NGD 1993 Rhoads Professional STD

[VoiceX3]

So I thought I scored a good deal when I found this baby online with a hard case for under $300 shipped. The description said great condition but it is a 26 year old pointy guitar which only offered 1 pic and you could see the guitar needed cleaning. I pulled the trigger knowing that these were built alongside the PRO's of the same era only without all the bells and whistles when it came to hardware, binding and inlays. (we'll get back to this later).
When the box arrived I was in for quite a surprise. Check the link below and go thru the pics I set it to public anyone can view.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ogUpHAGZ3avH3LLg8QWjJ5jycPVVmOe1

This guitar is in amazing condition for a 26 year old pointy guitar. The finish looks great, the frets are in fantastic shape. Very few surface swirls/scratches and the points while not perfect look better than most 5/10 year old guitars I see on the used rack. The case is HEAVY and SOLID!! Better than the cases my Mustaine Pro or Warrior Pro came in and you can see all the case candy was still in there. Now on to the elephant in the room...how does it compare to the Pros. Well this guitar either had the pots and switch changed or it came with switchcraft stuff from the factory. The back plate and front cavity cover are indeed metal like the USA's and not plastic. The tuners are the same ones my Warrior Pro and Mustaine Pro came with. The rosewood board is very nice and the dot inlays are real mother of pearl. The trem is not a JT590 but I gotta say, although I'm not really a trem guy I have found myself using it quite a bit just to see how good tuning stability is and it's surprisingly good. Actually MUCH better than the Floyd Rose Special on my Adrian Smith X series and very close to the OFR on my USA Soloist. The J50 pickup works great in the neck position but I'll be swapping the J50 bridge pickup with a Dragonfire Crusader I took as part of a trade for a volume pedal. If that doesn't work out it'll get a JB or maybe the new Mustaine passive thrash pickup.

Build quality on this guitar is 100% on par with the Pros if you don't mind the less flashy look and swapping a bridge pickup. I can't believe these sell cheaper than a new X Series!!!!!!!!

[z1n]

Very nice find and price! Thing is in amazing condition for its age. Those Takeuchi TRS trems are not that bad but I usually swap them out for an original FR. They will fit but the body route is slanted but it sounds like yours is staying in tune so I wouldn't bother

[Number Of The Priest]

Congrats on the score! That owner's manual looks to be practically new!

I can't believe these sell cheaper than a new X Series!!!!!!!!

This is why the E-fraid forum is dominated by inexpensive Japanese Jacksons and Charvels. I rarely see current Mexican/Indonesian Pro/X Series guitars this low. I've found more American-made Jacksons and Charvels that offer better bang for the buck than the current imports!

[VoiceX3]

Congrats on the score! That owner's manual looks to be practically new!



This is why the E-fraid forum is dominated by inexpensive Japanese Jacksons and Charvels. I rarely see current Mexican/Indonesian Pro/X Series guitars this low. I've found more American-made Jacksons and Charvels that offer better bang for the buck than the current imports!

I don't think the previous owner ever even looked at the manual...lol

I'm not so down on the newer imports. My Monarkh Pro is an amazing guitar that I got new for the right price. Retail list is ridiculous on these, but you can find them at the right price if you look around. I also have a X Series KV7, KVXT and Adrian Smith X series that I got used on the cheap and they are very good players.

Are they on par with this guitar? Not quite, but these guitars were discontinued with the Pros of the time as well because they were taking too big a bite out of the USA's....I'm sure that wasn't a coincidence.

[toejam]

That's pretty awesome, Jim! Nice score. Those JT-580LP trems are pretty decent, too.

[Number Of The Priest]

I'm definitely not disparaging the current Indonesian/Mexican imports. I myself bought a 2015 SL3X for USD$213 that I thought was good (https://www.jcfonline.com/threads/15...n-SL3X-Soloist). There are bargains in every tier of guitar. There just don't seem to be many bargains in the current import tier, for whatever unknown reasons, which puzzles me.

[VoiceX3]

So, I put the Dragonfire Crusader (Invader Clone sorta) in the bridge of the guitar today and holy crap this thing absolutely rips now. Sounds very Invader-ish but seems to clean up much better with rolling back the volume than the Duncan. The J50 neck pickup is great for cleans and blusey lead stuff. I think I found the right combo!