Saga LP-Style Kit

The idea of a kit to me, is a project. It's not like when you buy a box of legos where it comes with the parts and instructions and you get a perfect finished piece when it's all slapped together. This is a cheap guitar. That being said, it's probably a hell of a lot better than other guitars in this price range and offers the benefit of giving the buyer a nice intro into knowledge of how guitars work and what it really is that makes a nice guitar a nice guitar.

The body is cheap but sturdy and the flamed top looks great but is sticker thin. From experience, it is nearly impossible to properly stain the guitar because of the amount of cheap sealant that encases the wood, but it can still look great if you're ok with paints and not being able to see that flamed grain.

The neck is somewhat problematic considering that the fretting isn't 100% and mine had some forward bow, but after dealing with the bow and the nut all the problems have gone away. Electronics are on par with the cost if not better than the stock stuff in other 200 dollar level guitars.

Again, it depends on if you're willing to go the extra distance with it. It is a kit guitar. This means that there's no one setting it up for you or holding your hand through the process and as such, the sound you will get out of this guitar will depend on your own ability to identify some problems areas and to fix them.

Out of the box? Out of the box the intonality was absolutely atrocious. Everywhere on the neck was wrong and the overall sound was as another reviewer put it "tinny." To solve the problem for you, the issue is one of the nut. The nut is hollow and made of a super cheap plastic which results in the thin sound as well as the issue of the action and intonality. Grab a new nut, I suggest graphtech, and all the problems go away. This is a 10 dollar fix and basically will give you a neck that plays well above 150-200 dollar guitars and sound that also is significantly better than what you paid for.

Right now, this guitar's sound is pretty damn good. Not exactly what typical Les Paul's sound like, but not far off and not at all bad. Expect that you will have to do some work and be willing to do it.

Out of box rating, 1. After 10 minutes of sanding down and replacing the nut, 8.

Again. This is a KIT GUITAR. You don't have professionals doing the set up for you. This means that as much as you want to blame the parts, there's probably something that you don't know that can fix your problems. Do a little research and it all goes away.

Out of the box, again the nut caused a lot of problems with the action. The action was higher than an acoustic and intonality was a major issue. Replacing the nut solved most of those problems and adjusting the truss rod got the action down to below that of other guitars I own that were set up by people from guitar center.

Fit and Finish are really more of a question again of what you chose to do with the guitar. Out of the box, the pieces mostly fit. I don't consider it to be a flawed kit if I need to take a piece of sand paper to something for a minute to make it fit like a glove.

Action out of the box, 1. It was unplayable and intonality was impossible. Chords weren't chords, notes were insanely sharp and flat. After changing the nut, it's as perfect as you yourself can make it. 10.

Seems alright. The neck worries me some as I strung up the guitar with 12's for tone. Forward bow came back some and the truss rod seemed fairly resistant to being turned, but it looks alright now. Soldering on the electronics is poor, but again, a little know-how gets you pretty far on that end. I suggest completely gutting the electronics to make this guitar play at just under the 1000 dollar mark, but it will of course raise your costs as well (although only by 200 dollars or so which will still be cheaper than your stock Fender Americans or Gibson LP Studios)

No idea. I assume none.

It's been a decently long road to get this guitar to where it is now, but as it stands, it's a better guitar than my other electrics and has the added value of a custom finish and the pride of saying you built this guitar yourself. If nothing else, think of it as a couple hundred dollars spent to give yourself a crash course on the makings of an electric guitar. It definitely has increased my ability to fine tune and adjust my other guitars as well as the guitars of my friends.

ABSOLUTELY change the nut on this guitar. It costs 10 to 15 dollars and will make it mechanically play like a champ. The electronics are actually pretty damn good and will get you pretty far. Swap out the electronics and you have something worth playing for a long while.

