Jackson SDX adventure and review!

[84sups]

of the guitar!!!!!!!!!!!

[vklobucar]

So I finally got around to swapping out all the crap electronics and install all new CTS and Switchcraft gear. I swapped out the original humbucker for a TB-4 that I wanted to try. Even installed a nice new Sprague Orange Drop cap inside.

Setting up this guitar brought to light a few painful quality issues. The CNC machine was programmed waay wrong!

I understand that you dont want to bother routing for a fully floating Floyd due to higher costs but the neck angle was so bad that it took a shim to get the Floyd to move at all! And thats only to dive bomb!

Fine you say? Many a great guitars have needed a shim now and again?

Problem there is that the pickups are all mounted really high and some of the mounting screws are nearly tightened to the max.

The tuners feel like crap because they are! The Floyd is really "creaky" when you fine tune and does not have the solid feel of even a Ping or a Gotoh.

Even the locking nut has this cheap feeling when you tighten it down.

This guitar feels like a sub standard So Cal and I am not impressed for what I paid for it. A few dollars more gets you a much better player by scoring an MIJ So Cal. That gives you much better pickups as well as hardware too.

Why they did not make a white So Cal with a side mounted jack is beyond me. It would have sold like crazy and still been a super high quality axe too.

I am sure that some of you folks out there probably love your SDX's but I am less than thrilled.

And that's just my two cents!

[vklobucar]

And it just sold no less than 10 minutes ago......

[mike_bax]

Yes, guilty of resurrecting and old thread. I have just picked up a used SDX.........................and its awful!!!!!!!

OK, thats a little harsh, its plays nicely, the "E" string slipping off the neck isn't a huge issue for me, but I think that is probably more down to my playing style rather than the build of the guitar. Inspecting it, I can see that with the rolled edges of the frets and neck, plus the wrong nut fitted, for some players, this will be a complete nightmare.

My big issue is the awful single coils, and the clear design flaw of a top mount Floyd, tilted back neck (to compensate for the top mount), and the impossibility of getting the single coils anywhere near the strings. (my belief is that pick-up springs were removed at the factory, so the pickups could be wound up a little higher)

That said, they are still awful pickups.

Like vklobucar, I am going to fix these issues over the next week or so.

1. Install an Oak Grigsby 5 way switch, and dump the cheap Chinese "Squier" type one that comes as standard fit
2. Install new CTS Pots and maybe a new tone capacitor, these may look good, and be full size, but probably came from the same source as the 5 way switch.
3. Install MIM Strat neck pickup
4. Install Wilkinson Hot Single in middle posistion
5. Plug the beast in and hope the nasty Indian build issues have gone away