Description
This DIY guitar kit has everything you need for building your own SB Style Electric Guitar. You will only need some basic tools and finishing supplies. This kit includes all parts and step-by-step instructions to build a complete, playable custom guitar. All challenging wood cutting, drilling and shaping has already been professionally done, as well as fret leveling and dressing.
Recommended tools: Solo Guitar Assembly Kit – Bolt-On Neck
Recommended Guitar Finishing Supplies
*This kit uses regular single ball end strings
Kit includes:
- Ash body with a poly sealant
- Unfinished maple neck with Rosewood fingerboard
- Strings
- Strap Buttons
- Bridge Assembly
- Pickups
- Control Plate Assembly
- Jack plate (2 mounting screws included)
- Cord
- Hex wrench for truss-rod adjustment
- Allen Key for saddle height adjustment
- All mounting screws are included
IMPORTANT (in addition to our standard return policy): due to their nature kits can be returned only in virtually untouched condition and in original package.
Paul Lim (verified owner) –
I absolutely LOVE my guitar. If I based this kit on the finished product alone, I would give it a 6/5, but there were some minor details that made the process super frustrating.
Firstly, some of the screws were incredibly fragile, particularly the bridge screws. I’ve never worked with more easily-strippable screws in my life, and when they got stuck in the body the first time around It was a headache getting them out. I had to replace them with different screws from the hardware store and as a result of the slight difference in size I was only able to screw in the bridge at 3 of the 4 points. The strings are still straight on the guitar though, so all is well.
Secondly, there is no wiring diagram for this particular kit. When I called asking for one, they said they would contact me back and they never did. This was my first time building a guitar, and I wanted to put in Dimarzio pickups I had instead of the ones they give in the kit, so I was extremely lost at first. After doing sufficient research and a couple of failed attempts and start-overs, I fortunately got everything working, and the finished product is even more beautiful than I had imagined before.
To be completely honest, if the guitar had turned out to be average I would have given this kit 2 stars, with the whole experience and everything considered. The final product hard carried my review!! It’s just that good!!! I will be referring Solo to anyone who asks me about DIY kits from now on.
techior (verified owner) –
The first guitar I ever built! And it’s great. No flaws, No fretwork necessary. I decided to go for a black grain., wenge colour oil finish and worked out exactly as I had in mind. Electronics are modest but work very well. I may (or may not) upgrade in the future.
I’m already planning on my next Solo Music guitar kit!!!
zachrockstheguitar (verified owner) –
Let me start by saying I really liked how this kit turned out. BUT I had to do a lot of modifying to make this work. I opted for getting the “pro” bridge and head piece that solo guitars sells on their website. These DO NOT work with this kit and it is not stated anywhere that they don’t. After spending extra for the bridge and headpiece I had to make it work.
I had to modify the body to get to the tuners, and glue in and reshape the headstock area to accept the different string locks. I’m not sure how much work it would’ve been had I kept the original hardware. It looked like it would’ve worked out ok.
I did end up gluing a flamed maple veneer on top and staining it a really cool green black color. I wired everything up with guitarmory pickups and upgraded pots and switch. The frets were leveled just fine. I rounded the ends and polishes them nicely. I didn’t notice any sharp ends prior to me rounding them. I just like rounded fret ends.
My biggest complaint is that no where on this or the hardware’s listing does it state they will not work together. If you’re going to sell “pro hardware” in order to upgrade a headless guitar and you also sell headless guitar kits, maybe you should state they don’t work together. Maybe I’m crazy lol
Also like others have stated the screws are cheap soft metal. They strip easily or break off easily. Don’t even try to use them. Figure out what size you need and go to the local hardware store to get what you need. I’m not sure about the electronics or bridge that came with the kit as I didn’t use them, but I’ve seen that bridge on import Chinese guitars on eBay. The body and neck where good quality for the money though. Just be aware you need more than this kit gives you to have a decent build.
Brandon Quick (verified owner) –
The SBK-150 was my second guitar kit, after catching the build-bug in 2021, and also my second Solo kit. I was overall impressed with this kit, especially where the neck is concerned. The neck arrives completely finished, with great frets. I actually did nothing to this neck except bolt it on. The fretboard is clean and smooth, with no inlays, and I really like that with a minimalist look.
