As I posted on "Other Guitars" forum, I'm going to upgrade the Yamaha Pacifica 112 I just got. She was very dirty and grimy, with rust on the bridge, funk on neck, a little corrosion on the frets, and scratchy pots. I didn't think I was going to have any time to work on her until next week, but I have managed to find some time to begin the process of making this baby sing.

So far, I've managed to strip her down and clean her good. I've found that Murphy's Oil Soap and a toothbrush will do a good job of generally cleaning the rosewood fretboard. After getting most of the crud off, I took some 0000 steel wool and lightly went over the fretboard and frets to get the rest of the funk and corrosion off. There are some grooves in the frets, but overall, they're not too bad. Apparently, this guitar got played A LOT.

I've started lining the pickup & electronics cavity with copper tape, but I've got to wait on a sheet of copper foil to come in so that I can finish that part and start putting her back together. I metered the original pups and they were N-2.75, M-2.75 & B-12.76. The GFS Texas Specials I've got read N-5.36, M-5.38 & N-9.48. The Yamaha has an HSS layout, but I've got SSS GFS pups. I had hoped the tortoiseshell pickguard I had would fit, but it's not even close, so I'll have to stay with the Yamaha pickguard and the HSS layout. The humbucker is a fairly high output (12.76) and sounded pretty good when I tried her out, so I'm planning on keeping it and swapping the other 2 pups for the GFS's. The pots also need swapping, so when I get my foil in and can finish lining the cavity and the pickguard and I wind this part up.

I went ahead and swapped out the stock bridge/trem out with the one I got from GFS that has the large solid steel block. It barely cleared the back cover, so I ground off just a tiny bit. This should help with the sustain and overall tone, so I'm excited about this. The bridge was a dead-on drop-in, with no grinding or adjustments, so that was nice!

Anyway, I'll try to keep you guys posted as to the progress and I'll try to get some pics of the process posted. I'm thinking/hoping this baby will be a keeper. (Or, as strum defined "keeper" - at least a month or two ) Wish me luck guys!