I bought one of these Kramers last week. All it needed was new strings, fret polish with some steel wool, better trem springs for ease of vibrato motion, and volume pot capacitor removed. It’s an amazing guitar for $180
These guitars are a great core for mods. I have a white Special that I changed the tuners to locking, polished the frets, nut to Graphtech, put on a PRS SE Trem with the notched screws, a new 500k CTS Pot, and a Custom wound 9.5k A2 pickup. I say it's as great playing and sounding now was my higher end guitars. PS, the high E string to the D string, I wind them backwards to make them more inline and keep in tune since I am using my trem Floating.
Love it! I have to pick up one of these beauties. I have a Kramer Stagemaster Deluxe in Flip-Purple that I saved up all summer for in 1986. Apart from two refrets, it’s all original except for the single coil pups - now has a Hot Rails at the neck and the middle is a dummy. Perfectly compliments the 80s JB! Kramers Rock 🤘🏻😎🎸
Great video! So how does it stay in tune? Did you have to do anything to get the fret slots to correct height? I modded my Kramer to a Floyd Rose one and it stays in tune very well...
Thanks , it stays in tune way better now. Follow up video to come with some playing. The nut is pretty much good to go from new, I did file the slots slightly, but it was more just filing them to match the break angle as they go to the tuners if that makes sense
Great video I bought a kramer baretta special last month and I have to replace the nut Would you please give me the nut description so I can buy the same one you bought Thanks your video was very helpful
It took me 2 mins with 200 grit sandpaper on my Baretta special nut slots. No more pinging and strings sticking. As far as the stock tuners, I just tighten the nuts down and put a new set of strings on and that did the job. Stays in tune great.
The purple looks nice here but the photo doest look like this. either blue or purple. i haven't seen purple because its sold out. do you recommend purple or blue?
Sorry to be a bore but what specific gotoh tuners are they? Im very keen to get this done to my baretta special and they are honestly the only issue im having with it cus the standard ones are pretty weak haha
I bought one 4 months ago and love the guitar. It was playable out of the box. That being said, I set it up the way I like. New set of strings, used 200 grit sandpaper on the nut slots, ( 2 mins) and tightened the nuts on the tuning pegs and it stays in tune great. The pickup growls and sings with a little verb and delay. It's a budget version pickup of the JB. It comes with a 500k pot and all that needs to be done is snipping the capacitor, throwing it away and the volume pot works great. There are a few videos on YT showing how easy it is to remove. Bottom-line, A great guitar for only $179-$199 and less than 45 mins tweaking it.
@@johnsmith-ug5tp absolutely agree. I did some mods for fun, but it definitely stays in tune and plays well, and the pickup sounds really good actually. Almost didn’t want to change it, and I will maybe put the pickup from it in something else, it’s a nice sound for sure.
I bought one of these Kramers last week. All it needed was new strings, fret polish with some steel wool, better trem springs for ease of vibrato motion, and volume pot capacitor removed. It’s an amazing guitar for $180
These guitars are a great core for mods. I have a white Special that I changed the tuners to locking, polished the frets, nut to Graphtech, put on a PRS SE Trem with the notched screws, a new 500k CTS Pot, and a Custom wound 9.5k A2 pickup. I say it's as great playing and sounding now was my higher end guitars. PS, the high E string to the D string, I wind them backwards to make them more inline and keep in tune since I am using my trem Floating.
Good tip , I’ll have to try that
Great tip on the high E a D String..never heard anyone mention that in all the baretta special vids.sweet
@@overnightguitarist5063 👏🏼🤘🏼
Excuse me but what do you mean by winding the strings backwards? Thanks!
Love it! I have to pick up one of these beauties. I have a Kramer Stagemaster Deluxe in Flip-Purple that I saved up all summer for in 1986. Apart from two refrets, it’s all original except for the single coil pups - now has a Hot Rails at the neck and the middle is a dummy. Perfectly compliments the 80s JB! Kramers Rock 🤘🏻😎🎸
Awesome video....very surprised you didn't add a brass block to the tremolo, it makes a huge difference.
Just returned mine. Wouldn't stay in tune if you just looked at it. Didn't feel like dumping more money in it.
That was satisfying to watch. Thanks.
Thanks Qui gon, please subscribe, more Kramer vids coming
@@Brennosguitarsandgear sounds good!
Hey thanks for this video can you also make another one to show how you change the string heights.
Just ordered mine can't wait to get it I'm also new at Playing guitar so excited to learn with this one any recommendations for a newbie heheh
What is that green bar you were using with the dremel? Also, what type of disc did you use on the dremel to polish the frets?
