Guitar Reviews 4U - Gretsch 5420T Fairlane Blue upgrades you can do - improve your Gretsch 5420T with these easy revisions!

 Guitar Reviews 4U - Gretsch 5420T Fairlane Blue upgrades

Gretsch 5420T Fairlane Blue easy but worthwhile upgrades -

Hardware upgrades for your 5420T guitar

The purchase price leaves you a good guitar base

to upgrade with higher quality hardware

The Gretsch 5420 guitars are nicely made guitars for the price ticket and I've owned a few of them over the years! Starting with a 5120 in Orange that I upgraded and then a couple of 5122's, they offer you a great basic platform to personalise. I now own a couple of 5420T guitars, a Fairlane Blue Korean 2016 guitar and a Chinese made 2023 2 Tone Anniversary Green guitar.

There are great things about these guitars, with great quality construction they are not big ticket prices to buy, giving you plenty of scope to add upgrade hardware later or right away.

The hardware on these guitars is adequate, but can be easily improved, used examples of the 5420T guitars for example can often be picked up for reasonable deal prices and also one-owner guitars are often found for sale where they have not been set up.

Here the owner often new to playing quickly gives up on them sadly and the dream of playing, all these situations I found on these used guitars are mostly easy fixes. If only the new players knew, they could easily make their guitars more friendly to play.

A nice Stray Cats pin badge brightens up this

G5420T Truss Rod Cover Plate

We'll start with a few areas to improve  that will give instant improvement - such as the Bigsby, Tunamatic Bridge & Tuners. Our main example is a 2016 Korean made 5420T in Fairlane Blue and I'll include some pictures of a 5420T Chinese made 'Anniversary' guitar I've also upgraded. 

G5420T guitars upgraded and featured in this article

An instant improvement on the 5420T has to be the machine heads. The ones fitted work but are easily replaced with these Wilkinson WJ45 units. These Kluson style WJ45 units have better gearing and can be greased as I did before fitting them.

 Wilkinson WJ45 Machinehead upgrade

I used masking tape placed alongside the old units so the new ones would follow the same placing. The old holes were filled using cocktail stick cut into short length pegs which were glued with PVA wood glue and then the peg glue when dry paint matched.

 Vanson Roller Saddle Tunamatic Bridge

The Roller Saddle Bridge drops on as a unit, I've fitted this make of Bridge on six or more Gretsch guitars over the last 12 plus years. They are simple and inexpensive and do a great job.

 Bigsby B6C unit installation

Thr Bigsby B60 supplied on the 5420T can be upgraded with the B6C, which I've done on 4 5420T's over the years. 

Bigsby B6C in-filled with matched Fairlane Blue paint

On the Fairlane Blue guitar I in-filled the B6 details with colour matched acrylic auto touch-in paint mixed by hand from MG Trophy Blue and MG Platinum Silver to the correct shade.

 B6C and Roller Bridge installed

The B6C looks such a good unit, it makes an obvious visual improvement, as it also does to the sustain and tone of the guitar.

Wilkinson WJ45 Machine Heads

 Bush added to the WJ45 unit for support

Gotoh SG381 locking machine heads 

Used on the Brian Setzer guitars

Gotoh SG381 Dimensions

 Straplocks were added to the 5420T 'Anniversary"

The Schaller Straplocks fitted to the Green 5420T guitar when the wood was damaged removing the old strap button posts, on the Chinese 5420T, the posts are left hand threaded into the wood, not right hand threaded as on the Korean and Japan guitars.

The straplocks are more convenient as they are quicker to put on or remove the guitar strap.

 G6118T Anniversary Plate

Plate part number

The Green 5420T in the 'Anniversary' 2-tone green looks great with this Gretsch Anniversary plate on the head stock. It adds the finishing touch to the head. I have a choice of Gotoh or Wilkinson machine heads to fit to the Green 5420T. 

 Anniversary Plate on the 5420T

Guitar Reviews 4U Gretsch Paint repairs - Gretsch G5420T examples shown

 

Guitar Reviews 4U Gretsch Paint repairs - Gretsch G5420T examples shown

Upgrading a guitar can leave you with new areas to paint match -

this is often tricky for existing metallic colours like this Fairlane Blue

So, you've upgraded some parts on your Gretsch guitar but this leaves you with a situation to overcome - that of matching repair paint to the original colour.

In this review, I'll show you how to match Gretsch colours to Fairlane Blue and to the Anniversary Green used on the 5420T guitars for the repairs.

