Modifying the Squier VM Jaguar

[@garrison2574]

I like the phillip mcknight and the troggly's guitar show music lol

[@alexrcowan]

We must all be cheapskates and edit our movies on iMovie haha!

[@vainestlamb5917]

@@alexrcowan hey why not

[@dondraper3898]

Beautiful work (as always)! I just rewired my VM Mustang, which was the first time I ever successfully used a soldering iron. I was thinking about routing it for a humbucker but I wasn't sure how to go about it. I'm glad I saw this video cuz I don't think I'm ready for that yet

[@alexrcowan]

Cheers Don! Congrats on the soldering, nothing more satisfying than a circuit actually working! Yeah we were all there, a tech should be able to do the routing for you if you still want a humbucker in your guitar

[@suhailcouto1832]

Loved the series on the mustang, excited to see more

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks Suhail, hope you enjoy this one!

[@Spaceman-jo5mz]

BRILLIANT wiring set up! It just makes sense - very practical

[@manelalentorn]

This is a master piece… that’s how it should come from Fender!! Nice job!!

[@meltinoverdrive1592]

I own a VM jag and I've been looking to mod it and this is just what I was looking for thank you brother brilliant

[@alexrcowan]

Awesome! Can't recommend the mods enough, hope you enjoy it!

[@grungekid1539]

That looks fun, I've never modded a guitar before, I only have stripped off an old dean strat that i have owned for about 4 years

[@alexrcowan]

It's super fun! Fair warning, once you start modding guitars, it's hard to stop!

[@josephwytkamp5114]

I loved this video, this may sound a bit child ish, but all the guitars are so fricken cool!! can't wait for the demonstration!!!

[@alexrcowan]

Just uploaded!

[@josephwytkamp5114]

Yea, im watching it right now, lol

[@deasename5839]

Finally got one of these!! Now I'm going to change it.the pups make the guitwr

[@gregwolk5240]

Nice video man! I’m excited to see how this will sound. These mods will make this good guitar into a great one!

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks my man! Uploading demo vid now!

[@CaponeMedia]

Couldnt wait for this series!

[@alexrcowan]

Haha sorry for the wait. Had to wait to find the guitar, get parts etc! I'm very happy with it though

[@CaponeMedia]

alexrcowan yeah it looks great! Im looking to get one of my own soon, great video!

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks man, hope this video will be of some use if you decide to mod yours!

[@prozac4506]

Awesome video!! Thanks for sharing that. The finished guitar looks like a work of art. Bet it sounds great!

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks man, Yep it sounds awesome! Used it to record stuff yesterday in fact!

[@oolllliieeee3849]

Great video dude, really fun and interesting to watch! Can’t wait for more 🙂

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks man, really glad you digged it!

[@Wabin22]

Nice updates dude! But am I the only one who actually likes to split humbuckers using the tone or volume knob? So that it gradually splits the humbucker, and you get even more sound diversity out of it :)

[@CharlesWillisBonsai]

Seymour Duncan calls it a "spin -a-split." Sounds interesting, but I've never tried it. I like the series/parallel option personally

[@gagedoyle8626]

I ordered a WM Mustang for my birthday a while back that I was going to try and mod myself. I ordered the guitar off of Amazon and when it got here, the bridge bushings were UNDER THE VIBRATO PLATE. COMPLETELY UNDER THE VIBRATO PLAYED AND UNUSABLE. I ordered a replacement and was planning on shipping back the original one I got. Once I got my replacement, I tried routing it for a full sized Super Distortion with the correct router bit, but I couldn't afford a router so I used a Dremel instead. NEVER, EVER USE A DREMEL. I goofed up the entire thing after hours upon hours of work and still couldn't fit the Super Distortion in there, and I had messed up the pickguard for good and I had given up at fitting a full sized humbucker in there at that point and decided to just take the Hot Rails out of my Bullet Strat and place it in there instead. I had to custom order a pickguard from WD, which I traced off of the first guitar I got (You can't fit a Fender Mustang pickguard on it, I tried to and it didn't fit, so I custom traced off of the first guitar I got's pickguard which I was going to ship back but had yet to do so because I couldn't drive to a UPS store to do so yet.) I shipped back the original guitar a few days later and received my new pickguard and wired everything together, and the guitar works flawlessly now (surprisingly so even with the original bridge, but if it ain't broke, don't change it.) I'm planning on getting a Fender Jaguar soon, but after my experience I don't feel so safe cutting up a guitar worth over $50 dollars (lol), so I'm just going to get a Classic Player HH which has a Tune-O-Matic already installed and humbucker cavities already routed out, and then I plan on putting a Super Distortion in the bridge, and a Humbucker from Hell in the neck. I hope the guitar turns out alright because I've read mixed opinions on the Classic Player HH, but judging from one I've tried out, have no worries for what I'm to get :)

[@alexrcowan]

Oh wow, that sounds like an absolute nightmare. Don't get discouraged though, we all make mistakes and stuff things up. You learn from it and avoid the same mistakes in your next attempt :) I've necer tried a CP HH Jag but they look the business. Hopefully your luck has turned around and you get a really good one!