Green bar is polishing compound , used a cloth polishing wheel on the dremel
Great video! So how does it stay in tune? Did you have to do anything to get the fret slots to correct height? I modded my Kramer to a Floyd Rose one and it stays in tune very well...
Thanks , it stays in tune way better now. Follow up video to come with some playing.
The nut is pretty much good to go from new, I did file the slots slightly, but it was more just filing them to match the break angle as they go to the tuners if that makes sense
What size nut did you use from graph tech?
Great video I bought a kramer baretta special last month and I have to replace the nut
Would you please give me the nut description so I can buy the same one you bought
Thanks your video was very helpful
Its in video, he shows package with model #
Hello! What size hex wrench is used to adjust the anchor? For some reason it wasn't included in the package when I purchased it.
It's not such a straight forward switch to a new graph tech nut, debating whether I should just go for the vintage Baretta at 460 bucks
It took me 2 mins with 200 grit sandpaper on my Baretta special nut slots. No more pinging and strings sticking. As far as the stock tuners, I just tighten the nuts down and put a new set of strings on and that did the job. Stays in tune great.
Cool video.
Thanks for the visit
@@Brennosguitarsandgear 😊👍
Hey there, when you changed out the nut was there any mod you needed to do to that such as sanding to lower, raising or was it a direct fit. thanks
It was pretty much a direct fit , it overhung slightly on each end , you can see me filing it to make it slightly shorter at about the 6 minute mark
I'm loving the guitar! What glue did you use for the nut? Regular super glue?
I didn’t have any super glue at the time , so used a tiny bit of aradlite which is overkill, but that’s all I had on hand.
@@Brennosguitarsandgearis a regular super glue good enough?
@@n.h4944 yes , a drop of super glue is enough
This is my next guitar
What size tusq nut did you use. Thanks
PT-6060-00
The purple looks nice here but the photo doest look like this. either blue or purple. i haven't seen purple because its sold out. do you recommend purple or blue?
Purple for me , I also like the white one
@@Brennosguitarsandgear thank you. i have to make pre order. hehehe
@@ereimul1444 can’t go wrong either way.
Don’t forget to subscribe, more vids coming
@@Brennosguitarsandgear subscribed
Where can I get the polish compound block you’re using ?
Depends where you are in the world
I’m in Australia, I bought it from Blackwoods.
Sorry to be a bore but what specific gotoh tuners are they? Im very keen to get this done to my baretta special and they are honestly the only issue im having with it cus the standard ones are pretty weak haha
SG381-MG-T
@@Brennosguitarsandgear nice one mate cheers
The dirty secret is that a lot of ok guitars turn into great guitars with a few upgrades and a fret level and finish....
Question is, will it be a decent guitar without spending other money to upgrade?
The stock tuners are average at best , but everything else is fine honestly, just needed a good setup
@@Brennosguitarsandgear well, "average" is supposed to be more than enough for 180 bucks. Thanks for your answer.
I think if you set up right. It’d definitely rock out. Goes for any guitar I imagine
I bought one 4 months ago and love the guitar. It was playable out of the box. That being said, I set it up the way I like. New set of strings, used 200 grit sandpaper on the nut slots, ( 2 mins) and tightened the nuts on the tuning pegs and it stays in tune great. The pickup growls and sings with a little verb and delay. It's a budget version pickup of the JB. It comes with a 500k pot and all that needs to be done is snipping the capacitor, throwing it away and the volume pot works great. There are a few videos on YT showing how easy it is to remove. Bottom-line, A great guitar for only $179-$199 and less than 45 mins tweaking it.
@@johnsmith-ug5tp absolutely agree. I did some mods for fun, but it definitely stays in tune and plays well, and the pickup sounds really good actually. Almost didn’t want to change it, and I will maybe put the pickup from it in something else, it’s a nice sound for sure.
What is that green bar you are using when polishing?
Polishing compound
What size gt nut for this guitar 🎸
PT-6060-00
Where did you buy the gotoh tuners?
I bought the guitar second hand , the tuners came with it (not installed)
Where did you buy the Gotoh tuners at?
Came with the guitar , ( I bought it second hand)
@@Brennosguitarsandgear ??? You show a box of Gotoh SG381-MG-T tuners in your video... those are not what you used on the guitar you're modifying?
I bought The gotoh tuners and the guitar from the same person,
They were planning to mod it but ever did
What was that green kinda grey block to polish your fret?
Polishing compound