And here's some underbelly action: this issue is prevalent among the instruments utilizing the control plate design: be it Jaguar, Jazz Bass, Stingray or Mustang.

The designers' intent was to use the surfaces of the components as a ground contact, which does work well for some time, but as years pass and the metallic surfaces get oxidized, the contact between them vanishes and you get crackling noises and hum, or even lose treble and volume along the way.

The fix is fast and simple: a wire jumping across all ground lugs. It's a nice thing to do even if there is no issue right now.

This is one of the most interesting guitars to go through our shop and get a little guitar-spa.

What you see in the pictures is the Japanese Fender Jaguar HH with the custom-made aluminium neck. The neck was manufactured by the fairly mysterious yet well-known luthier Chapowsky. Also sporting one of our favorite pickups, Gibson Dirty Fingers, it would've been a crime not to share some photos with you.

This Jag had a very common issue with loose ground connection on the control plate which we were happy to fix along with installing a proper pickup height adjustment screw instead of the lost original one, general setup & cleaning.

Those aluminium necks not only look cool but feel immensely weird: they're cold to touch, ground up the circuit when you touch them (unlike a regular guitar that does that when you touch the strings), and most of them, including this one, are incredibly slim and lack a truss rod.

How do you like this thing?

P.S. For those asking: yes, it is rather heavy for a Jaguar.