[@RobertNolan]

Very impressive work. You make me want to buy a new one and do some serious mods to it.

[@DarkAnubis]

I definitely want to modify my 70’s Style Jag. I need to replace the singles with hums

[@BistroGlicerin3]

You do a very clean work there... 🤟💀🥀

[@jessejones5556]

The Cobain jaguar 😻😻😻

[@scottshields3054]

Good video, bad use of stock music from Logic lol. I hear that stuff everywhere nowadays...

[@Sinatra_115]

What does that wave looking symbol signify on the wiring diagram?

[@whitelighter1552]

Did you have to buy new pots and other electronics besides the 3 way toggle? Or can you use the old and the re wiring makes them work this way? Also could you link the 3way toggle? Thank you

[@alexrcowan]

Hi there! I would just get another 1M linear roller pot to swap the stock 50k tone pot in the rhythm circuit. Other than that you can reuse everything. And there should be a link to the toggle switch in the description. Hope this helps!

[@dastealthoperator4138]

Would the same wiring and mods work with DiMarzio Super Distortion and PAF humbuckers?

[@Sinatra_115]

Did you figure it out? I’m trying to do the exact same mod

[@davidrolt3173]

Hi Alex can you tell me if the caps you used were .033 or .33 please difficult to see on your diagramm also does the ground side go to the top of each pot..thanks

[@DaveWire]

what a good work ! clap clap clap !

[@alexrcowan]

Dave Wire thanks Dave! 😀👍

[@touchingstone]

awesome mod Alex, good job.

[@Ivanchota]

Hi how are you? I would like to make you a query I put the same bridge on my jaguar and it was the same as yours, but the problem I have is that the strings come off the bridge very easily when playing a little hard, did the same thing happen to you? or how can i fix it? thank you

[@gonzorudeboy]

Hi, I wanna build a JM project based on a fender style neck (12" Radiused) and home made body made from some korina planksI have. As I want a TOM style bridge, should I route the neck pocket straight like a regular JM and shim it or angle the neck pocket, wich seems hard to do? Thanks for the video, it's really helping me.

[@gonzorudeboy]

Btw, I wanna go on the JB/Jazz route and the Jimmy Page circuit. 4 push/pulls for parallel/series in/out phase. If you have any input on that. Thanks.

[@grungepower]

Nice guitar man

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks mate :)

[@UndeadBoogie]

Great vid, but there is a waaay easier way to pull your bridge anchors with a bolt, a washer, and a piece of 1 inch pvc. At any rate, I am definitely wiring the volume and tones on my new MIJ Jag this way, once I put in the p90s. such a great idea. Thanks!

[@alexrcowan]

I don't think that method will work here, the original thimbles/bushings have no thread for a bolt to grab onto. That method is more for pulling out tune-o-matic bushings. And no problem, p90's will sound great in these!

[@UndeadBoogie]

@@alexrcowan You are absolutely right. My apologies! And yes, the P90s really sound good. I wasn't a fan of the thin, jangly single coils, but I kinda knew that going in. I do like all the other things that make a jag a jag though.

[@johnbanks2275]

more info the wiring but great info otherwise great job thank you kindly john

[@reneflores8832]

Squier is releasing a new Jaguar hh that has a hard tai and adjust-o-matic bridge. Maybe I might do these mods on it to make it look more like a jag

[@furlag2]

This video is a one year old....but could you decribe a playabillitu with TOM bridge as neck radius varies? Do you feel much on string action?

[@alexrcowan]

furlag2 it’s perfectly playable, I file the high and low e saddle string slots deeper so the bridge radius follows the 9.5” fingerboard radius

[@ineedstuff8286]

im new to guitar tinkering. ive played for 20+ years. I want to get a squire jag body and completely build it with good stuff. I basically want to make it as comparable to an american version as possible. Being new to this, i am confused on what components on a squire are “cheap”, and differ from the quality of the american versions. Like… is a Squire neck garbage? Is the American better? what is it about a neck that one is better, etc. Thank you!, amazing channel and ability you have

[@iamshaggy3587]

Where did you get the scratchplate?