LP stile. I got to say when I first ordered the kit I was excited. I had never done a kit before. I bought off E-Bay from online guitar. Well, after I got the kit I was disappointed in it. The body had stains all over it and one of the tuning keys was smashed. I tried to get my money back but was told to just paint it and put it together. On line wouldn't even give me a tuner to replace the bad one.

Well, I had to wind up using other pickups I bought some new Less Paul pickups and had to replace the pots a switch. So after putting the guitar together with the new stuff it now sounds real good. I have to give this a good rating only because of the work I did on it.

Like I said I had to paint it the neck fit good but had to shim it a little to get it where the action was low enough. I also had to level the frets. The guitar had a lot of frets that were uneven. This is not a kit for someone looking to put a kit guitar together and playing out of the box. It wont happen. But if you want a kit to learn how to work on a guitar then you may concreter this kit. For under 200 dollars it will teach you a lot!

These days I don't play live all that much. But after all said and done the guitar came out real good. But It did take a lot of work to get it there. I would not be afraid to play this guitar anywhere. The only thing I wound up using in the kit was the neck and body everything else was replaced. It has real good tone and stays in tune. But again it's due to all the work and new parts.

None! I wish people that sell anything on E-Bay need to quit taking advantage of people and back up what they sell. It's not fair for people to buy stuff like this kit and basically be told you bought it and theres nothing we can do.( can you tell this has happed to me more than once)

I started playing guitar when I was 13. I was playing in Night clubs by the time I was 15. (i had to have an adult with me) I am now 53 years old and still love to play. I should have checked out the person selling this kit. I have since then found others that do back up this kit with no questions asked and some even give you time to look it over and if you dont'e like it you can return it and even get a full refund or they will send you another kit. If something happened to it I would get another one but I would not get it from the same people. I did look at other kit's but they are a little pricey. But now that I have built a Saga kit I am thinking of getting one of the other kit's. I have now had this guitar for almost a year and it is sounding better all the time. If you don't mind spending more on the kit it can be a good guitar. The only thing that happened was I wound up spending what I could have bought a guitar for but if I did that I would not had all the fun of building one. if you are thinking of buying a kit to build and it's your first time then you may want to buy a guitar that is already together and redo it. If I had to to it all over again I think that is what I would have done. You can find all kinds of guitars for under 200 that all they need is to have pickups and a little of this and that done and if you wanted to refinish it you could. It may save you a lot in the lone run.

I used the neck and body from the stock kit as well as the pick guard (nice) and rod nut cover. Everything else I replaced. I understand that this is not true universally, but the top plate was nicely flamed (enough to leave it natural), the neck fit the body well and the binding was perfect. It was a bit of a chore to mask it when painting the back (metallic burnt tangerine auto paint)but it turned out very well. I have built from scratch, and did not want to do the binding myself. I used Gotoh bridge and tuners, with some minor problems fitting the bridge and stop into the predrilled holes. I used the Great Age pick-ups and wire harness from Stew Mac, and got some gold parts (switch, knobs) off ebay. The final sound was more than a pleasant surprise. I put a bit of a personal touch on the peghead, designed my own logo on the computer and put it on with inkjet decal paper. The whole thing ended up costing me about $500, but the end result was worth much more. I took it to Guitar Center for the final fretwork and set up, though I have done some of this work on other guitars. They did a great job for less than $50. Their luthier was stunned at the quality of the final product. If you get lucky with the quality of the top and binding, and your neck actually fits the body, this is a great $160 gamble. The unfinished body alone will cost you that much elsewhere, and you don't get the binding.

some kind of asian made guitar, featuring a les paul style body, plasitic binding, all the stuff you need to make your own guitar (except for paint). also includes painting and care instructions. it's basically finished, with some kind of quilt top covering what i think is basswood, and some dark wood on the bottom. theres some odd black powder/ ink stuff in the routed parts that i got smuged on the body at first, but that got painted over. i think it's 22 frets, but not all of them are set in tune, 2 volume knobs, 2 tone knobs, HH pickup configuration, and a 3 way selector ring. the carve-your-own head stock is kinda cool though.

