter, but I did get a sound once just touching the wires directly to a cable. It's strange. Maybe for 20 bones I should just keep it and try later. They need it back by this week for a refund because of the holidays, and I really don't have the time tomorrow.

Multimeter works with other pickups. :shrug:

It's possible one of the wires has a break in it but, still is making contact when it's laying a certain way. Have you tried wiggling wires while ohm meter is hooked up? Sound just by touching wires to cable, are you saying there was a pop when you touched them or, you could do the tap poles with a screwdriver thing and it worked?
 
It's possible one of the wires has a break in it but, still is making contact when it's laying a certain way. Have you tried wiggling wires while ohm meter is hooked up? Sound just by touching wires to cable, are you saying there was a pop when you touched them or, you could do the tap poles with a screwdriver thing and it worked?
Screwdriver. So yeah, it was actually working. I'll fuck around with it and see if I can get it working. I've spent 20 bucks on worse projects.
 
Fuck eBay auctions.

How can it be that I was the only bidder twice for those pickups, only to have my "Maximum bid" outbid by 50 cents in the last second? No other bids to be seen. This time I counted down the last seconds on the auction with only my fist bid of 34,90 going. Max bid was 45. I counted down, certain I won, saw that bidding has ended with the message " You didn't win this one" with the sold price of 45,50. Last time my max was 40 and I checked 5 minutes prior and they sold for 40,50.

Something fishy is going on there.

I guess it's possible that someone is a master of the last second 50€ bid or something. Or it's a bot they set up to do it. But fuck that.

"Buy it now" Epiphone pickups it is....
 
Added a pickup yesterday and sorta DIYd a bracket for a floating pup. P90 housing fit right in there and it's housing a strat middle pickup I had already cut the ears off of. This way I only have to drill one small hole for the wires.

Pots are going to be placed like in the photo here, unless anyone can give me a really good reason why not to other than ergonomics.

I just think they look so much more vintage there.

Please don't mind the mess.

IMG_20251229_050305218_HDR.jpg


I totally ruined the first ebony pickguard trying to cut it for the pickup. I used a bigger drill bit to start which made the wood splinter off of the hole on the face of the guard. Luckily I have two more pieces.
 
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Added a pickup yesterday and sorta DIYd a bracket for a floating pup. P90 housing fit right in there and it's housing a strat middle pickup I had already cut the ears off of. This way I only have to drill one small hole for the wires.

Pots are going to be placed like in the photo here, unless anyone can give me a really good reason why not to other than ergonomics.

I just think they look so much more vintage there.

Please don't mind the mess.

View attachment 116063

I totally ruined the first ebony pickguard trying to cut it for the pickup. SED a bigger drill bit to start which made the wood splinter off of the hole on the face of the guard. Luckily I have two more pieces.
Looks great.

"Pots are going to be placed like in the photo here, unless anyone can give me a really good reason why not to other than ergonomics."

Maybe somebody else can comment on this, I don't know, I would just be worried. I'm thinking since this is like a new build, never had tone and volume pot so, you don't have the old tone and volume pots to put some fishing line on, which you will use to put the new tone and volume pots into the holes that you make. Because of that, I'm thinking, the closer to the F hole, the better.
 
Looks great.

"Pots are going to be placed like in the photo here, unless anyone can give me a really good reason why not to other than ergonomics."

Maybe somebody else can comment on this, I don't know, I would just be worried. I'm thinking since this is like a new build, never had tone and volume pot so, you don't have the old tone and volume pots to put some fishing line on, which you will use to put the new tone and volume pots into the holes that you make. Because of that, I'm thinking, the closer to the F hole, the better.
Clothes hanger to hole from F hole, attach the thread and pull back through. I built a 335 kit before, all good.
 
I've decided against the single pickup and am going back to the Epiphone Wild at P90s even though it's a lot more work and invasive. The single p90 was hard to get the right angle on and was sitting at an angle that would:

  1. Keep me from having great action (if I even can) due to its angle.
  2. Probably rattle against the body under hard playing without mounting it somehow.
 
And then there were two....

Lucked out finding some mounting screws that worked. Accidently threw the ones that came with the pickups away ......

Electronics will wait for a few days until I plan it out. Done for today.

Note to self: black wire is bridge.

IMG_20260105_143056690_HDR.jpg
 
Minus the pickguard, but I just spent a day and a half in the electronics which gave me a hassle and a half. Tried with solder less connectors that kept letting wires lose inside the body, and then an out Jack that refused to int fall back into the body. Then a bad buzz, then a faulty cable, now finally my Black star Fly used its last batteries before I could do a final check. I went back to it's big cousin and checked. She now sounds fabulous. A bit dark on the neck, but everything does on that amp, which is why I'm getting a new amp for my birthday. Anyways, all good now and looks great . Pickguard will make it fancy in the future.

1000049867.jpg
 
Oh and I had to break out my trusty whetstone that I use for fret leveling. Yesterday I finally got the action down low and the neck relief set, just to find that the frets were actually pretty bad without the action being away too high.
 
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