This is my son's Yamaha Pacifica. He's had it since he was about 9 years old - 15 years ago - and it was his very first guitar. Although he has  a few other nice guitars as well these days, he plays the old Pacifica a lot and it still plays very well. For a budget guitar costing less than £200 it's quite outstanding, the build quality is excellent with cavity routings that are really neat and tidy and would actually put a lot of more expensive higher spec guitars to shame. The wood is of a decent grade & looks like Alder,  this one is bog standard except for a Seymour Duncan "Little '59" pick up fitted at the neck a few years ago. It is starting to look a bit tired and worn though.

He's been wanting a guitar with EMG DG active pick-ups fitted for some time (big Floyd fan) and the original plan was to pick up a Strat body and build one around that. He then suggested we use the old Pacifica as a donor guitar, which I thought was probably a better plan - the Pacifica gets a new lease of life and he gets his EMG pick-ups........so work has commenced.

The original guitar before starting work

There are a few knocks and dents but overall it's not too bad for a 15 year old

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First job is to mark out the battery compartment. Most people who fit EMG active pick-ups just shove the battery into the control cavity space, but doing that makes it a pain in the 'A' to replace as the strings have to be slackened off and the scratchplate removed to get at it.

The final shape / size of the battery compartment will be cut with a router
but to remove most of the wood a flat bottom Forstener bit is used

The finished battery box, the lid will be recessed to fit flush with the guitar body

The EMG's have one more tone control than the Pacifica set up, there's also a small pre amp to fit in there so the original controls cavity has had to be extended. This was done freehand with the big router, it may look a bit wobbly but I've tried to remove as little wood as possible so the lumps and bumps are just to make some relief for the bits that need to be fitted in.

 I've also started to flat off the wood for refinishing, and the ends of the horns have been cut back (compare them with pics of the original at the top) and re-shaped to more resemble the Strat. The Pacifica is slightly more "waisted" than the Strat but it looks better for having the long horns cut back

Fitting he Wilkinson VSVG vintage style trem / bridge unit. The saddle positions on this bridge are different to the original Pacifica one and would have altered the scale length by about 3/16". To set it in the right place I've had to rout the bridge cavity and place the trem unit further forward, this pic shows it now in it's correct position   

Strung up to test that the intonation can be set ok with the bridge in it's new position. This shot shows the quality of the original Yamaha routings - they really are neat for a budget guitar and everything lines up perfectly.

The EMG pick-ups as bought, they come complete with the scratchplate, but as the Pacifica is being finished in black
with a black scratchplate all the gubbins shown here will be dismantled and fitted to a new scratchplate. The Fender Strat
one shown above wouldn't have fitted too well to the Pacifica anyway.

The template being made for the new pick up mounting board /scratchplate. From this a Daler board mock up plate will be made then from that the final one cut from laminated plastic. The shape here was drawn in Corel Draw, printed off and cut out 

 Should have used a bigger piece of paper really!  

Cutting the single coil pick-up slots in the new pickguard.  The masking tape is to protect the 
surface of the plastic while I'm working on it, it marls very easily
   

Once the 18mm holes are bored at each end it's quite easy to cut out the middle to give 
the approximate pick-up shape. The final finishing is done by hand.

Final pickguard shape cut, all that needs doing to it now is for the edges to be bevelled. 
I'll do that later on and move on with the body now to get it stained.

The body stained black, this was done with a superb stain that I ordered
 from the 'States a few years ago - you just can't get stuff like this in the UK

I've tried my best to photograph the stained / oiled finish but it doesn't really how
up well, it's more of a satin finish than it appears in the photos

When you get right up to it the grain of the wood can just be seen beneath the stain. This is the result of about 4 weeks of 
constant oiling and wiping, the finishing oil gradually builds to a lovely satin sheen. 

The new scratchplate fitted up with the EMG pick-ups

To be continued..........

       
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