[@camilincamilero]

Great video and great mods! I was wondering tho, why heating the bridge thimbles make them easier to remove? I thought heat caused metal to expand, so it would actually make it harder? It's kinda counter intuitive to me.

[@alexrcowan]

It's not enough heat if you do it properly to expand the thimbles that dramatically. It's more to soften or melt any adhesives used to make it easier to remove the thimbles

[@vw9659]

It would have been great to hear noise recordings before and after copper shielding. The Squier VMs (and many Fenders) already have shielding paint, so the difference may not be great, if any. Of course it would have been most interesting to hear the difference with the jag single coils rather than the HBs.

[@alexrcowan]

T W it depends what kind of environment you play in. If your are playing at home in a room with no big tv or fluorescent lights to create interference, the difference will probably be negligible. However, if you play live in venues with dirty electronics (or even a house with dirty electronics) or have lots of interference, the difference will be night and day. Shielding paint will never do as good a job of shielding electronics on squiers and production line fenders as copper tape. The paint hardly conducts (if at all, they don’t use premium grade shielding paints) and hardly ever make a complete faraday cage since the shielding paint doesn’t consistently touch any shielding on the pickguard (of which there is none on these VM pickguards). So they don’t make a cage around the electronics to shield them from outside interference. I can’t retroactively go back and record the difference, but I do a lot of shielding for clients Jaguars, and it makes a lot of difference on squiers, MIJ, and MiM models 😊

[@vw9659]

@@alexrcowan Fair enough. But DC resistance/conductance is not a measure of noise rejection at common noise frequencies/wavelengths. Shielding paint with similar resistance is widely used in high quality electronics applications. But I don't think anyone knows exactly what paint Fender/Squier use, good or bad. Its resistance is consistent with other shielding paints though. So I think any real difference between that paint and copper foil for real noise sources is uncertain. The noise difference you note may actually be due to the full pickguard shielding you also add, which Fender only uses sparingly, and sometimes not at all. Anyway next time it would be great if you could include a before/after comparison, ideally after just the pickguard shielding is added to the cavity paint, at high gain with single coils. If a guitar already has cavity shielding paint, it may be that all we need is full-pickguard shielding (with copper or similar). Or it may be that copper is indeed better.

[@alexrcowan]

T W in all my experiences working with shielding electronics (jobs in the hundreds for my own business and on subcontract for other guitar repair businesses) I’ve never encountered a situation where a customer complained of excessive 60 cycle hum in direct relation to single coils hasn’t been more satisfied with noise levels post copper shielding. As you say it could have a lot to do with pickguard shielding, however since guitar manufacturers rarely have shielding paint over the lip of the cavities, they wouldn’t contact the shielding on the pickguard and complete a faraday cage, so I wouldn’t think simply adding shielding to the pickguard is effective as making an actual faraday cage around the electronics. But yes next time I’m doing a shielding job on a single coil guitar I’ll try to remember to film a before and after. My workshop is rather good for that as unfortunately the electronics are old and dirty.

[@thesuccessfulbarber]

Pro job man!

[@alexrcowan]

Cheers Cody!

[@pekledutangler]

If i use 2 humbuckers but it has only 2 wires on each, is it possible to create like this?

[@Sinatra_115]

You need two have hot and ground and 2 extra wires. So four total on a humbucker to achieve split coil

[@Edward-MTBKR]

Alex, your skills are amazing, but.... 1: That poor guitar will never Surf again. 2: You basically just made a close copy of a Fender Duo-Sonic HS.

[@alexrcowan]

Ed haha thanks man! And i actually play quite a bit of surf on it! It still does single coil tones great and the trem is smooth as ever! And having owned a duo sonic it’s not really anything like it. First of all this jag is hh rather than hs like the duo. The duo has no trem system. This jag gets wayyy more tonal variety that the duo sonic. In fact I can’t really find any way that they are similar haha

[@seangladish2539]

So I just bought one of these.... I'm about to put some serious work into it

[@Radiotomb]

Great video! When prepping the route for the pickups, did you align the template off of an existing edge, or did you center it off of the existing cavity hole?

[@durferz]

Hey, do you have a neck shim in this? do you find any issues with action?

[@TheDarkmore]

I have doubts that the blade style saddles will go along with a floating trem. I would choose something which has rollers. Also if you find some hotrail pickups that sound okay to you you don't have to route.

