NGD: LTD F-207

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joshuallen

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This is my first 7 string. I've owned baritones in the past, but this is my first true 7. It's a decent guitar I received in trade. It's a basic LTD F-207, Korean made. It's got a few paint chips and scratches, but the cosmetic stuff is secondary to me. The neck feels good, if slightly thicker than I'm used to (and wider, obviously). The previous owner but a pair of Duncan Blackouts in it, and botched it all the way. He tried to ground the electronics to the inside of the electronics cavity (!!??). He said he was surprised at how noisy actives were, with a bad hiss. I thought that was weird, but when I opened it up and saw that it was improperly grounded, it made sense. He also claimed he rigged the 3-way to kill, so the neck wasn't hooked up. Since I use the neck almost exclusively, I knew I would have to fix that. When I cracked it open, all the wires were hooked it up, but it didn't work, so he knew he'd done something wrong, but had never bothered to fix it.

I decided after some playing around to redo the wiring from the ground up. There was tons of lead on both pup wires, so I cut them and started over. I removed the tone knob someone had added and inserted a killswitch into the circuit. I grounded it properly to the pot body and basically resoldered and taped all the bare wire (did I mention he had a mass of ground wire sitting exposed, loose, in the cavity?) except on the jack, which looked fine.

I put a sacrificial string on it to test and everything worked perfectly on the first test.

The only issue now is that it frets out a little in the upper registers. It could probably use a fret leveling. It works if I raise the action slightly. Can't decide if I should go for it or leave well enough alone. It's my only guitar at the moment.

7194_10200842579242151_1978735644_n_zpsab77ff04.jpg
 

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Mike

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If I had to go through all that I'd probably kick that guy in the face for being dumb. But congrats on the new piece and good job on the rewire. I'd probably just raise the action if I was you and call it a day.

Then mail that guy a package of hot bologna.
 

joshuallen

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It was all good. I would have at least partially redone the wiring anyway. I like a certain setup, you know? I was just happy the p'ups worked. If one had been bad, I might have been genuinely pissed.
 

Mike

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amen to that well HNGD enjoy!
 

Rotatous

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Congrats!

I love the F shape, I myself have an FB-200

I'd totally have one of these if it wasn't for the floyd
 

joshuallen

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I used to have an FB-200. Sold it to someone on sso, in fact.

I don't mind the FR. Takes a little futzing, but I like the way it feels for palm muting and I like the ability to fine tune. And it can always be blocked if I get sick of it. In general I like simpler. Doesn't someone make a FR lookalike hardtail bridge? Like on Mick Thompson's sig?
 

Tones

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Nice find. Hard to find these nowadays. I loved the look of it the LTD F400 in purple flamed veneer. If they made the 7 string version in that finish, I wouldn't mind owning that at all :) Enjoy the NGD!
 

joshuallen

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That'd be all right. Of course if you're super ambitious, I guess you could retop a 207 yourself, or make a body from scratch with a flame maple top. The most I could conceivably see doing to this is stripping the paint and maybe changing up the color, or even just sealing the wood (which I'm sure is ugly) with a natural finish. I'll probably just leave it. For a player guitar, I don't worry too much about the aesthetics of it.
 

studmiester7

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The previous owner is a dumbass lol. You got a killer find, though. The F model has always been my favorite body shape, but they've never made a 7 since the 207. They discontinued all of the high-end awesome F series guitars lol
 

joshuallen

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I ended up practicing my luthier skills (I'm building a guitar in my spare time) and leveled the frets. It turned out well. I basically followed the method of the guy from Crimson Guitars (who's got a lot of great videos on guitar building). It turned out great, and the guitar is now at the lowest action on the high end with no buzzing or fretting out.

I also ordered a Tremol-No after spending a couple hours futzing with the FR.

The Crimson Guitars video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBRude9l0Tg
 
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