The rebirth of a Pearl Lavender Silhouette

This guitar found its way from Canada to Germany in 2007. During his research due to inconsistent information regarding the S/N, which did not match the guitar, Azilla received the information from Dan at EBMM Customer Service that

• the pearl lavender body must be from the short period that color was offered: 1999-2002
• the neck according to the stock Grover locking tuners must be from the mid-nineties
• the neckplate with the s/n: 88818 is from a trans-purple Axis from 1996

Axilla took this beauty bastard to a luthier where it got new pickups, pickguard and knobs, the neck also got new frets.

Back to the future (… Guess you guys aren’t ready for that yet…but your kids are gonna love it …):

A few days after last Christmas I saw an ad of this guitar and shortly afterwards I bought this particular guitar from someone also from Bavaria, to whom Azilla has probably sold this beauty in the meantime. I live 600km away, but have a friend who lives just 5 minutes away from the current seller. Because I had no opportunity to pick it up, another friend brought the guitar to me in January due to a visit in Bavaria. So far so good.

The Silo had probably some strange days and was unfortunately in a bad condition. All metal parts were corroded and rusty, almost all screws were not tighten, the neck was shimmed at the end by a plastic :confused: stripe and sat loosely in the neck pocket (which is a bit too wide, so the strings didn’t run straight. The neck was completely stained and very dirty, but straight, and the truss rod was movable. Some frets showed wear, but the general condition of the frets was ok. The height of the strings was unusual and unsuitable for each other, because the saddles were badly adjusted.
Probably beer or other tasty stuff had poured over the guitar. The whole guitar was greasy and filthy. The body has a small bump on the upper contour, but fortunately no other damage or scratches.

So I dismantled the silo down to the last screw, polished all metal parts from the tuners over the tremolo (and all saddles and saddle srews …) and the output plate finally to the end pin and replaced nearly all screws. First I thought that I would need new trem bolts, but polishing by rotating in a cordless screwdriver 😀 gives great results (praise polishing paste!). The body was cleaned and polished also, as well as the pickguard, pickup covers and knobs. The electrics were checked.
It took several hours to clean the very stained neck carefully with steel wool and grinding pads. Some frets were levelled and re-crowned and all frets got rounded up fret ends. The neck angle is perfect without shim, the tremolo lies on the body and the saddle height was and is well adjustable. Don’t understand why it was shimmed before. But a 0.5mm shim on the upper neck pocket side was needed to set the neck snuggly and tight. The saddle needed a small adjustment at 2 grooves.

After polishing all frets and after oiling and waxing the back the neck feels very comfortable and again as usual of Ernie Ball. All metal parts are shiny, the body looks pretty good and the neck is again in a respectable condition.
It’s a beauty gain and plays very well! She fits perfectly with my other guitars. And my wife wants nail polish in the same color :).

The replaced Kinman pickups are not bad, but unfortunately, they don’t quite match my tonal expectations, I like more the stock DiMarzio’s or – even better – a Cutlass pickup configuration.
The original pickups, the pickguard and the buttons were not part of the purchase. If someone sells a Silhouette Special or Cutlass SSS pickup set (with Silent Circuit) please let me know. I am thinking about to rebuild this guitar to the original configuration.

Does anyone know if I get a 4/2 Schaller locking tuner set by the german distributor (or elsewhere)? I do not like the handling of the Grover locking tuners where you have to screw the top nut.

I hope you enjoyed the story of the rebirth of this unique guitar in that rare colour I like.
Rolf