This guitar was made for Ed by Kramer. Aluminum 12 string neck, with the standard strings tuned at the headstock, and lighter strings tuned at the body. Classic kramer beak headstock neck for the 6 string neck with an early Rockinger tremolo. This guitar was delivered to Eddie during the Hide Your Sheep tour of 1982, and he performed "Cathedral" and "Secrets" with it.
Making a replica of this guitar is not easy. It was almost a one-of-a-kind body, the aluminum necks are hard to get a hold of without paying close to $1000 and removing it from it's original guitar, and the Rockinger bridges are very rare. Considering all those difficulties, I decided that I wasn't going to worry about being very accurate, so why not see if I could make one from all the leftover parts I had hanging around? So here is what I did:
I took two separate bodies and cut them each in half
I picked these bodies up for less than $25 at a flea market
I glued the 2 half-bodies together by drilling out holes and connecting the 2 bodies with wooden dowels
Shaping and filling old routes
Rather than sanding the old paint off, I actually used a milling machine to thin out the body to reduce the weight
Adding the tuner plate
Adding the long horn
Roughly filled, ready for grain filling and sanding
Stripes masked
Yellow coat
Peeling mask
After wet sanding
Here is a breakdown of parts used:
Some leftover Schaller style tuners for the 6 neck
The Floyd locking nut is not historically correct, but it and the string tree were leftover parts that I already had
This set of Washburn tuners was also a leftover set. If I remember correctly, I got this set from the modded Charvel Star that I picked up to make my Star/Dano hybrid replica
Couldn't find a 12 string nut to fit this 6 string neck, so I had to cut my own nut with my bandsaw. I made the headstock bridge from an old trem claw
This 12 string bridge is not historically accurate, but I couldn't find a Rockinger version
Another leftover tuner set
Hit the jackpot on this find! A real Rockinger trem for $80 on Ebay! The Floyd posts aren't historically accurate (the original had the 6 pivot screws) But it's close enough for me!
Ya, those are matching Squier neckplates that I had laying around. And the rear cavity covers? Yup, I cut up a leftover pickguard to get the shapes I needed
The neck is NOT aluminum. I just couldn't find an affordable aluminum neck, so I bought a paddlehead, and painted it metallic aluminum. If I ever find an affordable aluminum neck, I will be replacing this one.
I had to buy the LP knobs, but all the switches, pots, and other electronics were leftover parts as well. The bridge pup on the 6 side is a generic "brown sound" style pickup that was leftover from one of the kits I previously bought, and I paid $12 on Ebay for the old Kramer stock neck pup. The pickups on the 12 side are both GFS Classic II Alnico 2's for a nice "woody" sound, from guitarfetish.com
What an exciting project this was! I really enjoyed using up some of my leftover parts and modifying them to work! It's the first time I've made or setup a 12 string guitar, and trial and error during the setup took quite some time. The setup still isn't perfect, but it's close enough to sound good:
