Starcaster/ Mooncaster project doomed before it's started?

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Kieran

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Hey everyone,

New to the forum but seems to be a very informative and inclusive community.

I’ve wanted to build a guitar or customise an off the shelf guitar for years so looking for some advice as I have zero experience in this field. Just a casual player with very little knowledge of the inner workings of guitar building but with a design in mind that I would really like to run with.

I like Starcasters but never owned one. I am an Ibanez man mainly due to the necks that I have found to be most comfortable for my child-like hands. I’ve tried other necks over the years but just always found Ibanez to be the most comfortable. So my first thought was a Mooncaster and a wizard profile Warmoth neck combo as the base for the project. But after reading that the Mooncaster is not actually semi-hollow like it’s Fender/ Squire counterpart, I am not sure how to proceed.

I think I read on another forum that Warmoth necks are not compatible with official Starcaster bodies. Am I to understand that there is no work-around then? Are there any other methods in which I could use a true semi-hollow body and wizard profile (or similar) neck as the base for my build?

Any advice to get this project off the ground would be appreciated.
 
I read the same thing - that the neck pockets are incompatible because the starcaster has no overhang at the 22nd fret. But if you are a talented woodworker, there's always a workaround. If it were me I'd make a piece of maple to go into the resulting 'hole' beyond the 21's fret, stain it to match the body, then bolt up the warmoth neck. Might have to shim it as well, but it's certainly doable. I would not glue it in there just so you could reverse it later.

You have to love those wide-range pickups though... substituting humbuckers would require some kind of adapter ring (or something).
 
Welcome to the forum.

The Starcaster and Mooncaster are indeed different.

See at link below areas of incompatibility.
  • Starcaster® - 22 fret neck with no fretboard overhang

Will it fit my Guitar Body?

warmoth.com warmoth.com

Warmoth necks fit a more traditional Fender spec, which is based on what were originally 21 fret necks, and the 22nd fret is accomodated on an overhang. A Starcaster neck or body with a Warmoth 22 fret or Mooncaster style body are incompatible.

A Mooncaster is a hollow body but routed out with a separate top as a construction method rather than laminated etc pieced together.


Perhaps putting the construction method aside a Mooncaster with a Wizard profile neck will be remarkably close to what you want to achieve.
 
It is the starcaster neck that is incompatible, as far as I know, the starcaster neck is only compatible with the starcaster body, won't fit on a fender stratocaster, I could be wrong and there may be something it works with but I don't think so.
 
@teleme01 a Starcaster neck is incompatible with most Stratocaster neck pockets, but it may work with some Strat models which have a 22 fret neck with no fretboard overhang. These are listed at areas of incompatibility at the link I provided earlier.

stratamania said:

Will it fit my Guitar Body?

warmoth.com warmoth.com
Click to expand...

However, it will not help the OP as no Fender Strat neck comes in a Wizard / Ibanez like profile.
 
Everyone's input here is much appreciated!

The question of tone between a chambered and semi-hollow is minimal at best and high subjective to personal taste. Although the project will now cost more, purchasing a mooncaster body and neck may indeed be the best option.
 
I’d consider it heavily chambered. This is the same thing Rickenbacker uses for 330s, 360s, etc. It is NOT a hollow body or semi hollow body. Both of those build techniques require the use of sides, a back and a top: ala an acoustic. The only difference in them is a semi has yet another piece, a center block, glued to the back. The top may or may not be attached to the center block.
 
TBurst Std said:
I’d consider it heavily chambered. This is the same thing Rickenbacker uses for 330s, 360s, etc. It is NOT a hollow body or semi hollow body. Both of those build techniques require the use of sides, a back and a top: ala an acoustic. The only difference in them is a semi has yet another piece, a center block, glued to the back. The top may or may not be attached to the center block.
Click to expand...

I see what you mean, and there are traditional hollow and semi-hollow construction techniques, as you mention. Though it is of course a different technique than those more traditional techniques, nonetheless, routing large chambers is what Warmoth call a hollow body. Both result in hollowness inside the bodies. PRS also calls the guitars they make with a similar construction semi-hollow.

Diverse ways of achieving something that ends up as being hollow.
 
there is also the carved out Gibson 336 ... and I am thinking the blueshawk, is also carved out. they don't vibrate like a 335, a solid carved out has its own unique tone with I think results in more sustain than the semi and less than the solid body. Jmo
 
Apropos of the Blues Hawk, years ago I played a night hawk, and that was a great guitar. In my memory the neck pup was like a dimarzio vintage neck mini humbucker and the bridge was like a JB. Can't remember the middle. I know the pups on the blueshawk are different, p90ish. For that, I like the railhammer nueovo 90 neck and the heavy 90 bridge.
 
Rick said:
Apropos of the Blues Hawk, years ago I played a night hawk, and that was a great guitar. In my memory the neck pup was like a dimarzio vintage neck mini humbucker and the bridge was like a JB. Can't remember the middle. I know the pups on the blueshawk are different, p90ish. For that, I like the railhammer nueovo 90 neck and the heavy 90 bridge.
Click to expand...
IMG_5168(2).jpg
Just like "Lil' Ricky"
 
stratamania said:
I see what you mean, and there are traditional hollow and semi-hollow construction techniques, as you mention. Though it is of course a different technique than those more traditional techniques, nonetheless, routing large chambers is what Warmoth call a hollow body. Both result in hollowness inside the bodies. PRS also calls the guitars they make with a similar construction semi-hollow.

Diverse ways of achieving something that ends up as being hollow.
Click to expand...
The resulting product sounds quite different. As an owner of multiple hollow, semi hollow, heavy chambered and chambered guitars.
 
TBurst Std said:
The resulting product sounds quite different. As an owner of multiple hollow, semi hollow, heavy chambered and chambered guitars.
Click to expand...

Undoubtedly, there is likely to be a difference in sound, but I am only mentioning what Warmoth, and other manufacturers, call them. Hollow, at the end of the day, is a word being applied to things that are hollow.
 
Kieran, how good are you with tools?
Any good at DIY?
Any good at faffing about with cars or motorcycles?
If you have any practical skills at all building a guitar is not beyond you.
If you don't know which end of a soldering iron gets hot or how to use a chisel just go and buy a ready built guitar.
Or learn the hard way - that works too!
 
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