Obtaining a perfect match to paints can be expensive for the amount needed and often the amount of paint needed is very small. 

On the 5420T in Fairlane Blue, I upgraded the open back machine heads to closed back Wilkinson WJ45 units you can see this review here on how I did that job. This left me with bare wood plug ends to disguise to the original paint colour.

Blue mix in a Bigsby B6C unit I did -

Acrylic car touch-in paint used

After drilling the new holes for the replacement Wilkinson units I plugged the original screw holes that were now not usable with hardwood cocktail sticks. Small wood plug pieces were glued in to flush level and left to dry.

Once I fitted the new machine heads, I then had the bare wood to cover. In this case I already had some car touch-in paints to hand to use but not a direct match, this was a Trophy blue acrylic paint for a 2004 MGTF car. I find the car acrylic touch-in paints are easy to use and dry quickly, working with cured poly and epoxy paint and cellulose.

Touched in Fairlane Blue on my 5420T

after fitting Wilkinson Machine Heads

I used a couple of drops of clear acrylic finish in the mixing palette and then toned this with the MG TF blue a small amount at a time, in this fashion you increase the colour depth in the clear carrier gradually until it matches. Its done a pretty good job here. 

Dark Green infilled B6C detail on my Gretsch 5420T upgrade

I upgraded my 5420t 2 tone Anniversary Green 5420T with a Bigsby B6C and you can read the story here. During this job also I replaced the strap buttons with strap locks and had to do a reinforcing repair to the strap button area nearest the neck which meant I needed to do repaint areas to chipped paint. 

My 1958 Cadillac Versailles Green Dietzler paints match!

for my Gretsch 5420T 2 tone Anniversary 5420T

Once I had done the repair to the inside of the body of the green 5420T guitar, I was left with an area where the paint had chipped away. The colour I needed I found was from Dietzler paints and although I did find some Du Pont cross reference, it would likely be tricky to get a pure match to the darker green on the 5420T. So I mixed my own by eye to suit.

5420T Versailles Green repair around the strap button area -

you can't see the new paint - so a successful job done

The Dietzler 1958 Cadillac paint chips 

On this darker green match for the 5420T, I noticed that the Versailles Green was a 'smoky' looking green and rather than just use a dark Racing Green type of shade and lighten it, I would blend up to the green shade I wanted.

The Versailles Green has 'yellow' tone to it rather than some of the green shades which have more of a  'Blue' tint to them.

I noted that a Ferguson Tractor Grey would be a good carrier base to tint up, so found a Ferguson T20 Grey which was a mid grey and could be tinted up with a dark green, for this I Green I used a Fraser Green I had modified the shade of slightly to paint garden bench ends. 

Both of these shades are UN1263 Synthetic Resin paint base used in vehicle restoration, the type it is also referred to as semi-cellulose in some places. 

For the final paint match, I put a small amount of the Ferguson Grey into a mixing palette and then using the Fraser Green, added small amounts into the Grey and mixed it around with a brush.

I checked the paint on a brush by eye to the Gretsch paint, until it matched and then painted in the repair areas on the guitar.

Once the paint had dried and hardened, after about 2 days, I carefully flatted the proud paint back to the level of the original paint using 1200grit wet and dry paper with water and washing up liquid to get the blend of paint levels. 

Once to level and dried, I gently polished the repair area with Farecla G3 rubbing compound to remove any surface swirl scratches and then used a clear autoglym resin polish to finish it off.

As you can see here, the paint match is invisible which is the intention! 

Paint matching to original paints can be done at home, but can be more challenging with some sparkle and candy finishes.

For the 5420T with clear tint coats like the Orange, I would use a Tamiya X-26 Orange Clear tinted into Tamiya Clear Coat. These paints are shown below

X26 Clear Orange and X22 Clear Coat acrylic paints

 

Guitar Reviews 4U - Gretsch 5420T Machine Heads upgrade to Wilkinson WJ45 machine head units

 

Guitar Reviews 4U - Gretsch 5420T Machine Heads upgrade

The Wilkinson WJ45 Machine Heads - I use the Chrome ones in this upgrade

I had been considering doing this upgrade on my 2016 Korean made 5420T for some time to replace the original units for improved tuning stability, its a straightforward job to do. 

I chose these units as they will fit the existing bushings and are 2 screw fixing - although I had to drill new holes. They also are based on the Kluson style units from the 1950's so look the job. 

A shame that Gretsch didn't use the the sealed units from the modern Streamliner 2420 guitars on the Electromatic as they are much better.

