{"id":2629,"date":"2026-07-08T08:18:01","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T07:18:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=2629"},"modified":"2026-07-08T08:18:01","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T07:18:01","slug":"prs-inspired-guitar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/prs-inspired-guitar\/","title":{"rendered":"PRS Inspired Guitar"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

I have long desired a PRS guitar. They have an elegant aesthetic and sophisticated construction. This comes at a price of course.<\/p>\r\n

\"PRS<\/a>
PRS Like Guitar<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

Unless you find a cheap used guitar and use it as a modification platform, like I did.<\/p>\r\n

This is a well trodden route for Stratocaster type guitars. Cheap copies are readily available (Well, unless Fenders recent law suits prevail !). There is a thriving after market in replacement and upgrade parts. Unfortunately PRS Copies and spares are harder to come by. However, if you can source the parts,\u00a0 a clean up, suitable upgrades and a setup can still produce excellent results.<\/p>\r\n

\"Dirty<\/a>
Dirty Donor Guitar<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

I got lucky when I bought this for just \u00a335 from a charity shop. Filthy, but complete and with only minor cosmetic damage. It’s quite a looker, especially if the light catches it and brings out the body patterning.<\/p>\r\n

As best I can tell, It’s a lose copy of a PRS SE range guitar. Full mahogany construction with a set neck. 25 inch scales and 24 frets. The tune-o-matic bridge and tailpiece are deviations from the usual PRS practice of using their own trem’ or wraparound bridge. To keep the lawyers at bay it has a different shape headstock and the “bird” inlays are conspicuous by their absence.<\/p>\r\n

Technical Assessment<\/h1>\r\n

First impressions are excellent. However, a good close inspection is in order to confirm the viability of any potentially expensive upgrades.<\/p>\r\n

The play test was a real surprise. I found an old e-string for it. Tuned up and played. Wow. Nice low action. No buzzes. even the intonation was spot on. I was able to play fast and accurately. I’m thinking someone was here before me. It clearly didn’t leave the factory this good.<\/p>\r\n

\"Bodywork<\/a>
Bodywork Chip<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

The bodywork is very tidy. Just one significant chip which reveals the mahogany body below. It’s on the edge, so isn’t even visible from the front. I’ll probably fill and polish this at some point. No hurry. It’s “Road Rash”, character. That aside, fit and finish is excellent.<\/p>\r\n

\"Truss<\/a>
Truss Rod<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

The neck is straight and level with no sign of twist. It looks to have a tiny amount of relief (confirmed with a straight edge) I was surprised to find that the truss rod was actually lose. Nipping it up and adding 1\/4 turn reduced the relief to barely visible. It plays even better now. I’ll come back to this later when it has fresh strings. The important thing for now is knowing that the adjustment mechanism works well.<\/p>\r\n

\"Nice<\/a>
Nice Frets<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

Frets look to be in excellent condition. There is evidence of some light levelling being done, but done well with crown and polishing to finish. The nut is well fitted and cut. bridge height and intonation is spot on. The tuning keys are ever so slightly glitchy but I was able to tune up easily, and it stayed that way.<\/p>\r\n

\"Original<\/a>
Original Pickup<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

Woodwork is looking good. The electrics however tell a different story. The pickups are disappointing. Ceramic humbuckers with high resistance (12.8K) coil. I would expect a nice hot output. These are insipid and uninspiring. Rusty pole pieces do not inspire confidence. They’ll have to go.<\/p>\r\n

\"Damaged<\/a>
Damaged switch and it’s replacement<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

The controls are also rather cheap and nasty. The selector switch is actually falling apart. I’ll need to add a push pull pot for coil tap. That only leaves the volume pot salvageable. Nope. Replace the lot.<\/p>\r\n

To conclude: I have a good solid physical platform to fix up. Woodwork and finish are very good. The neck and frets are very good. Hardware looks adequate. The electrics are in a bad way.<\/p>\r\n

Electrical Repairs<\/h1>\r\n

To keep costs down I’m looking for 2nd hand pickups. Luck struck again when I quickly found exactly what I needed on Facebook Marketplace.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n

