I haven’t started doing anything yet, but regarding the How, I got a rather good idea. From measurements, it was already clear that two additional Burns Tri-Sonic pickups would fit into the Mini May’s body. Here‘s a layout that should work quite nicely; the red lines are the additional routings that have to be done to the body. Still missing depth information, but otherwise complete. Continue reading »
Billy Nvlay’s sonic capabilities should match Brian Mays “Red Special” relatively closely. But the Red Special has 24 frets and a 24″ scale length, whereas the Stratocaster kit has 21 frets and a 25.5″ scale length. Maybe I’m overcomplicating things, but I think that the pickups should be in similar positions below the strings to produce a similar result. So how might that work? Continue reading »
If you ever searched for “Brian May Guitar” on Aliexpress, you might have noticed the strange text “Bill Nvlay” that’s part of most descriptions. It meant quite a lot of head scratching until I found out what that’s supposed to mean: on the head of the guitars, there’s a faked “Brian May” signature. For the first copyist, the signature must have looked like “bill nvlay”, and since then it’s used that way 🙂
Since I just acquired a Stratocaster DIY kit without any hardware, I’ll outfit it with the circuit of Brian May’s Red Special – three Burns Tri-Sonic pickups in series, each of which can be switched in or out of phase. And since the Chinese text amuses me endlessly, I’ll call it “Billy Nvlay”. But I won’t apply Dr. May’s faked signature 🙂 Continue reading »