Bacchus guitar project!

This is another Bacchus BST-1R Universe series stratocaster style guitar!
Here is my previous Bacchus project:
http://guitar-dreamer.blogspot.gr/2014/05/bacchus-universe-series-strat.html

 Bacchus guitars have some interesting vintage-oriented features. This historic guitar company is based in Japan and produces guitars in China, Korea and Japan. This particular bacchus strat is part of the affordable "Universe" series guitars that are produced in China. However, these guitars are pretty high-quality instruments that could compete against Mexican and US-made originals.
Here's some information regarding Bacchus guitars: http://www.deviser-bacchus.com/english/

http://www.deviser-bacchus.com/products/universe-series-guitar/

This guitar was bought used in Athens, Greece. It was in a pretty good shape although it didn't have any strings on it. I am always extra careful when it comes to used instruments that have no strings on... There may be serious issues such as neck warp or twist, uneven frets, worn out nut, broken truss rod and all shorts of things... You should definitely check twice for such issues on used and new instruments with no strings on.

Luckily, the neck and its frets were in a good shape and only a mild fret leveling job had to be done. The hardware and the nut were in excellent condition. The finish was not flawless but there were only a few dings which is not a deal breaker. The electronics were pretty basic and vintage oriented in terms of tone. Its pickups were really low-output single coils.  Everything worked okay and there were no wiring flaws.
 However, I didn't like the vintage tone of the guitar and I decided to replace its loaded mint-green pickguard with a new metallic H-S-S one. The humbucker pickup in the bridge position is an old ceramic ESP one and it's really hot. The new ceramic neck and middle single coils are hotter than the stock pickups but the trebly strat tone is all there. Not to mention that the aluminum pickguard acts as a hum shield and the single pickups sound clearer than ever before and hum-free. The tuners are vintage kluson-style and they work just fine, the 6-point tremolo has the old S-style saddles but it's pretty easy to adjust and it stays in tune.



Here's the Greek guitar store where the 1st owner bought this guitar:
http://www.kourbismusic.com/bacchus-universe-2-tone-sunburst-el.html#.U9n_phFP0zw

Here are the official Bacchus BST-1R specs:
BODY POPLAR
NECK MAPLE
FINGER BOARD
ROSEWOOD
MAPLE
SCALE 25 1/2 inch (22F)
MACHINE HEADS ROTOMATIC TYPE
BRIDGE
SYNCHRONIZED TREM
PICK UPS ORIGINAL SINGLE COIL TYPE
CONTROLS 1vol, 2tone, 5way p.u selector
FINISH URETHANE  2 tone sunburst
with ORIGINAL SOFT CASE

As mentioned in the original article, these guitar have some minor issues one should take into consideration:
-Their custom headstock style is distinctive but it's not even close to the original strat headstock shapes. I really like the shapes inspired by the fender '64 headstock:
http://reverb.com/blog/a-brief-history-of-the-stratocaster


-The guitar has a nice mint-green pickguard but the tremolo backplate was plain black...  In the previous project, I replaced the stock backplate with a matching mint green one. I didn't use a back-plate on this guitar as I didn't find one to match the aluminum pickguard.


-The truss rod adjustment is more difficult than it should really be these days. That's because the truss rod hex adjustment bolt is located in the neck pocket of the guitar... One has to loosen up all the strings and remove the neck to gain access to the truss rod hex box. Then, you have to adjust it just by guessing what the string tension would be if the guitar was in tune... A qualified technician has no problem adjusting these vintage style truss rods but a hobbyist will definitely find this adjustment a bit difficult.
-The stock 3x singlecoil pickups are ceramics but they're definitely "weak" in terms of output level.


Apart from these minor issues, these Bacchus guitars are pretty playable and sound good, especially with a few mods. They're made just like their cousins from Japan, sharing the same handmade low-output pickups and vintage hardware. I had also come across a few Mexican and US-made originals that were less playable than these Universe series Bacchus strats... These are value for money instruments and they're worth checking out!

If you are willing to do a bit of market research, check out a few other Strat-models here:
http://www.thomann.de/gb/st_models.html?partner_id=73786

Here are a few photos of the actual guitar:

Cheers,
Thanos