What would you do? Opinions please.

[GASMAN]

I've got two Hollow T's, one with the piezo bridge------one with regular bridge. I'd like to have these bridges swapped, then will most likely sell the one without the powerbridge.

My question--------would you send both guitars to Anderson to have this done, or take them to a qualified tech to do the work? I know the procedure isn't exactly rocket science, yet I want to be sure the work is top notch.

Thanks.

[theatomicjeff]

Look at it this way: you spend a lot of money for those guitars. If it were me, I'd send it to the crew who knows those guitars the best, regardless of the shipping charges.

[GASMAN]

Yes, I agree. Plus, I'd like to be able to tell the buyer that the work was done by Anderson.

Not really concerned about the cost, however I'd be curious to know what the labor figure would be to have this done.

Tom?

[pipedwho]

If you don't have a local shop that you KNOW you can trust, then I'd send them back to Anderson for the transplant.

The problem with random techs is that you don't know how good they are until they've stuffed up your guitar(s). ;)

Another option would be if Tom and co could recommend someone local to you that they know would do a good job.

I have quite a bit of experience with dodgy guitar techs over the last 15 years. So much so, that I now just spend the time to do as much myself as I can. :)

Here's a recent story:

I had finally found a place where the guy did fantastic work - you could see examples of his work in all the guitars that other people had given him to restore. And from his current backlog of work - most purely from referrals - it was obvious he was trusted by many 'big names'.

Anyway, I took one of my cheaper guitars there that needed some serious fret work. The guitar came back better than when it was new! I was as happy as a pig in mud. I took another 4 guitars there over the next 12 months for similar fret work and each came back playing better than they'd ever played. Frets were polished to a chrome like sheen, the ends were as smooth as butter, and there was no buzz with super low action. Yes, a pig in mud was I! This guy was brilliant!

Fast forward another 12 months and I finally feel the need to take my beloved Drop Top in for some fret work. I turn up a week later to pick up the guitar and he calls over one of his junior techs to show me to my guitar. Huh? :eek: Junior techs? I don't remember this. Hmm.

Anyway, I couldn't wait to see and play my Andy!. The junior tech opened the guitar case, picked up the guitar, plugged it in, tuned it up again, played a cool little riff, and then handed it to me.

I immediately kick it over to the neck pickup - my favourite mellowing out position - and nothing comes out. I check the cables, tap the guitar, tap the switches, but still no sound. I try the other two pickups - no problems there. But, my neck pickup is dead. So I give them the benefit of the doubt and just assume that it must have died in transit - I mean, it had been a few weeks since I played with that pickup and maybe sweat had been eating away at the enamel for the past few years and it had just died a natural death.

While looking at the neck pickup I noticed what looked like a screwdriver gouge in the beautiful purple finish near the neck pocket - right below where the truss rod adjustment screw sits. It was pretty obvious that someone had gone to adjust the truss rod and slipped with the screwdriver. Well, I was getting a bit pissed off at this point, so I pointed out the gouge to the guy. Who, to his credit, performed a 'super glue' repair that ended up looking pretty good.

At that point, I was in a hurry to get out of there before I got a parking fine.

When I get home, I realise that the guitar setup is nowhere near the quality of previous setups - the fretwork wasn't bad, but the action and intonation were a bit off and one of the strings still buzzed a bit. Now, I was too scared to take my Andy back there, so I spent the next 4 hours setting it up, polishing the frets and buffing out any evidence of the 'super glue' repair. Once I was done I had chrome like frets and no trace of paint damage. I was very happy with the results! :)

Once I'd done that I remembered that I didn't have a working neck pickup, so I got on the phone and ordered a couple of the new SF1/SF1R pickups. One as a neck position replacement and the second to match it in the middle position.

Fast forward another month when the pickups finally arrived (along with my new Cobra S - YAY! I love that guitar too - but that's nothing to do with this story. :D)

After replacing the pickups (and BTW these SF pickups are AWESOME!!), I decided to pull apart the broken pickup. What do I see? You guessed it, I see a massive fresh looking screwdriver gouge underneath the cloth wrapping. Not dissimilar to the gouge that I had seen in the paintwork. :rolleyes: Hmm.

Anyway, I'd already learned my lesson, and I was VERY happy with my Drop Top at this point. So I decided not to follow it up - I haven't since bothered calling the place and complaining.

The moral of the story is: if you care about your guitar ABSOLUTELY MAKE SURE that you know exactly which guy is going to be doing the work. All shops will suffer growing pains as they put on new staff, but you need to make sure that you're not going to be one of the early test subjects.

I'll still use them again, but you'd better believe that I'll make sure I meet with the exact person that is going to do the work first.

This could have turned out much worse. I was just fortunate that none of the problems were irreversible. Relicing is for Fender and Gibson, not for Anderson. :cool:

[pipedwho]

Holy $#!7 that was a long post! :eek:

[michaelomiya]

Look at it this way: you spend a lot of money for those guitars. If it were me, I'd send it to the crew who knows those guitars the best, regardless of the shipping charges.

+1000 on what Jeff said:cool: There isn't anyone (that I can think of) that could customize or maintain my Andy's better than the crew in Newbury Park.

[tom]

our problem right now is that bruce is on the road most of the time for the next several months so we are trying not to take in "elective" mods.
how old is the one that is going to get the powerbridge?

[GASMAN]

Thanks for sending me the price info Tom. I'll be in touch with you should I decide to send them in right away. I have other piezo equipped guitars, so no------it's nothing I would need imediately.

One other question for Tom. Do you have a preference for communicating this type of info? Should I use this forum, or would you prefer I use the Anderson e-mail ------which I found on your site?

Thanks all for your advice. You pretty much confirmed my "gut feeling". I'd want the work done by the TAG crew.

[tom]

i'm totally fine with any info being here on the forum. i check in almost every time i sit down at my desk, so i shouldn't be long in responses. one nice thing about public communications is that someone else may have the same question and i'll only have to answer it once:)
if you have specific questions about a work in process here, it's probably better private because i may have to go looking for it.