Carvin Bolt Kit

I built this guitar from the Carvin Bolt Kit in 1999. My goal was to build a guitar that I couldn't find at a reasonable price at the time...a hardtail, Strat-like, guitar with a Humbucker/Single Coil/Humbucker configuration with a versatile sound. I decided the best, least expensive, way to do this was to go with the Carvin Bolt kit.

Of course, Carvin doesn't offer this combo either, so I bought a H/S/H pickguard from Warmoth, pickups from Guitar Center, and switches from Stew-Mac. I ordered the kit with the basic stock 3 single coil configuration. The only Carvin 'extras' I ordered was black hardware and straplocks.

When I fortunately did a 'test fitting' before applying the finish I discovered a problem. The Carvin routing is sort of a "semi-swimming-pool" that looks like it would easily take any combination of humbuckers and single coils. Looks are deceiving. The 'divider arms' that extend into the pickup cavity prevent anything but a H/S/S or S/S/S configuration, at least with a standard shaped pickguard. So, I had to get out the Dremel and take the 'arms' out. This gave the guitar a larger than usual 'swimming pool' and ended up giving the guitar a touch of semi-hollow or chambered tone.

Once I did this, I was ready to start finishing the guitar. I did the standard, Carvin recommended, tung oil finish on the neck. For the body, I'd decided on a mahogany stain although it came out looking more like walnut (several people have asked if the body was walnut). I spent about 2 weeks working on this part of it, doing a coat a night, letting it dry overnight, and doing another one the next day. I was pleased overall with the way the stain came out although there were some parts where the stain didn't take evenly in spite of my best efforts. I found out later that the Home Depot standard oil based stains would do this, particularly in colder weather. So, if I ever do another one, I'll either buy pre-finished or go with a stain from Stew-Mac.

Once I got the guitar finished, put together and setup (I did need to make a few tweaks to the nut to accommodate 11's) it played nicely. The neck is very different from a vintage Strat...it's very flat and since it's ebony, it feels pretty hard.

Here's a closeup of the pickguard.

Carvin Bolt Kit - Close Up

Here's what the back of the guitar looks like. I was happier with the way the finish came out here than on the front of the guitar.

Carvin Bolt Kit - Back View

Electronics and Modifications

The original pickup configuration was a Seymour Duncan Jazz on the neck, a tappable Seymour Duncan QuarterPound in the middle, and a Seymour Duncan StagMag for the bridge. Instead of the standard 5-way pickup selector, I put in a 3-way toggle mini-switch for each pickup. This allowed 26 different sounds (27 if you count all off). It also had master volume and tone knobs with 500k pots.

On the pickguard group I built, I liked the SD Jazz, but I didn't care for the StagMag or the Quarter Pound in the middle. I ran across a good deal on a Seymour Duncan Seth Lover at a Guitar Center Close-Out sale ($15!) and put it in the bridge and I put one of the Carvin AP11s in the middle. I've liked this combo much better although only the Jazz was splitable after this mod. This configuration is shown in the picture above.

Also, I did try it with the stock pickguard group for a few months. The stock Carvin 500K pots with the 3 single coils were too bright for my taste so I replaced them with 250k pots and got more Strat-like results. I also tried out the SD QuarterPound in the bridge and it did better in this position than in between two humbuckers.

In October of 2005, I did another pickup swap on this guitar. Although I liked the Seth Lover in the bridge, I had been wanting something hotter in there. So I decided go over the top and buy a GFS Crusader. This pickup is a high output one similar to the SD Invader although the voicing is somewhat different, particularly in the upper-mid range. I also decided to swap out the original tone cap for a .022uf Sprague Orange Drop cap. Swapping it out went smoothly. I removed the Seth Lover and put it aside since it was going in my Ibanez Artcore TM71 after I was done here. Since the Crusader is splitable I hooked it up to use the bridge mini-toggle. Soundwise, the Crusader has a really throaty sound but also has a nice bit of upper mid clairity that produces a good sound when clean. With distortion, it sounds like your typical high output passive HB. However, it doesn't get muddy, something I was concerned about. Split, it sounds a lot like a SD Quarter Pound, sort of a semi-P90-ish sound, although it's fairly noisy like this.

Sounds

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

Download Clip

This sound clip features 6 different clips that highlight different pickup configurations and sounds. All of them were done using my Tech21 Sansamp GT-2.

The first clip is of the bridge pickup, the Seth Lover, and is sort of a surf-metal rhythm pattern. It uses the 'British' setting on the Sansamp along with a slapback delay on the DOD Echo FX.

The second clip also uses the bridge pickup. It's a blues solo clip done with the 'Tweed' setting and the same slapback delay.

Clip #3, an open chord pattern, features the middle pickup, a Carvin AP-11. It was done with the Tweed setting also with less drive and adds in the DOD VibroThang.

The fourth clip was done with the neck Jazz pickup. It's a metal-ish rhythm pattern with the SansAmp set on '11' with the 'California' setting with full drive and no delay.

Clip #5 is also the neck pickup except this time it's split. The clip is a blues noodle with the SansAmp in 'Tweed' again with a little slapback delay.

The final clip is a Jazz-Blues clip using the 'Tweed' setting with almost no drive along with my standard slapback delay and the VibroThang providing a shimmering effect.

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

Download Clip

This clip features two different clips that demostrate the GFS Crusader pickup. The first is a metal-jazz type jam track with the full pickup using a metal-ish setting on the DigiTech RP-350. The second, using the pickup split, is a roots-rock jam track.

My Performances on SoundClick that Feature This Guitar

— Discuss this guitar on my blog