I had a set of Wilkinson WJ45 3 + 3 units to go on the guitar in my spare parts stock. They are also 2 screw fixing type and based on a Kluson style design with a better gear ratio than the ones on the guitar at present.

Remember to check any screw sizes before drilling! 

I am re-using the original screws that were on the guitar. 

Later guitars may have different sized screws. 

Always check the size twice before drilling!

The original unit left and the Wilkinson at right

Notice a moulded on collar on the original, more on that later!

Firstly, before removing a machine head unit I placed a small piece of masking tape under the machine head base lower side to ensure I had a straight line to work to after removing the original one. The original small holes for the baseplate do not match the hole spaces on the new WJ45 units so the old ones would have to be filled. 

I used a PZ1 Screwdriver to remove the screws and it fitted the ones on the guitar fine. (Take care here removing the screws and ensure your screwdriver really fits well as the last pack of WJ45's I got for another job didn't have any new screws or bushings in and small screw heads are easy to damage.) If you rip the screw head recess this creates a real headache to get the screw out!

The original unit left - Wilkinson Right -

Wilkinson with Stainless Bush as shown front.

Bush is 8mm OD Stainless tube bored to 6mm and 6mm tall

9mm OD Tube could be used for a tighter outside fit.

The Bushings in the Head stock were the same size as the new Wilkinson ones so I did not remove the old ones as the WJ45 posts fitted them fine, I did lube them carefully where the post touched the collar area.

I used cut down cocktail sticks to make filler plugs for the old holes that had to be filled as they did not line up to the holes on the baseplate of the new units. To do this cut off the sharpest part of a cocktail stick point at 3mm or 1/8" from the tip so there is still some taper on it, then using the original screw depth of 9mm, measure on and cut a c. 9mm filler plug from the stick to that length. This means you likely won't have any excess to trim off.

I used a small amount of PVA resin Wood Glue to glue the plugs in and this worked well - don't overpack the hole with glue as it may stop a tight fitting plug going in fully. I ensured the plugs were to the level of the headstock rear face by using the flat end of my scalpel blade holder to seat them flush.

One of the old screw holes is covered over by the new machine head under the plate on each new unit, but I decided to fill both old holes for each unit to make a good job of it. Once the new WJ45 machines are in place and the glue has had a day to dry out, I can paint match the exposed plugs.

Masking tape strip to help line up the new unit

I've done the E and A string units here.

I greased the new units before installing through the oil hole on the 

back cover. I used a light duty general auto chassis grease from a tube 

Having taken off the A string machine head I found that an order of removal would be needed here. When I test fitted a new WJ45 unit onto the headstock in to the A string position, I found that the WJ45 plate just sat on the E string baseplate of the old unit.

So I would have to also take the low E string unit off to get the clearance for fitting the new A unit, having firstly used a piece of marker tape placed for alignment purposes, before removing the old unit as you can see in the picture above. I found this method gave a clear run to the job and replaced the Low E and A string units together.

The original unit has a moulded collar to the baseplate - 

I will use a lathe to hold the string post and cut these collars off with a parting tool

and at the next string change, then install them with the WJ45 units

to give more support to the base of the post into the headstock

For the new screw holes, I used a 1.5mm drill with a piece of masking tape 9mm from the tip as my drill depth gauge - you don't want to drill through the headstock plate here! I drilled one hole, blew out any wood debris and partly screwed in one screw to the new unit, I lined up the baseplate snug against my tape line, checked that the post wasn't binding in the bush by giving the key a turn or two and then drilled the second hole using the baseplate to the tape as a guide.

All the new WJ45 machine heads fitted

Once the second hole was drilled and any debris removed from the hole, I took the unit out and gave the post shaft at the lower end a light coat of Brass instrument Key oil to help lube it where it contacted the bushing and then lubed the small screws with beeswax.

I retrospectively fitted these Stainless Steel Bushes as shown front

and on the Post of the WJ45 machine head at right

I retrospectively fitted Stainless Steel Bushes to the machine head Posts to prevent any lateral stress on the post - from it being pulled to one side by the string tension. 

The Headstock holes were 9mm width and having already pre-drilled the holes to mount the WJ45 units, I decided to go slightly undersize with 8mm OD Bushes to prevent binding of the Post inside the Bush in use, if the Post wasn't centred in the hole.

The Bushes have improved the sustain and made the keys easier to turn. 

