We need to talk about V and X shape guitars!

[DrewJD82]

It’s only been almost ten years since I sold it to you, why are you in such a rush?

That’s not even an exaggeration.

I have an uncanny ability to completely forget about things that are right in front of my face. To the point I’m medicated for it.

 

[laxu]

...and the ESP/LTD KH-V arrived. Unfortunately it's not a happy NGD.

• Volume pot is scratchy.
• Tone pot doesn't work at all.
• Jack seems to cut out the signal randomly.
• Jack plate is slightly bent on one side.
• Clear manufacturing defect where they've filed off too much binding on the last few frets.
• Cracked bridge pickup mounting ring. Small piece missing from the bottom and the pickup ring is loose.
• Tooling marks on fretboard.
• Seems to have some wear on the fretboard.

I would not be surprised if someone played this heavily for 30 days and returned it, or this was a display model. It was sold as brand new, and this is B-stock at best.

I've sent Thomann an email asking if they would be willing to give me a decent discount so I can keep the guitar and fix this stuff myself.

The good thing is that apart from the binding issue, everything else is fixable. It just comes down to whether Thomann will play ball. Otherwise I'll just return it.

I do want to like it. Issues aside, it looks gorgeous and is very pleasant to play. Fretwork seems good though the stock action is not the lowest. When it works it sounds great.

 

[Henry]

Flying Vs are cool and easy on the back.
Here's me right after high school with an Ibanez V.

 

[laxu]

So Thomann agreed to give me a weirdly specific 99 € discount on the LTD KH-V, which puts me into the same price as their previous sale on the model which I just barely missed. Maybe they are running at pretty slim margins when getting rid of the stock for these, considering the model was like 1800 € originally.

I'll take it, because I already fixed at least some of the issues.

Jack plate could be bent back in shape and it seemed that the main issue was that the battery was not connecting properly. Interestingly it put out sound like that, just weaker output. I bent the jack plugs a bit and then it would work, and the scratchiness of the volume pot somehow disappeared too.

I think the tone pot still doesn't work, or is extremely subtle. I remember the one that I tried in a store worked normally.

Looking into the cavities, this does not have any of the quick connectors EMG normally has, just soldered. Pickups might have a plug connector. Couldn't spot any obvious fault with the wiring, but can't find a wiring diagram that is not using quick connectors. The pots are also PCB type instead of the normal lug type (little holes to put wires through).

Yesterday I was rocking the repaired KH-V through the Mark V 90, and I absolutely loved it. The narrow neck (42mm nut width) feels really good to play and it sounded glorious. Neck/middle position also sounds good for cleans.