it's rather tinny, i liked it's sustain and tone on single notes, but when chords got muddy real fast on it. as for the different tones, I thought they were diverse, and all sound rather good. I ended up upgrading the pickups provided with some PAFs from guitar fetish, and those worked out really well. the only setting i didn't really like was the bridge pickup distorted, but that's because i play a punk/ pop punk style (blink 182-sum 41 ish?). anything else, it's kinda weak, although the neck pickup can produce some nice, warm tones. You can survive with the stock pups, but i would recommend upgrading to something else. (i've used this guitar with a behringer v-amp, a crate, a randall, a line 6, a fender, and a marshall)

the guitar was set up terribly, with no real quality control. the frets are set up so that getting it in tune is a total bitch, and i'm not sure if it's even possible, and theres still a huge gap between the body and the fret board. the tuning machines stick and aren't very responsive at all, and the contours make it so you can't turn one of the knobs.

it's durable (it's been dropped several times and still works fine; don't let your girl friend play your guitar if she doesn't know what she's doing, not matter what she tells you), i've replaced the strap buttons with dunlop strap locks and used a longer screw, so those are solid. I also painted it and finished it so that has stood the test of time. With a good replacement neck, i've used this guitar as a back up, and even as my main guitar on occasion. since i had to upgrade the hell out of it i'm only giving it a 5.

no clue, not sure if it even came with a warranty, if it did, it probably expired by the time i'd gotten it (not saga's fault though).

i've been playing for about 3 years come january. i have a fender and behringer amp, an ibanez rg series guitar (my main one), this one (my back up), a strat i made later, a johnson accoustic, and an alvarez accoustic/electric. If all you want to do is make a guitar, or get started with building your own guitars, this kit is good for you. The only parts that are worth keeping are the electronics (pups not included), the bridge, the pick guard (which is actually 3 ply, not some crappy 1 ply), and the body. the neck is garbage, the tuning machines suck, i decided to change out the strap buttons for something that locked, the pups are ok to start, but this guitar could sound alot better with something else. in closing, this guitar has potential, and with the ability to personalize it in so many ways, it can be alot of fun to build, and incredibly satisfying to play when you're done; but it sucks balls the way it comes as an instrument.

I finished the body with and antique clear lacquer finish from a spray can from Reranch, a site dedicated to finishing guitars.
http://home.flash.net/~guitars/
The headstock was spayed with black lacquer. The whole guitar was sprayed with a several coats of Deft spray lacquer. After drying I rubbed out the finish to a nice gloss. I though the final finish looked very good. The wood had a few little dings and defects but good enough.
The hardware was decent. I had no problems with any of the parts. I replaced several of them more for cosmetics reasons. I wanted a mix of gold, black and chrome parts.
The electronic wireing diagram color codeing was off but I was able to figure it out.
The weakest part of the guitar are the quality of the frets and the nut. The frets are uneven and the string height off the nut is too high.
The quality control on Saga insturments are not very consistent. I've talked to other people that have built Saga instruments and they have had uneven fret jobs and other little problems with their kits but when they finally got them together, they like their guitars. Its a WIP. (work in progress).

I feel the guitar sounds very good. It's a sound that can be worked with. It has a full bodied, hearty sound.

Every thing fitted together but the frets and nut were goofy.

The person putting the guitar together is responable for most of these issues. How good this guitar comes out is a result of your knowledge, craftmanship and positive attitude.

Didn't ask them for anything but they give a number that you can contact to get replacement parts. Didn't need customer support.

This guitar is not something you can slap together quickly and get a great instrument for $160 so you can laugh at your friends that paid thousands for their Les Pauls.
I'm using this as an opportunity to learn more about guitar building. I've learned how to dress frets and I'll probably get to learn how to refret a guitar. Thats OK. I want to learn more about doing these things.
I would think if you want a better grade of guitar kit you could go with a Carvin kit or one from Grizzly Industrial:
http://www.grizzly.com/
They have some beautiful kits but they cost over three hundred dollars.
Or buy the parts from Stu Mac or Warmoth.
I 'll make another Saga kit.
You can see some pictures of finished kits at Online Music. I'll send them a picture of my guitar even though it's a work in progress.