If going from new with Stainless Steel Bushes, then you could use 9mm width Bushings made from Stainless Tube, if 9mm tube diameter isn't available you could get some 10mm thick wall tube as long as it has 6.5mm core space, that should fit the Posts. 

This thicker 10mm Tube can the be turned down on the outside to 9mm using a Lathe and cutting the Bushes to 7.5mm length. Grease the inside of the Bush and the post before fitting to the guitar. This way the unit will be a push fit and you can then drill the screw holes for the WJ45 units anew.

Stainless Steel won't corrode and a light car chassis general purpose Grease will last a long time and make the operation smoother.

In retrospect I recommend having these Bushes to hand before fitting the WJ45 units!

I installed the WJ45 units with the Bushes and screwed them down checking again that there was no binding of the bushing against the post. I was co-ordinating this upgrade with a string change so I didn't waste any strings in the job. 

Start with the the machine heads on the lower wound strings, firstly having detuned the guitar slightly to prevent too much uneven strain on the neck.

The rest of the high E, B and G string units were then replaced in the same fashion and holes filled.

The new WJ45 keys look in place here from the front and suit the headstock size

The button style of these is like the G6118 Anniversary style ones

So, that's the job done, and the guitar has some improved machine heads on. The WJ45 units have grease holes on the rear casing, I greased mine before use and turned them to distribute the grease around the gearing, then topped them off again.

I did consider fitting locking machine heads to this guitar but I think these Wilkinson ones will be adequate. Once I have the colour match on the wooden plugs, it will finish the job off.

With new D'Addario 10-46 strings fitted, the guitar sounded better than before.

The Wilkinson units are around £25 GBP a set and although inexpensive look and feel good in operation. I have fitted Gotoh versions to a Stratocaster without problems and they worked very well too.

Paint colour matched in - MGTF Trophy Blue base

added to clear lacquer to colour tint match with a brush

Guitar Reviews 4U - the Gretsch 5420T 2 Tone Green 'Anniversary Green' model review - China made - a fabulous guitar for the money!

 

A review of the Gretsch 5420T 2 Tone Green 'Anniversary' model

As the 6118 Anniversary gets hard to find, this is a suitable

alternative with great build quality and playability.

Pictured from the official Gretsch site.

The Gretsch 5420T 2 Tone Green 'Anniversary' model is a new edition of the 5420T in the popular Electromatic series guitar range. So lets give it a review.

I was looking to buy a 6118 Anniversary 2 tone green guitar but they are hard to find so I thought the 5420T would fit the bill, having previously owned a 6118 in green.

The 2 Tone Green on the 5420T is quite a hard colour to photograph -

Nice smoky green back and sides with a minty ice cream top

The 5420T harks back to when the Gretsch 5120 kicked off the move to provide a popular Gretsch 6120 style guitar in an affordable format around 2008. Like Fender with Squier, this was a genius move by Gretsch.

It immediately put an affordable Gretsch 6120 style guitar in your hands, without breaking the bank. And effectively impacted the marketplace presence of similarly Gretsch looking guitars made for boutique companies such as Alden, Vintage, Hutchings and Eastwood.

The Ditzler' Paints 1958 Cadillac paint swatch shows the two colours on this guitar

Building on this success, the 5420T guitars emerged around 2012 and were refined over the years with small detail changes, including a number of limited edition special colour editions being released onto the market.

The Ditzler  'Gretsch shade' paint chips matching the 5420T

The game changer for the 5420T was the Fairlane Blue model made in Korea that really took the guitar world by storm in 2016. Recently a new 5420T colour combination based on the old 6118 Anniversary 2 tone green guitar was launched. Having owned a Terada made green 6118 I was interested! And seeing the 6118's are now hard to find and wanting one, I thought I'd look at a 5420T in this colour configuration.

Ditzler's 42260 Acadian Green top with a 42261 Versailles Green back and sides

The DuPont codes for these colours are 246-92001 and 202-912151

In recent years, the 5420T moved from Korean production and production is now done in China. So, also owning a Korean made Fairlane blue 5420T, I was curious to see how this new Chinese made guitar fared. I'll review the two side by side in another review posting.

The 'minty Ice Cream' Acadia green on a 1958 Cadillac

This 2 tone 5420T green guitar was purchased on-line from Peach Guitars in Essex and I'll review their shop later in another review but please visit the link and check out their range, they offer great service and very competitive prices. They are a proper old school guitar shop that cares about the guitars they supply their customers.