\"PRS<\/a>
PRS 85\/15 Pickup set<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

A set of original PRS 85\/15 guitar pickups, removed from a PRS SE Custom 24. Just \u00a350 for the pair. These are a massive improvement and lend themselves to coil tap.<\/p>\r\n

\"Poor<\/a>
Poor fit neck pickup<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

The bridge pickup installed with ease. The neck pickup however, refused to sit level. I figured out that the back plate was bigger than the original pickups and was fouling against the cavity.<\/p>\r\n

\"Chisel<\/a>
Chisel out pickup cavity<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

It was clear I would need to enlarge the cavity. A router with a suitable template would be the usual approach here. Unfortunately the set neck, which is not removable, would make this very difficult. Hand tools it is then. Don’t try this at home unless you are very confident of your woodworking skills.<\/p>\r\n

[Correctly fitted neck pickup]<\/p>\r\n

\"Correctly<\/a>
Correctly fitted PRS Neck pickup<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

The pickup now sits well in the mounting ring and floats on it’s springs, allowing a full range of adjustment.<\/p>\r\n

\"Pre<\/a>
Pre fabricate the wiring<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

Most of the necessary parts were found in my spares box, except the push-pull pot. I cut out a piece of cardboard to match the control cavity so I could do most of the soldering outside the guitar.<\/p>\r\n

I referred to the PRS SE24wiring diagram on their website. You’ll need this. The neck and bridge pickups are voiced differently and use different resistors for the partial tap, so it matters how you wire up. PRS use their own wire colour scheme, so generic wiring diagrams will be of limited use. A push pull switch is used to do a partial coil tap for single coil like sounds.<\/p>\r\n

\"Controls<\/a>
Controls in shielded cavity<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

It is not usually necessary to shield the control cavity for a humbucker equipped guitar. These can be coil tapped though? I’ve got the electrics out anyway and a roll of copper tape to hand. Rude not to do it when you have the chance. A fiddly job, but a worthwhile precaution.<\/p>\r\n

Finishing Touches<\/h1>\r\n

A good clean up with a slightly damp cloth followed by a polish with Dunlop guitar polish brought the finish up beautifully. The fingerboard responded very well to a few applications of lemon oil.<\/p>\r\n

\"New<\/a>
New Wilkinson tuners<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

I’ve got a nice set of Wilkinson tuners left over from another project which were calling to me. Fitting them sorted out the slight glitchyness that I had noticed. Like night and day. A great improvement.<\/p>\r\n

\"Headstock<\/a>
Headstock inlay<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

On the other side of the headstock was another problem. The original logo had come away (maybe I helped it). It was a hideous thing and I think it distracted from what the guitar now is, after many hours of expert attention and upgrades. The gap left was filled with an oval of mahogany which i treated with lemon oil to echo the finish on the fretboard.<\/p>\r\n

Setup<\/h1>\r\n

At some point in it’s life this guitar has clearly been on the bench of a good tech. The setup is already absolutely on the money and the frets are a delight. All I did was a slight tweak of the truss rod and a quick fret polish. The only other adjustment required was to adjust the height of the new pickups.<\/p>\r\n

Playing<\/h1>\r\n

This guitar is a pleasure to play. The action is fantastic, largely due to the unknown tech who kissed it before it was mine. The PRS pickups provide delightful tone and responsiveness. The partial split available from the pull pot provides very useable additional sounds.<\/p>\r\n

\"Finished<\/a>
Finished Guitar<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

It is a smart looking instrument, particularly when the light is right and you see the flame in the finish. It’s not a PRS, but it’s a lovely guitar which captures much of the essence. For an overall outlay of only about \u00a3100, it’s a keeper.<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have long desired a PRS guitar. They have an elegant aesthetic and sophisticated construction. This comes at a price of course. Unless you find a cheap used guitar and use it as a modification platform, like I did.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-guitar","category-makes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2629"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2671,"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2629\/revisions\/2671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wiredwood.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}