Masonite Strat
(or Bass box-bass – It’s an instrument of tongue-twistering)
Dimensions
| Height | 105cm |
| Width: | 29cm |
| Depth: | 9cm” |
| weight: | 3.9 Kg |
| Scale Length | 25.5in.(64.8cm) |
| No. of strings | 6 |
build
Hold on a minute – you didn’t make this guitar/ Strictly no, but when anyone talks of building an electric guitar, the usually mean they assemble a bunch of parts from new or second hand sources. I put a fair few hours in this as my original intention was to refinish it, upgrade the pickups and sell it. However, when I had sanded back to the body through the 17 or so layers of paint that is usually customary on new Strat copies, I found a surprise. Initially, when I saw the first signs of the body, I was intrigued; The wood was a dark brown colour – not the light wood I was expecting (usually agathis, basswood or alder ). I gently sanded more, my breath had quickened, It looks like oak or something, no couldn’t be, unheard of. I sanded more and eventually revealed enough to try to identify the wood.
The body is basically a kitchen counter top
Only it wasn’t wood, well, it sort of was. It was wood fibre, held together by glue/resin. It was thick hardboard, masonite. One popular make of guitar in the 60s the Danelectro was wade of masonite but that was deigned around a hollow body. They did this because it was cheap and and also gave a great tone. I kept this guitar because, I like it and think it sounds great. Some guitar afficionados talk at length about guitar tone and selection hardwood for bodies and necks but I would argue the difference is minimal. I think weight is what seems to give a guitar a better tone. Custom weights are designed to clip onto guitars to achieve just this. Anyways I kept the body and swapped the parts out, Made a scratch plate from the most apt material that I could – some flyboard I had salvaged elsewhere, changed the hardware and shaped the headstock – you can probably tell.
Playability
The action on this guitar is set quite high
