Grizzly Guitar Kits

[Jarrod Nelson]

Does anyone have any experience with the Grizzly guitar kits? Specifically the strat kit.

I know papa Grizz is quite a guitar builder, so I assume the kits are good, but I'd love to hear anyone's experience.

Thanks,
Jarrod

[Glen Gunderson]

I'll preface this by saying that I have never built, nor even seen in person, a Grizzly guitar kit. However, I am familiar with building guitars and have heard reliable opinions on other similar electric kits that have a similar price point.

Given the price, I would guess that with a little work the body and neck are decent, but the hardware and electronics are junk. I'll reiterate that I have no direct experience with these kits, but corners simply had to be cut somewhere to get the price that low, and I'd assume that the hardware and electronics are similar to what you'd find on a $200-$300 knock off brand guitar. Alder bodies and maple necks are fairly simple and cheap to make with a CNC so I don't think they'd need to seriously compromise the quality of those to keep the price down and they can still be used as part of a good sounding guitar. A cheap body with excellent hardware and pickups can make a great guitar.

However, given that the strat kit is only $150, even if you only used the body, neck, pickguard, and some minor hardware you'd still be coming out way ahead (you'd pay that for just the body from other suppliers though they are likely of higher quality). Electric guitars (especially ones designed by Leo Fender) are by their nature almost entirely modular. So even if you build the Grizzly kit with stock parts, you could easily replace them with better parts later if you find that certain aspects of it are lacking.

It could turn out to be an excellent project as long as you understand that you're not getting top of the line for $150. What you are getting is a servicable kit that could provide an excellent starting point to getting your feet wet building guitars.

[Alan DuBoff]

The kits are probably ok, but I have never seen one. I have sold thousands of guitars in my life, and have seen the entire gammet of products produced in Japan during the 80s.

Most Grizzly product is manufactured in China, and China has gotten quite good at building violins over the past 10 years, to the point they dominate the entry level lines.

However, the best instruments are not coming out of China in bulk, but there are good ones when a craftsman spends the time on them, and they cost more $$$s. But the best instruments in bulk such as electric guitars have come out of Japan over the recent years. I don't know where the guitar kits are produced and/or if Grizzly makes them themself. Not anything against China, I like Chinese food! For all I know, Grizzly could make their kits in the states, or buy them from another manufacturer. But seeing how Grizzly is in the business of bridging the gap between China and America that would surprise me. Like all of their products (how they appear to me;-), they probably have the absolute best price for the functionality, with acceptable quality. This type of product is what can be marketed to the masses (or at leas appeals to them), so Grizzly seems to be doing well.

Why not just buy the neck and built the body yourself? It's only a hunk of wood, Bo Diddly played a square guitar. Scott Spencer had a thread here on building an electric guitar, I would reccomend considering what he did, buy a neck, build the body and get the electronics and tuners. Even if you need to get someone to setup the guitar for you (i.e., cutting the nut for instance) it would be fun to build the body, IMO.

[Vaughn McMillan]

...It could turn out to be an excellent project as long as you understand that you're not getting top of the line for $150. What you are getting is a servicable kit that could provide an excellent starting point to getting your feet wet building guitars.

I've also not built any Griz kits, but I completely agree. I also agree with Glen's points about the hardware and electronics likely not being top of the line at this price point, but on the other hand, I've got one or two low-end guitars that sound good enough with cheap electronics that I've not spent the money to hot rod them out. (My $200 Oscar Schmidt would have given my Gibson ES-335 a decent run for its money...before the 335 was stolen.)

I'm interested in the higher-end Grizzly solid body guitar kits, but as Glen said, a low-cost body and neck with upgraded guts (if necessary) can equal a real nice guitar.

[scott spencer]

Hi Jarrod - If you glanced through the thread that Alan linked to about my guitar project, you'll realize that I'm really green so I won't offer any in depth advice. If you choose to by just a neck and/or body and buy the electronics, Ebay has pickups and parts for sale and auction by the truck load...seems every few minutes a set of pickups go for less than half of retail....some used, some new. Some of those guys swap pickups like we do saw blades! I just bought a pair of Ibanez Affinity humbuckers for $13.50 plus s/h. The loaded Strat pick guard from Ebay with 3 single pick ups, pick guard, wired with pots and switch was ~ $21. Most of the pickups are interchangeable. Worth checking out.

Good luck...hope you do it!

[Ed Snyder]

You might want to try stewmac.com This is a great source for parts and also has kits. They also have a great catalog

Ed

[Jarrod Nelson]

Great points everyone. Thanks for the replies.

I also was figuring if I wasn't happy with the pickups, tuners, etc, I could upgrade them. As long as the neck fits the body properly and the intonation is ok.

I would like to try my hand at building the body, but I think this would be a good first step.

Spencer - I read through your thread on the solid body you made. That is one sweet axe! I really like the body style. Did you come up with that design? The pickguard really brings everything together. Beautiful.

Thanks again for the advice.

[scott spencer]

... Did you come up with that design? The pickguard really brings everything together. Beautiful.

