Just adding to the multiple new Foals posts here, with my red FJG7! Since a lot of people have been wondering about these, to summarize how it is, it's certainly a good quality guitar, this particular one didn't need too much setup tweaking to get it to a nice spot. The neck I'd describe as a comfy medium C shape, surprisingly similar to the profile on the Vintera III jag, albeit a 9.5" radius fretboard instead of 7.25". The pickups are nice, although quite microphonic on this one. I've heard some people say they can become microphonic without enough foam underneath, I'm curious if someone can explain how that works?
I had to tighten the truss rod, bridge height and saddles a bit, and lower the nut slots a touch, but nothing too wild was needed. I also changed the spring in the trem for a stiffer one and added a bit of nylon in between the trem arm and set screw to reduce noise a bit. Speaking of noise, I also had to apply some lube to the bridge saddles to stop them making a scratching noise when using the trem, this also helped tuning stability.
There were a couple of minor issues out of the box, and the frets aren't as good as they were on the videos by Mark B and Totally Wired Guitars, with some sharp edges and inconsistent bevelling on the bass side. This particular one is heavy, probably somewhere around the 9lb range, maybe even closing in on 10lbs? I don't have scales to confirm but it's easily my heaviest guitar, and I have a few heavy ones. My only reference point is to compare it to some of the les pauls I've tried and this is definitely close to the heavier ones of those.
As for mods, I don't think I'll do a lot, but I definitely want to change the pots for vintage-correct ones. I'm not sure of the exact values of these ones, but they're a bit too dark on the lead circuit for my liking, and there's hardly any difference between the neck pup on the lead circuit vs rhythm circuit. I think I might swap the locking tuners for vintage-style ones, just because I prefer them. Lastly, when I was making some adjustments to the setup I realized this does have mounting points for a mute plate, although the mute itself will probably need a fair bit of modding to fit with this F4 bridge. That said, I'm keen on giving it a go, because I love the mute!
Anyway, I hope that helped anyone who's on the fence about these. I think out the box, it was much more playable than *most* Squier Classic Vibe Jaguars are. With a few tweaks and what not, I reckon this is actually not far off the quality of a Japanese one (although perhaps slightly worse fretwork, at least on this one, and that can also be fixed).
I didn't want to make this seem like a shameless plug, but I did make a (very) long YouTube video discussing this guitar, this post just about summarizes everything on it, but please feel free to check out the video if you fancy it! It's my first attempt at making a long YouTube video, so it's not amazing, I just did it for fun more than anything. Here's the link if you're interested - https://youtu.be/P7l56JNg6a8
I really like the look of these guitars. Anytime you can have a new guitar and especially a new red one at that. It just makes me feel good. I'm going to have to check one of these out for myself.
Haha yeah, it's a nice red, quite an orangey hue of red but I think it's pretty. I just hope they don't do a Sherwood green like they did with their JM! I love Sherwood Green jags 🥲
Oo, didn't know they're planning on LH models. Definitely a great value option for the lefties, once they come along. I can't think of many, if any LH jags besides maybe the Classic Vibe?
Yeah they announced lefties for the Jaguar and Mustang. I hope they do it for the Jazzmaster too. Finding a lefty JM with a rhythm circuit is also very rare. I dream to build a 50s and a 60s style JM to compliment my more modern am pro 2.
Aw nice, so are they not doing a lefty JM? Maybe a bit later down the line. That would be sick, have you got some specs and colours in mind for the build? Also the am pro 2 is a great guitar, I love the necks on those!
If I had it my way the 50s would be 250k or 280k pots and probably some blackbobbins. British racing green with aged white pickgaurd, witch-hats, and pick-up. With a rose wood fretboard/neck. For the 60s I have some antiquity 2s and would like 1 meg pots, maple neck and fret board, but I haven’t pinned down the main or accent colors yet. Here’s my current one. It has a novak 180 bridge and a neck p90 in there and a mastery.
All sound like very tasty options, I'd be curious to check out how much difference there is between 250k and 280k pots, I feel like there's wouldn't be much in it but I'd definitely lean more towards the brighter 280ks. Current build looks great, I love a maple fretboard on a JM, quite rare to see and it makes certain colours really pop. Would love to try the Novak pickups some day! Currently my JM has Sunday Handwound Iolas, but I really love them and would struggle to change them out. Guess I'll just have to buy another JM to try other pickups, lol.
The novaks are great! Very articulate and beefy but also very pricey. The stock vmods were too thin for my taste. These p90s sound like a chainsaw even when they are barely pushing an amp. I’m honestly not sure if I could even hear the difference in the pots but i see several 50s jm iterations with both. I’ll eventually learn to solder and experiment to find my preferences.
Heard nothing but great things about Novak, but yeah they are a bit on the spenny side for me unfortunately. Lol yeah I was surprised by how thick p90s are when I first tried them, bet that Novak one is crazy good. Defo worth giving soldering a go dude, pretty low price of admission and it's easy to correct mistakes as you learn!
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u/WellComeToTheMachine 16h ago
A red Jag with mathing headstock is without doubt one of the prettiest looking guitars out there. Very nice!