Has all the features of a Les Paul only with a bolt on neck. Maple veneer top and basswood body. Accessories include a cord thats crap and strings that are also crap.

And since i purchased said kit from Torres Engineering it did not include the inserts and studs for the tunomatic bridge and tailpiece(motto for Torres Engineering" If you buy from us its your fault")

Also the wiring diagram was designed by a monkey on crack and has no value what so ever. Example:the diagram has 3 wires going from the switch when there is actually 4. Also the colors used on the diagram do not exist on the guitar.

I did not use the stock pickups and instead put a Diesal in the neck and a Duncan Performer Detonator in the bridge. With this set up it is laughably easy to get an extemley heavy Black Sabbath style sound,which is exactly what i was looking for.

The nut has to be filed down a bit,but since i had to do this on the previously strat Saga kit i got. Action is nice and soft after set up. The neck had quite a bow in it so i had to adjust the truss rod. Some of the holes are a slight bit off,in my case the upper hole for the truss rod cover and one of the holes for the pickup rings,which doesnt matter at all to me. Everything else was perfect.

The top was actually quite good looking as was the rest of the body and neck. You could just seal it and get a good looking guitar. In my case i like dark foreboding guitars,so i painted it flat black.

Since i myself put it together i would have only myself to blame for anything wrong. Other than that the parts dont seem half bad.

TORRES ENGINEERING IS THE WORST COMPANY IN THE WORLD TO BUY THIS KIT FROM!!!!!!!!! DO NOT BUY ANYTHING FROM TORRES111DO NOT BUY ANYTHING FROM TORRES!!!!

When i recieved the kit i recieved it without the studs and inserts for the tune o matic bridge and tailpiece,perhapes i am not as experienced building guitars but it seems to me that i would probably need these pieces. So i called Torres Engineering who said that i would have to call Saga and talk to a hard to get ahold person who apparently hold the fate of all studs and inserts in the palm of his hand,Joey. After trying unsuccessfully to reach the StudAndInsert God half a dozen times i left a message with whomever answered the phone about my problem(this person was really helpful although he couldnt help me). I then called Torres back saying that had left a message to which the lady said"I will pick it up today and if i can get to the mailbox in time mail it to you this afternoon" after asking when i would get it she said "Ummmm i dont know 4 or 5 days maybe?" This is utterly unacceptable but i had hoped to get it sooner so i didnt say much.

I then called them the next day to make sure that they had sent the part. They had not. The lady then said"I wont be able to get the parts until tomarrow or the next day or maybe the next day as it is OUT OF MY WAY,because Joey wasnt there".(capitalized for total disbelief on my part). I then called Saga and told them that Torres was jerking me around and asked for them to send out the part themselves. They said they couldnt,so i ended up buying the parts and since Saga drills the holes way to big for the bridge inserts i had to buy a new bridge and tailpiece with the parts i needed for 42 dollars.

I am very unhappy.

I like the guitar and will buy again,only from www.universaljems.com and i reccomend you do to.

The guitar is great and well worth the original price,but i would like to see an actual wiring diagram that has some semblance to reality.

Recently I began quite an endeavor in constructing an electric guitar for my high school "culminating senior project". Many options appealed at first but the price is what it truly cam down to. To be honest, when I purchased this Les Paul style guitar kit by Saga, I was quite apprehensive. The only complaint I have thusfar is that the company I purchased the kit from (not Saga, but instead a dealer) promised a 3-5 business day shipment to be shipped April 1st but neglected to do so until an eMail was sent 18 days later. The company then shipped the product promptly but has created quite a bit of stress to complete it by the deadline set by my school district. Other than this everything has been well...
This product remains true to the Les Paul configuration in nearly all attributes. here's the features:

Controls: 3 way selector, 2 tone and 2 volume dials

Pickup Config.: Dual Humbucker

Body Wood: 'Flamed Maple' topwood and I believe a basswood underneath.

