EVH Frankenstrat - The Original Frankenstein Guitar

Starting off at Only $25,000.00 you too can have your very own EVH Frankenstein Replica equipped with every scratch, ding, and cigarette burn!

This red, black and white ash-body guitar has been put through an astounding aging process to replicate the original down to every last scratch, ding and cigarette burn. Fender craftsmen even scoured the land for 1971 quarters-just like the original Eddie at one time stuck under the original tremolo bridge-to mount near the Floyd Rose® Original tremolo bridge. The guitar features a Seymour Duncan® Custom Shop EVH® humbucking pickup, a single master volume knob (that says "Tone") mounted on a partial black pickguard identical to the original. Leaving no stone unturned, the guitar is complete with a non-functional three-way switch and single-coil pickup that occupy two of the three pickup routs.

EVH Eddie Van Halen Frankenstein Replica Electric Guitar Features:

• Body: Ash
• Neck: Maple bolt-on
• Tuning Machines: Schaller
• Fingerboard: Maple w/12" 16" compound radius
• Frets: 21 Jumbo (Dunlop® 6100)
• Bridge pickup: Seymour Duncan® Custom Shop EVH
• Middle pickup: None
• Neck pickup: Seymour Duncan® Custom Shop EVH
• Controls: Master Volume
• Bridge: Floyd Rose® Original Tremolo
• Pickup Switching: 3-way
• Hardware: Aged Chrome
• Strings: .009, .011, .016, .026, .036, .046
• Pickguard: One-ply black
• Scale Length: 25.5" (648 mm)
• Width at Nut: 1-5/8" (41.2 mm)

The New - EVH Wolfgang

The "Wolfgang", named after Eddie's son, starts off at around $2999.99 . All in all this is built like a tank to last!

EVH Wolfgang Electric Guitar Features:

• 1-1/2" basswood back
• 1-2" arched AA maple top
• Bolt-on quartersawn maple neck
• AA birdseye maple fingerboard
• 25-1/2" scale length
• Compound fingerboard radius 12-16"
• 22 vintage-size stainless steel frets
• Floyd Rose R2 locking nut
• 1-5/8" nut width
• Chrome hardware
• EVH-branded Gotoh tuners, chrome with pearloid buttons
• EVH-branded Floyd Rose locking tremolo
• EVH humbuckers (neck and bridge)
• 3-way pickup switch
• Master Volume and Tone Controls
• 2 Bourns low-friction pots 250k/500k
• SKB case with molded stripes
  
  

  Unique features:

• Hard mount pickups
• Magna Coatings paint
• 2 graphite neck reinforcement rods
• Schaller chrome string retainer
• EVH D-Tuna
• Square jack plate

Crazy J Player Guitar

Crazy J has officially brought me to Geek Tech Heaven! Player Piano meet Player Guitar.

Presenting: The Crazy J- guitar playing machine

The Crazy J is made up of mechanical parts, electronic components and software control.

The mechanical parts can be seen in the picture above and include a fingering module (on the left) and a plucking module (on the right).

Here is a close up of the plucker:

Here is a close up of the teflon picks that actually contact the strings, and the solenoids (top, pink and blue wires) that power them, via the pluck rod linkages (middle).

The fingering on the guitar is actuated by solenoids also (below), which connect to levers (above).

The "fingertips" that press the strings to the neck are seen close-up here, the springs that return the fingertips after a note is played are also visible:

This next picture shows the banks of solenoids that actuate the fingertips and the springs, which serve to damp the slapping of the solenoids (held by two nuts on threaded rod).

The control part of the Crazy J is a Motorola HC11 Micro-Controller. The output ports B and C of the HC11 connect directly to the Control Board shown below (ribbon cable on left of board). The control signal is sent through adressable latches (column of black chips) and then to the Power Boards (3 ribbon cables on right of board). Each signal line has an LED connected in parallel with it, so that the LED lights up when a signal is sent (yellow, green, red bulbs). This helps in debugging.

One of the two Power Boards for the fingering solenoids can be seen below. The blue potentiometers allow for adjustability and fine tuning of the power sent to each solenoid. The transistors see a lot of current and are therefore connected to heat sinks (metal bars in back). The connection to the solenoids is made via a 15 pin connector (back right of board).

The Power Board for the plucking solenoids is very similar to the fingering board. One difference is in the connection to switches, which act as hard stops for the plucker (brown connector with cable coming out, in middle of board, behind blue potentiometers).

The switches can be seen in this end-view of the Crazy J (small black tops touching levers between solenoid connections).

The positioning of the Power Boards in the black box below the guitar can be better seen in this picture:

The MIDI signal that comes into the HC11 connects in the right connector on the top end of the box, shown below. The power cord plugs in to the left of the MIDI cable, and the other end is plugged into any AC wall jack. The metal grate on the right covers the cooling fan.

And here is one more picture of the entire Crazy J.

Tom Morello's Rig

Tom's Gearbox

Whether in Audioslave, Rage or solo as The Nightwatchman, here's the gear Tom keeps close by:

GUITARS
“Arm the Homeless” Frankenstein guitar

The body is a Kramer Pacer that was routed so that the Floyd can go up and down. It contains EMG single coils in humbucker housing, Ibanez Edge Floyd Rose Tremolo, toggle switch, and a locking nut on a 22- fret Kramer neck.

1982 Black American Fender Telecaster “Sendero Luminoso”

“Whatever It Takes” custom Ibanez Galvador Acoustic
A nylon string acoustic guitar used during concerts as The Nightwatchman.

Ibanez Custom Talman
Three single coil pickups, an Ibanez Lo-Pro Edge Floyd Rose Tremolo, and the killswitch. He noticed that the guitar made a weird noise when the middle pickup was selected and the noise could be manipulated with the tone knob. Ibanez built him a new guitar with that internal noise.

AMPS + CABS
Marshall JCM 800 2205 50-watt head
Peavey 4x12 cabinet

PEDALBOARD

DigiTech Whammy WH-1 (original)

DOD FX40b Equalizer

Jim Dunlop Crybaby Wah
Boss DD-2 Digital Delay
Boss TR-2 Tremolo
MXR Block Phase 90 Phaser
Ibanez DFL Flanger
Voodoo Labs Pedal Power 2

HTML clipboard

Drums by ZZ Top

The pix below are not in chronological order and in no way is this an exhaustive list of all their Drums. But it's still nice to see how the pros do it. IMHO Frank Beard is one of the most Under-rated Drummers ever.

Exhaust Pipe Drums

The RECYCLER TOUR

The Year: 1983 "ELIMINATOR"