I think I have settled on a color for the V. My friend’s daughter has a Squier Telecaster that is bright orange and I love it. Her guitar is orange with a white pickguard and chrome hardware. It looks like an orange creamsicle. As everyone knows, orange and black look really cool together so I think I’m going that direction.

A company named Createx makes a line of water based paints that can be used on guitars and purchased in small amounts. The have a some really cool metallic colors that can be used with their clear orange. The video below shows all of their candy colors applied on 4 different basecoats. I love the orange applied over a charcoal metallic basecoat.

Metallic orange has a cool 1980’s vibe with a cool “heavy metal” twist with the dark metallic undercoat. Slap some all black hardware on that and it will pop.

I think I also want to paint the black part of the headstock with the same orange metallic and add the same logo back except in black.

I picked up a new Floyd Rose tremolo and locking nut for the Kramer Vanguard. Bombs away! It seems like a drop in replacement for the original tremolo (that’s what I was hoping for).

A friend donated a pickup to me. It’s a wicked nasty Seymour Duncan Invader.

Seymour Duncan Invader humbucker

I measured the resistance of it and it’s 18k Ohms which is STUPID hot! It’s going to be a flamethrower.

I’ll prolly fill in the neck pickup rout with wood and run this as a single pickup guitar. Edit: I decided I’ll buy another one of these for the neck position.

I’ve always wanted a flying V guitar. My friend gave me an old one that he had laying around for a bunch of years.

This is the assembled guitar. My friend wanted to convert it to a hardtail and disassembled it and then lost interest.

Assuming all the parts he gave me are correct, it’s a Kramer Vangaurd. The serial number on the neckplate dates it to 1985-1986 according to vintagekramer.com. The included pickups are Schaller brand which jives with the date. The tuners are also Schaller and are stamped with “Made in W. Germany”. The tremolo is a licensed Floyd Rose.

This page has some info on Kramer Vangaurd

I want to put a cool flashy paint job on it and some newer parts to get it back into playing shape.

Kramer Vangaurd body

Kramer Vanguard neck pickup and neck pocket. TC was added by my friend.

Kramer Vanguard body back

Kramer Vanguard neck with hockey stick headstock

Kramer Vanguard hockey stick headstock with logo

Kramer Vanguard headstock back

Kramer Vanguard neckjoint crack?

Kramer Vanguard neck heel

Kramer Vanguard neck plate and truss rod cover

Kramer Vanguard front of Schaller pickups

Kramer Vanguard back of Schaller pickups

Kramer Vanguard pots

Kramer Vanguard Floyd Rose tremolo

Kramer Vanguard Floyd Rose tremolo

Kramer Vanguard Schaller tuners