Neck Wood: Rosewood fretboard, I think

Finish: The flamed maple top had been sanded quite smooth as was the rest of the body... with a tack cloth to remove all sanding remnants this guitar would be presentable as is. I do not know what the anonymous submitter on this page was talking about... this was actually a very impressive guitar, cosmetically. The neck was also finished in some way, providing a smooth, playable neck that didn't create any resistance.

Accesories Included: A short, lower quality guitar cable and crappy strings. What do you expect... they're free! (hint: use the crappy strings as a guide when joining the neck and body to acheive the right posistion... these can also check if the pickups work properly before you fully assemble the instrument.

The sound projected by this guitar isn't too shabby. I'm playing through a practice amp right now so I cannot speak for louder levels such as a gig and whatnot. The two pickups provide a distinct difference and range between smoother rythym-style sound to high-treble leads. Typically, I use my distortion pedal on everything because with a foot I can turn the level of distortion up and down to what's appropriate. Boss DS-1 if anyone would like to know.

As stated by others, the neck did not seem to fit properly but I overcame that problem with logic. You see, as the neck gets closer to the body of the guitar (frets 15-20+) it also grows wider. After examining this for a bit I realized that because each neck and body are meant to fit eachother, this fit should be tight with little movement. Taking this into consideration, I lined the neck up with the body at the exact point it should be located at and essentially 'dropped' it in. This neck WILL NOT fit inside of the slot unless you align it properly and push it in straight down. Even then will the fit be quite tight but that is a great feature. There were also a few minor flaws with the wood but these all seem to be from the shipping. Nothing major, nor observable without extremely close inspection.

I'm not sure yet as to whether this guitar will withstand the test of time but as long as it lasts through my senior project, I'm content. The hardware is iffy. I am definitely going to replace some of it as soon as my presentation is complete. I painted my guitar kit (Duplicolor MIRAGE (color change) paint. I chose duplicolor because it is a car lacquer and car paints have been used on guitars for ages. The MIRAGE color change system beautifully transforms from a deep sparkly purple to a vibrant emerald green. I also chose to finish the neck but I do NOT recommend this unless you know what you're doing. The neck, as is, is playable... after I got to it, it creates 'friction' so to speak and resists movement.

Pssshiunno... I never dealt with Saga, but if I did, I would definitely thank them but suggest better packaging for shipping. The company I purchased the kit from was horribly unreliable.

I've been playing for about 11 years but only truly been playing for 7. I own just one other electric and a vintage acoustic. I plan on replacing the strap buttons with strap locks (not because they don't seem stable but because I don't want to hurt my paint job) and swap the mounting rings for the humbucker pickups. warmoth.com has a great selection of EVERYTHING needed to assemble a guitar and had the curved top mounting rings but only in plastic. I will be replacing the originals with these because the Warmoth rings are FAR sturdier. I wish it came with a nice, vintage strap... yea, that would bring it together.

I bought this peice of shit for $150 on ebay. I have several guitars and I thought it would be fun to make my own. Unfortunately, the purchase of this guitar began a very unrewarding journey. The body is a Les Paul Style. I admit that it does LOOK like one, but upon closer inspection, i realized that this was the lowest quality guitar I have ever seen. The "flamed top" Saga boasts of on this model is horrible. The neck doesnt even fit in the slot properly, and most of the other things dont fit either. The pickup rings are plastic and the screws to hold them to the body just go right through it and become worthless. The wiring is shit. Once I put it together, I was horrified at what I heard. I plugged it in, and their was no sound. After messing around for a while, i got sound... REALLY BAD FEEDBACK that only stopped if I put my finger on the bare sound or tone knobs, which by the way did not work properly, if at all.

