"New" Parker on the way...

[Marcthemusician]

Hey all

I've been loving my Fly Classic, and since getting it up and running it's become my number one guitar. I've been downsizing my guitars and discovered I really wanted a Strat back in the arsenal. I had a 50s reissue a while back but the neck was a little too big for my liking. After consultation, I found a decent deal on a Dragon Fly (You may have seen it on Reverb). However, I can't lie, it's not the color I wanted. I received it and visited my tech; electronically its fine but it needs a little love and maybe a fresh new look. Thanks to everyone here for their opinions and guidance, and now I've got something in the works. More to follow...

[mmmguitar]

More to follow...

I look forward to reading about it! If you can tease anything: Do your plans include moving the guitar a little further into fulfilling that Strat niche, or was that merely the impetus for a more ambitious project?

[Marcthemusician]

More to follow...

I look forward to reading about it! If you can tease anything: Do your plans include moving the guitar a little further into fulfilling that Strat niche, or was that merely the impetus for a more ambitious project?

Nothing super ambitious; the guitar is in pretty good working order all things considered. I had my tech go over it to make sure I wasn't pouring money down a pit and he did a preliminary setup. The thing plays and sounds great. Really, I'm just changing the color, scrubbing up some finger cheese, and fixing a little neglect (cracked ebony; it happens to the best of us). I also changed out some screws due to oxidation.

As to color, I wanted to keep the guitar in the family so to speak. The satin emerald green on the DF524 is not very appealing a color, I think. Upon checking the 2010 catalog, I see that the next model up, the DF624, had 3 colors available. I find it amazing that Parker released 3 models with the exact same specs at 3 price points with the finish being the only difference. I reached out to a few people, including some who are allegedly retired (and heard back!) But ended up going with Pat Wilkins as he has good reviews and, frankly, stellar communication.

I do have some project guitars I'm working on, but they aren't Parker. I'm keeping an eye out though. If I find a good candidate for a project I will try to snag it though!

[Marcthemusician]

Fresh from Pat Wilkins and my buddy/guitar tech, here she is!





Funnily enough, this is the color I would have bought if one had been available! I'm not sure how many were made in Taxi Cab Yellow, but mine is now! A few things: when I got the guitar, it had a couple of problems, namely some cracking in the ebony, a poor setup, and a few finish chips in the body. I'm not one to poo-poo a guitar with some wear, but the satin emerald green wasn't my cup of tea. I was able to get a decent deal on it and decided I'd make it the color I wanted. Pat Wilkins did a great job and I'm quite happy with the results, but in the future I'm going to try and get the color I want the first time. Any sort of "deal" I got on the guitar originally is long gone thanks to the refinish, but whatever, I'm happy with it! My tech also fixed the cracks in the fingerboard and gave the guitar a fantastic setup; it had the spa treatment, alright!

Compared to my pre-refined Fly, it's a different beast altogether. Comparing it to a Fly, I could see people being underwhelmed with this guitar, but if you look at it as an HSS superstrat with a quartersawn maple neck, ebony fingerboard, stainless steel frets that weighs about 5.5 lbs, it's quite the guitar. I also got lucky that there's a bit of flame on the neck. I am happy to say my Strat is a Parker. Of course, I'm not ditching my Fly Classic anytime soon either!



So, for cataloging purposes, here's the serial number: 1006033
If the serial numbers for the Dragonflys follow the other Parkers, this dates it to June 3, 2010 and was the 3rd guitar (Dragonfly or overall, I wonder?) produced that day. It is technically a DF524, but now with a Taxi Cab Yellow gloss finish, I suppose it's now a DF624!

[vjmanzo]

So cool, @Marcthemusician! Congrats!!

[jb63]

Nice! What's it cost to painting of these now?

[mmmguitar]

Maybe this is a Marc thing, but I refinished my 2025 project Fly yellow as well (sadly, no more photos until it's assembled sometime in this next calendar year). Gotta love those guitar bananas!

Oh, and if you intend to fit a GK pickup on that, it looks like you'll need a pickup ring adapter to afford room for it (you might have to shop around to find one on eBay or through a third party seller - Soliciting one on the vguitarforums is probably your best bet). A cheaper alternative is to just cut off the bridge-facing end of the pickup ring so that it's flush against the GK pickup.

Example of an adapter ring:

[Marcthemusician]

Nice! What's it cost to painting of these now?

More than I'd have liked, but the job was done well. $575 all in.

[vjmanzo]

the job was done well. $575 all in.

That’s $575 well spent! It looks professional, and, clearly, you’re much happier with it than the old color. Way to go!!

[Fox]

That is a yellow guitar!

It's like a yellow Corvette: I don't know if I would want to own one myself, but damn it's nice!

Congratulations!

[Patzag]

Beautiful job! Congratulations!

[mockchoi]

Love it! My yellow Fly has gotten more positive comments that any other guitar I play. People have shown up to shows and given me yellow sunglasses, hats, and a pair of yellow shoes to go with it

[mmmguitar]

Cross-posting between here and vguitarforums to answer @marcthemusician's question:

Bumping to say that the pickup routing for your guitar seems to be the same distance from the bridge rout as on my Fly (I put a humbucker mounting ring over the rout; and it looks pretty close to yours). Because I still have a version of the stainless GK adapter I must have purchased in 2011 (supposedly, the internal space diameters have been revised in the meantime), I photographed it showing that you might have just enough room (or will have to do minimal shifting/enlarging of the rout to accommodate the humbucker and GK pickup).

Note that, if you're installing an internal kit, you'll need to snake the GK wire harness into the cavity, somehow. On this Fly, you can see where a previous owner first attempted to rout a channel under the pickup, before deciding to just drill a hole from the pickup rout into the bridge rout (the GK wire harness essentially snaked the same path as the single conductor+shield piezo wires soldered to the underside of the trem:

Also expect to have to raise the bridge height and shim the neck to accommodate the GK pickup to get the string action as low as you'd like (very common in Strat and other GK installations with bolt-on necks).

[Marcthemusician]

Cross-posting between here and vguitarforums to answer @marcthemusician's question:

Bumping to say that the pickup routing for your guitar seems to be the same distance from the bridge rout as on my Fly (I put a humbucker mounting ring over the rout; and it looks pretty close to yours). Because I still have a version of the stainless GK adapter I must have purchased in 2011 (supposedly, the internal space diameters have been revised in the meantime), I photographed it showing that you might have just enough room (or will have to do minimal shifting/enlarging of the rout to accommodate the humbucker and GK pickup).

Fly GK adapter.JPG

Note that, if you're installing an internal kit, you'll need to snake the GK wire harness into the cavity, somehow. On this Fly, you can see where a previous owner first attempted to rout a channel under the pickup, before deciding to just drill a hole from the pickup rout into the bridge rout (the GK wire harness essentially snaked the same path as the single conductor+shield piezo wires soldered to the underside of the trem:

GK wire snake.JPG

Also expect to have to raise the bridge height and shim the neck to accommodate the GK pickup to get the string action as low as you'd like (very common in Strat and other GK installations with bolt-on necks).

After consideration, I believe I might relegate synth access to a different guitar! I do love my Dragonfly as is, and it might get a little crowded if I add in the GK3 kit.

[tunerone]

Great choice not overcrowding the Dragonfly! That Taxi Cab Yellow looks killer, and $575 seems fair for such a professional refinish.