I never intended to use the included pickups, subbing in a pair of Kyle Shutt Signature Railhammer pickups – a P-90 style “humcutter” in the neck, and a vintage humbucker with a harder edge in the bridge. In addition to the pickups, I also subbed in the Planet Waves elliptical strap buttons (upper button applied to the BACK of the upper horn, and the pre-drilled hole dowelled), and a Solo black speed knob with Abalone inlay.
The biggest point of contention people seem to have with this kit is the bridge, but once I took some time to analyze it and figure it out (some well written instructions for the bridge would be nice in this kit), I was able to set it up in no time. It’s done very well over the last 10 months holding both tune and intonation.
My only grip, a small one at that, is the body is made of three pieces, and the grain on mine is pretty badly mismatched. For the stain I applied, it doesn’t work well. If this was a solid piece of ash or at least to bookended pieces, this kit would be 5 stars all day long.
le penhuizic Pierre (verified owner) –
It’s my third guitar kit, and the first from Solomusic. The quality is really good. I make this review after 2 years.
It’s one of my favorites guitars and I prepar it for my future concerts.
I don’t made any finish. The sound with an EMG 81 is just amazing, so I don’t now if I will apply some oil in the future.
A day, maybe, I will take an another model to have a spare for concerts.
Kevin Godin (verified owner) –
The body and neck feel great, and the pre-made screw holes were all in the right spots.
The included strings were pretty bad, but no big deal and no points loss there.
We did have to replace the pickups immediately with the Wilkinsons that are sold on this site. The included chrome ones sounded thin, but they also had a problem where a very high pitched squeal would almost always come out of them at anything past 40% volume.
Outside of the pickups, this thing was a treat to work on. The site has the wiring diagram tucked away somewhere, but it would of been nice to have a print-out come with the guitar.
Solid buy.
mark.fuller09 (verified owner) –
Very happy with the final product but this kit required quite a bit of troubleshooting and I upgraded all of the electronic components.
The Good:
The wood is great, and the neck fit the guitar nicely. The bridge and headpiece also work well – bridge has mixed reviews but there are a couple of youtube videos that demystify it. I found it very easy to string up.
The Not-So-Good:
The frets needed to be levelled. They may have been functional out of the box but I have done a few basic fret dressings on my other guitars and decided to make this one perfect before I put it on the body. I also found that some of the frets looked like they were lifting a bit so I superglued them all down before I levelled them. They were great after a couple hours of elbow grease. If you don’t have the tools for a fret job, you can probably live with the stock product but mine improved dramatically. The fretboard also needs to be oiled, pretty basic but it comes completely dry.
The finish on the back of the neck is pretty rough. I rubbed mine to a nice satin. Only takes a few minutes with some fine sandpaper and 0000 steel wool, but you need to have these things on hand.
As others have said, the screws are junk. Two of the bridge screw heads snapped off as I was tightening them. Save yourself the aggravation and buy some 1 1/4″ #6 sheet metal screws from the hardware store to secure the bridge.
The pickup routes aren’t perfectly lined up and there is a slight shift in the alignment of the strings with the bridge pickup poles. I didn’t bother trying to adjust the route to fix this. I added a pair of chrome pickup rings in place of the stock screws that the pups attach with. To do this I needed to deepen the sides of the pickup routes to accommodate the screws but it looks cleaner and the pickup height can be adjusted easily.
I didn’t even try the electronics. You can tell they are very cheap by the feel of them. Darrell Braun does a nice youtube video on the stock pups and they weren’t worth installing for me. I pulled a pair of humbuckers from a PRS SE and they sound great. I also replaced the selector switch with one that I pulled from a les paul studio.
There is only room for one control knob. I replaced the volume pot with stacked concentric 500k pots and wired one of them up as a tone pot. Worked perfectly and I have nice tone control on this guitar. The space was very tight but I managed.
A $5 switchcraft output jack is another easy upgrade.
All in all a fun project and I’m quite happy with the final product. The cost of the upgrades was worth it to me and many of the parts I had repurposed from other projects. I don’t think I would try this without having some basic experience first.
Finally, if you are looking for a gig bag, I found that a Levy’s baritone ukulele bag fits this guitar perfectly. I bought this as a travel guitar and the size is perfect.