Sound? Once I fixed the feedback problem, it finally made some noise. It sounded horrible. If I accidentally touched one of the pickups, it would make this high pitched screaming noise. I tried it with my Marshall stacks, and my friends Fender amps, and the thing still sounded like crap. I even used my pedals, and still... crap.

Every aspect of this "guitar" made me sick to think that it actually belonged to me. The "pre-soldierd" wiring came apart, the rythm switch did not work, the tone/ sound knobs did not work, and the bridge... ahh the bridge. The two parts of the bridge were just like everything else... really, really shitty. I painted it because I wouldnt have been able to look at the half-assed wood it was made out of. There were VERY noticeable flaws ALL OVER the body. Some of the wood on the back was fucked up, so someone poured some type of sealent in the fat empty space. The sealent didnt even come close to matching the color of the surrounding wood. On the top of the thing was a venier of some other kind of shitty wood or something, it felt/looked more like plastic, which chipped and cracked whenever and wherever I drilled any kind of hole. (I had to drill my own holes for almost everything.)

How could I even think about using this thing for a gig if I cant even get it to work in my shop? Now, I have a deep respect for guitars, and all other musical instruments... but this thing didnt even deserve to be looked at. Some time after finninshing it, my friend and I took it out in the woods, and shot it to hell.

I don't feel like I need to call these people up and tell them how shitty their product is, they probably have recieved enough calls and letters telling them just that. I just wish I had spent the 150 I used for this on something that ACTUALLY FUCKING WORKS.

If I could rate this thing in negative numbers, I would. I have been playing guitar for several years, and this is by far the most depressing situation I have ever encountered in terms of a bad guitar. Saga, the company that manufactures these things, should be ashamed to put their name on them. After I rid myself of this pile of shit, I bought an Ibanez SA420XDR, and Jesus Christ, am I happy to have a real guitar again.

A "Les Paul" Style kit with the body design, two pickups, controls etc similar to a typical Les Paul.
It comes with a "Flame" top. yeah, right. It was an ugly greenish grey mystery wood that is in no way accepatble with a stain finish.The top wood is VERY THIN, so thin I opushed the volume pot through it down into the routed cavity when I was placing the knob on. The binding is already glued to the body which makes for some tricky taping when painting. The neck is a bolt on which would be fine IF IT FIT! I had to do some major shaving and sanding just to get it to slide into the body. The tuners and other hardware were pretty junky. Most of the screw holes were in the wrong position and the screws for the pickup mounmts were not long enough to pass through the plastic ring and into the body of the guitar. The route for the pickup selector switch was not deep enough to use the treble/rhythm ring. Of course you cannot expect much for a DIY kit at $130 but some of this stuff was truly poor quality even for a cheapy.

The electronics have a "snap together" system so there is not supposed to be any soldering. Of course if they had actually pre-assembled the electronics correctly that would be true. After a few quick corrections it snapped in easily. Here is the shocker: This thing actually sounds pretty damn good! Raw and rough around the edges but a full ballsy tone, good for stonesey rock and roll and maybe blues.

Neck is wide and stiff, the action had to be set very high to keep it from fretting out on the 14th and higher frets. Some of this might have to do with the poor fit (see above). The frets are rough on the sides and need to be dressed so you don't catch your hand.

I can't see this thing lasting very long if used regularly but then you get what you pay for right?

Been playing for 23 years, I have a number of gibson and fender guitars. I have to say that despite all of my bitching about the poor quality I did have a blast building this thing. I have wanted to build a guitar for a long long time and this gave me the chance to do so with out a major investment in aftermarket replacement parts (with the risk it might not work!). I think my next "project" guitar will have to be with quality parts not a cheapy kit or maybe a refurb on an older junker. I'd say fun of building the guitar was a "9" but the final result was a bit dissapointing but again, not much can be expected from such a cheap kit.