[@alexrcowan]

Tuneomatic saddles are fine man, never had a problem with them. Very little surface area of the saddle touch the strings, if anything it will make less contact than the standard jag barrel saddles. The tuneomatic has worked perfectly fine for guys like J Mascis, Lee Ronaldo, Thurston Moore and Kurt Cobain on jag/jazz style guitars. As for hot rails, yep you can use them, you may have to still rout a little nib out of the cavity to accommodate the wires coming out of the bottom of the pickup, otherwise you can just mount them upside down (did that today for a customers American Jag).

[@TheDarkmore]

@@alexrcowan Yes the factory saddles are the worst, still I would lock my trem with a tuneomatic bridge. Actually I mount my humbuckers/hotrails upside down most of the time, I love HSH and they are always mounted the bad way: in position 2 and 4 when the H is coil splited and the S is activated the coil next to the S is active, which does not give you that stratish sound it should, so I always flip my HH's upside down so that the coils near the bridge and near the neck will be active when they are used with the middle S pickup, I guess everyone has his own quirks XD

[@thtavrgwhteguy8808]

just curious man, did you use low or high ring mounts for your pickups??

[@Mr.Steve-O]

Great video, that's a lot of work but I'm sure it was the the time and effort. How is the sound now with the Humbuckers ? Thanks again for sharing

[@arnoldurbanowicz3621]

Awsome job! What kind of capacitors did you use on roller pots?

[@alexrcowan]

Arnold Urbanowicz I used sprague .047 orange drop caps

[@Indierockguitarist]

I know it's been ages, but what was the purpose of the series/parallel switch in a hh?

[@alexrcowan]

Was a bit of an experiment really, works well with the humbuckers split. I was just seeing how many different tones I could get, and I had that switch spare to do something with. Is it practical? Depends if you find humbuckers or single coils in series to be a useable tone I suppose

[@Indierockguitarist]

@@alexrcowan gotcha. Yeah I can see the point with using on single coils to get like a humbucker tone but you got the real deal already. I'm doing a similar build with a SS Jag. You're right about the extra switches these guitars have so much potential than the standard rhythm circuit.

[@alexrcowan]

@@Indierockguitarist there’s so much potential. Going back I might have used that switch as a blower switch just a killswitch. I love the freedom jaguars give with their circuit

[@zut25]

Im gonna need some help with routing the pickup cavity, you got any type of stencil?

[@alexrcowan]

Alexis Zaragoza check out stewmac, they have some great humbucker routing templates that make the whole process a lot easier!

[@doumeki1282]

Nice!

[@alexrcowan]

Thanks! :D

[@a.e.8874]

Great work, what is your back ground.track?!

[@jeraldjoyce2995]

7:34 Why is the Trogly's guitar show intro here?

[@alexrcowan]

Thomas Joyce haha it’s just a generic song on iMovie you can use

[@FURGens]

"Welcome back troglodytes to your daily dose of guitar information"

[@abaser66]

This mod is pretty much what I was looking for! Thanks for the info, now to wreck my perfectly good jag special 😆 Just wondering if you posted the wiring diagram? I had a gander at your fb page but didn't see it there?

[@alexrcowan]

Hi, this mod is killer indeed! I have just posted it on imgur, heres the link: i.imgur.com/f2NJ1ne.jpg Happy modding!

[@abaser66]

championnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@alexrcowan]

haha enjoy!

[@abaser66]

I checked out your wiring diagram, very nice. I think I'll tweak it a bit by making the lower switches s/p for each bucker, and then make the upper switch a coil split that operates on both simultaneously. You can then use the vol knobs to select neck or bridge as single, or both!

[@alexrcowan]

abaser66 awesome man, sounds good! I love how the jags have all the switches and cavities to make these mods possible without changing the look of the guitar too dramatically

[@dannypotter3917]

How would you say adding the 3-way toggle switch was im planning on doing this mod myself and was wondering how difficult it is. Great job!

[@alexrcowan]

It was super easy, and definitely with considering. Seymour Duncan has put out plenty of wiring conversion diagrams so you can see how to wire up a 3 way toggle using different kinds of switches. And thanks Danny, I appreciate it mate!

[@Rjhorning]

Hey Alex, how's it going? I love the new look of your jag. Great job on the Serve the Servants cover also. I've got a question & I was hoping you could help me out. As you may remember, I've got a Squier VM Mustang I've customized to be a Cobain Mustang. But I've got a Seymour Duncan lil 59 im putting in the neck, & a full sized JB in the bridge. I want to have the switching be, all the way toward the bridge for regular humbucker, middle is off, & all the way toward the neck be coil split. I hope that makes sense. Any ideas or info on how I can wire this up to work properly? Thanks a lot & keep up the good work.