Yeah, the shape was an original. I looked at alot of pics to decide what I liked and didn't, then made several sketches, followed by a couple of templates until I got one I liked.

[Thomas Herview]

I have purchased an built one of the kits Grizzly has to offer. I built the western style, steel string guitar. It turned out very nice and my Daughter is still using it. She was a music major in college.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I'm with Allen 'cept I'll go one further.
Don't buy anything pre made.
Just make your own.


My first guitar was a copy of a Martin 12 string.
It was my first effort at making a guitar. I bought two books on the subject and I still have that 12 string today.

All I owned for tools at the time was a craftsman TS (with factory fences), a pile of rasps a couple of old planes a few chisels I had dragged from various rubbish piles, and some really horrible power tools from K-mart.

It's way easier than it seems. Once you do it you will see.

[Sam Chambers]

Jarrod:

I don't have any experience with the Grizzly kits either. But I want to echo what some others have said - Consider building your own from scratch. I have a video that Dan Erlewine did, probably 20 years ago, where he copied a vintage Stratocaster. There were very few specialized tools used, and the overall process did not seem overly complicated to me, as long as you are accurate when laying out the instrument. One of these days, I'm going to build one of my own from scratch.

[Dan Jurta]

Don't know anything about guitars or the kits, but just wanted to point out that the September issue of Woodcraft Magazine has 2 articles about guitar making and guitar kits. Doesn't address the Grizzly kit, but might be an interesting read to you.

[Jarrod Nelson]

Ok, you all sold me. I've been running over guitar designs in my head the last couple days. I think I'll order a tele neck and hardware and make the body. Probably cover it with figured maple veneer in a blue dye.

It should be an interesting project. Thanks for all the advice.

[Alan DuBoff]

Ok, you all sold me. I've been running over guitar designs in my head the last couple days. I think I'll order a tele neck and hardware and make the body. Probably cover it with figured maple veneer in a blue dye.

It should be an interesting project. Thanks for all the advice.

Good luck with your project, I think you'll learn that guitars are not rocket science. It's all down to the mathmatics of placing your bridge, and ensuring that the 12th fret is the midpoint between the nut and bridge. Since the bridge pieces adjust seperately on most electric guitars, it really allows for even a musician to build a guitar. Most folks here are much more familiar with woodworking to the point that it should be child's play once you have done it once.

When I lived in Japan during the 80s, I used to trade vintage guitars for music product, mostly Yamaha DX7s (I literally lived off of those for several years, funding my travels around Asia), and other equipment like guitar parts (necks, bodies, pickups, tuners, etc...). Get some decent Gotohs or similar tuners, I'm sure those are still available.

Prior to moving to Japan in '82, me and my partner used to buy all the 2nds from Grover Jackson, for both Jackson and Charvel guitars, the difference being that Jacksons were neck through body like Gibsons and Charvels were bolt on like Fenders. (Wayne Charvel was already out of the business by then). I am not bragging, I've been out of the music biz for years (more than 20), but the real hard work in building an electric guitar is making the neck, the frets need to be measured precisely. Once you have the neck/frets, it's only a matter of bolting it on the body. Funny that Grover Jackson sold the Charvel line to Japan, they bought it for the name, literally. I believe those are made in Japan (most likely Matsumoto prefecture, but I don't know who makes what anymore).

If you were building a neck through body guitar, like a Les Paul, that's a little more complicated as you would need to glue it up with the neck attached to the body, and would need to line it up so the truss rod could adjust it. IOW, if you had the neck glued up way out of wack, the truss rod wouldn't be able to get the action on the strings low enough, or worse, high enough to prevent the strings from buzzng. With bolt on as your doing, you should be fine as long as the area where the neck bolts to the neck is somewhat level. Trust me, anyone that can turn a router on who frequents this forum could almost do that with their eyes closed. I don't reccomend using your router with your eyes close though (I want to make that clear! ). I bet I could cut one out by hand, using chisels, and as long as it was bolted on securely, it would play fine.

Keep us posted on your progress, you'll love your guitar, and proudly show it off to your friends who will also be envious of you for building it yourself. That's braggin' rights!

[John Pollman]

Oh my gosh, that is so weird. I haven't been here in a week or so and just made a post about a guitar my son and I built and just finished last night. It's a Saga Telecaster kit that I picked up for only $79. I got it through onlineguitar.com. It was only like $103 shipped. I know it's not going to be top quality but the body and neck seemed decent. I know that the electronics aren't that great but my son has only been playing about eight months and is only ten. He's been talking about he and I building a guitar from scratch. (Brian May of Queen is his absolute IDOL and he built one with his father when he was a kid) I told him that it takes a lot of time and experience to build a guitar from scratch but maybe we'll tackle it down the road a bit. For now, this kit was a good place to start. We finished it last night and I've got to tell you that it sounds better than I thought it would. My son came up with the paint scheme and colors. We painted it up and I like the way it came out. I figured that down the road if we feel like it we can replace the components with better quality stuff. Overall though it does sound pretty good and I think it looks decent for a first attempt. Here are some pics....