So, after ten years I got the itch to play guitar again, I picked up a vintage Morris MD-502 dreadnought in pcpark Makati square and played a couple of familiar tunes. It called to me, it was like my hands were measured for the dimensions when they made this guitar's neck, it just felt so nice to play it. I felt like I had owned it before in another time haha..
I then proceeded to check the body, neck, frets, machine heads and everything in between, a fair assessment would be 91% mint condition, there was only a total of 6 dings on the body and they were something I could fix myself. The finish was unbelievably shiny and mint for a guitar of this age. It had a solid spruce top with mahogany back and sides and sported a nato neck. Really didn't need much convincing at that point haha.. And so, the guitarist and DIY'er in me opened the wallet and forked over a fair amount for this lovely vintage guitar.
And then the DIY story begins!
I decided to update this baby just because she felt so special to me. I had never done any previous modification or repair work on guitars but I'm an avid DIY hobbyist with years of experience in building. Plus it doesn't hurt to come from Don Bosco Makati where music and technical training are a part of the everyday scene, except that my shop was Industrial Drafting hahaha!!! But really, the education and technical training from that school is still something that I apply everyday. Really great! Here we go!
Adding a pickup:Firstly, I looked up some info on acoustic pickups and found some interesting reads on both piezo and magnetic types. I spent a lot of enjoyable hours on youtube watching demos for both. I finally decided to go with internal mounted piezo pickups because I like the vibration activated concept, seemed appropriate for an acoustic guitar, and it was mounted and hidden away underneath the soundboard away from view.
I did my homework on the simple construction concept of piezo pickups and also found nice examples online (youtube is a very good source). Piezos are fairly easy to work with, you just have to be careful when soldering the white side because it burns easily. You'll find them locally and very nicely priced and available at Deeco Quiapo, 3rd floor, ask for transducers.
I have built a lot of cables for my other hobby which is hifi audio and chose to use, based on experience, 100% double shielded, fpe insulated, very low capacitance and high bandwidth belden brilliance series, small gauge solid core coaxial cable to wire it up.
And finally, I sourced out a nicely priced and attractive, modern-looking, very shiny endpin jack locally from guitar salon, great guys there and nice selection of DIY parts!
Here's what my piezo pickup looks like fully assembled:
Here is the inside of the body looking to the back of the MD-502:
Here are the piezos mounted with blu-tack below the bridge:
And this is the mounted endpin jack:
DIY Saddle and NutSecond on my list was to upgrade these two parts, the saddle and the nut. I read that these two components contribute significantly to a guitar's overall tone signature and performance.
I can attest to that claim. Upgrading these two parts brought forth so much richness to the tone, beautiful harmonics, overlapping textures and so much more sustain and openness to the sound.
My cousins and some friends who heard this guitar before the mods were so pleasantly surprised at the change, they said it was like unwrapping the real tone of the guitar for the first time. I really have to agree with that, it really is a worthy and true upgrade wether you'd like to DIY it or have a luthier do it for you.
Now some pictures, a DIY nut and saddle isn't an easy project, and that's the truth.. But I've been DIY'ing stuff from cars to cues and almost everything in between. I love doing it! And this was a worthy challenge haha!!:
The old nut was made of bone, previous owner must have upgraded this long ago, oh well time to let the old dog get the bone (nut)
:
Next, carefully cleaned the slot of old adhesive:
G10I chose to use G10, I make a lot of knife scales for a client so I had these. They are, without a doubt, one of the best modern-day synthetics that have a multitude of applications for anything and everything. They possess superb vibration transfer properties so I thought it would be perfect to try out, but it is not a material that's easy to cut and tool. Fair warning, it'll kill your files and sanding discs fairly quick when you work with it as much as I do. The masochist/guitarist builder in me says...Perfect!
Here I've cut a small blank to size with the original nut:
Now it's time to size it to the slot:
Took my time to file it down to size and finished of with ascending grits of sandpaper:
Compared it often to the old nut to make sure I was on track:
Final shaping and sanding along with initial slotting using some thin files and sandpaper, and a light buffing to bring out the G10 pattern:
Nuts!:
G10 nut mounted and strung up:
Moving on to the saddle, the stock saddle was just a cheap strip of soft plastic, really bad. Here, I've cut out a similarly dimensioned blank from the same G10 material of the nut:
I used some small files and sandpaper to shape the saddle. When I finished making everything I strung up the guitar, pulled out my chromatic tuner and did the compensation on the saddle. Here's the new saddle:
Here's another shot:
Nice and snug fit, strung up. I also changed to black colored d'andrea bridge pins to highlight the orange saddle, the original cream colored bridge pins clashed with it. I might upgrade these to brass or carbon fiber rods when I find the time to make them. But I'm happy for now.
The two of them together:
Love 'em!
A New PickguardThe original black pickguard looked old and dated, I wanted to change the asthetics to give this guitar a more modern look. I chose to use a semi-transparent sheet of polyethylene so that it also hid the discoloration of the finish left by the old pickguard, but would still be transparent enough to put the rosette into full view, I like that:
Another view:
Upgraded and updated Morris MD-502 DreadnoughtThe guitar sounds so nice and alive now! I can play it straight as an acoustic or plug it into an equalizer and amplifier combo and have even more fun with friends! I love the subtle but noticeable facelift and so does everyone else who's seen and played it Enjoy the pics. Happy building! -Les