[@alexrcowan]

Hey Robert, I had done a similar thing to this with one of my old mustangs. The neck pickup switch acted like a 3 way toggle - so up is neck pickup, middle is both pickups, and then down is bridge pickup. And the bridge pickup switch operated the humbucker, so split, series, and parallel. I have a picture of the diagram if you want me to email it to you

[@Rjhorning]

@@alexrcowan Sure, that would be great, if you don't mind. Do you still have my email address? Do you know of a way I could have each switch control it own pickup, but instead of having a pickup selector, I can make it full normal humbucker in 1 position, off in another position, and coil split in the last? So the bridge would have it's own switch for humbucker, off, or coil split. And the neck would have it's own switch for the same options. I can't find anything online. I've been looking for 3 days, lol. Well, when I'm not working that is. Thank you very much for your time by the way. I'm sure you're very busy but I know you're a genius with this stuff.

[@v1z3rr]

Is parallel and out of phase the same thing?

[@drifter8164]

For the mounting rings, did you just drill through the pickgyard and the body

[@alexrcowan]

Yep, just drilled pilot holes through the guard and body and then screwed the screws in.

[@Kurmudgeon]

Still doing the mustang?

[@alexrcowan]

Yep, well I've finished all the mods. Just gotta put the footage together of painting the headstock and all that

[@lorenzopincinato5731]

i recently bought a vm jaguar and that bridge really annoys me, im going to change it by a tune o matic one, did you had any issues with this bridge radius?

[@alexrcowan]

Lorenzo Pincinato I didn’t have any issues. Just file the e saddles to match a 9.5” radius as best you can. Otherwise use a Gotoh 510BN Tuneomatic, they’re handy cos you can adjust the height for each saddle to match the radius perfectly

[@lorenzopincinato5731]

@@alexrcowan thanks for your help, im going buy the ge103 and just file the saddles, i live in brazil and its hard to find a 510bn here

[@jayvalentine2046]

Check out the mastery bridge its fuggin expensive but well worth it

[@vainestlamb5917]

How big of a shim did you put in?

[@joshuajensen1574]

About how much did this cost?

[@alanjefimovs5554]

Where do you get so much money from to get all of your guitars?

[@CONTROLTHEYOUTH]

Alan Jefimovs A job?

[@alexrcowan]

From working, buying selling guitars and gear etc :)

[@chrisbliss7]

Good job man, if you install a mute please video it there's nothing out here on that

[@aidengabehart]

bruh i thought i pulled up another tab when i heard the troglys song start playing

[@shawnhuff3920]

I just bought a fender blacktop jaguar hh special silver from 2011 it's awesome I found it used at my guitar shop in town Ksm music and it is in great shape so you should probably get rid of your shity squier jaguar and buy a fender blacktop jaguar hh

[@alexrcowan]

Both are great guitars, the squier VM and CV ranges are very similar to Fender Mexico build quality

[@itaintmebabe714]

Awesome mods but I will say the neck and feel in general of this guitar is horrible. Good tones but a very cheap feel. I had to go with the Fender player series Jaguar and it's a way better feel.

[@alexrcowan]

That sucks maybe you tried a dud. My two vm jag necks outplay my MIM and CIJ jaguars easily

[@darrenlee1938]

Ruined it imho. It’s perfect as it is (apart from that crummy bridge)

[@alexrcowan]

Darren Lee that’s all subjective I guess. I wanted a jack-of-all-trades jag I could use in the studio that could give me all the tones I would need and it delivers. I’m planning on getting a classic vibe jag when they come out this year and will hopefully keep it as stock as possible

[@johnbanks2275]

u ruined a vintage guitar

[@alexrcowan]

I always wonder why people watch these videos specifically about modifying guitars when they know they are going to be upset for some reason. And no this guitar isn’t vintage, it’s a ‘vintage modified’ series guitar from the 2010’s. Not quite vintage. And not ruined either, it was a guitar that someone never played, and is now a regularly played instrument with a lot of tonal serviceability, for a lot of people (discounting yourself) that’s actually an improvement. Yes, it can still surf - that’s why I included a split coil option. If anyone picked up this guitar and was offended by the mods, they could easily restore it with the original electronics and a new guard and switch plate. It’s not a big deal at all…

[@alexrcowan]

And you also commented this on this video 2 months ago: “more info the wiring but great info otherwise great job thank you kindly john”. Must have changed your mind I guess.