The Versailles 'smoke green' rear aspect of the 5420T

Unboxing the new 5420T 'Anniversary' Green guitar I was amazed at the quality of the guitar, both in terms of the build quality and finish. Given that it has 2 paint shades, this was very nicely finished with no uneven paintwork even where the two paint colours met, it might be unfair to compare this guitar to a Gretsch made in the Terada Japan factory, but against those it really does hold its own.

The post-2015 revised smaller headstock -

more 'Gretschy' sized than the larger one of the earlier 2008 on Electromatics

Hardware is an area that is adequately done on the 5420T but the buying price allows you to upgrade these parts, which is something I have done on my previous Electromatic guitars.

The machine heads were found to be quite sound despite being inexpensive. The Streamliner in comparison has closed machine heads, geared with a good ratio, I found them very good. (On my Korean 5420T they have started to wear so I will replace them with the Wilkinson WJ45 ones as the screw holes are a near fit).

I previously owned a 6118 Anniversary and I must say that the 5420T 'version' of it having the bound F holes, neck sides and headstock looks better for the binding and is an advantage in protecting the guitar and makes it look more finished.

The 6118 in comparison looked rather 'incomplete' I felt without the binding.

Open backed 'Waverley' type Machine heads - as on the Anniversary -

the 5420T machines are worth upgrading with closed Wilkinson WJ45 Kluson 3+3 ones

The paintwork on the 5420T is quite amazing as I have stated. It was often like that seen on cars of that era that could be purchased with 2 tone complementary colour schemes.

Gretsch was one of the first companies, as was Fender to visit the automotive paint colour charts for inspiration. The 6118 Green shades combination has continued on this 5420T edition and I think it is a superb choice of well suited colours.

Wilkinson WJ45 'Kluson' style  3+3 Machine heads -

a 2 screw fixing like the Electromatic 'Waverley' type

A good upgrade for your G5420T and not expensive

Our guitar here is finished in the two shades of Green, seen on the 1958 Ditzler Cadillac colours chart and looks great, but is hard to photograph to get the lighter green really show the true colour. Once you see one in real life you'll love it! 

I have adjusted the colour of the top in the picture below to a more realistic representation.

Colour adjusted to how it looks depending on your screen - 

With a B6C Bigsby it will improve the look!

Pickups are plug to plug wiring making assembly easier

See my upgrade of this guitar here

The guitar for the review had been set up well by Peach Guitars and even came with a Q card showing it had been checked, acoustically the guitar sounds bright and seems slightly lighter in weight than my Korean 5420T in blue. Sadly, a number of retailers cut corners by not setting up guitars, it is not difficult to do. Recent previous buying experiences showed this up.

The Gretsch 5420T from Peach Guitars

The C shape neck on this 5420T does not seem much different in profile to the U shape on the Korean one I own, even down to the thickness at the nut. The body is around 2mm thinner on this Chinese made 5420T than my Korean 5420T, the measurements all round though seem very similar. The Chinese 5420T does have trestle bracing, perhaps adding to the brighter sound.

The Gretsch 5420T 3 way selector switching

The fretboard is Laurel on this guitar and I did oil it well before giving it a play, I have noticed on the new Gretsch guitars of late that the first few plays of them leaves you with dirty fingers on the fretting hand, I am not sure if the strings were original from the factory but they sounded ok, I will replace them in any case in my upgrade project.

The B60 Bigsby works well -

I will upgrade to a B6C to make it more like the 6118T Anniversary guitar

The black top Broadtron Pickups fitted are new FT5E uprated units (which like the Brian Setzer signature pickups) in comparison to a standard Filtertron, are brighter sounding than the standard fare or in this case against the Korean FT5E types on my Fairlane Blue 5420T.

The smoke green with lighter green top colour scheme

Plugged in the new guitar like my 6120 Hotrod in Candy Blueburst sounds really great, the sound is 'woody filtertron' with a nice clear sound all round even on the neck pickup, but more inclined to a single coil clear treble sound. Its unmistakably a Gretsch sound still.

The Trestle Bracing and the new pickup version does seem to make the sound brighter.

The neck and middle switch position (which can often sound muddy) are clear and with a bit more treble edge than you normally find on the previous FT5E pickups, the bridge pickup has a more cutting sound, but without sounding fragile or thin.

At around 4.9k output the pick ups sound nice and not tinny or thin.

A really great specification for the price tag

I tend to play a clean sounding guitar and testing the guitar against a Barney Kessel track playing along, the new 5420T sounded the part. Chords and single note playing were sounding good, although I will give the action a final adjustment to my taste when it has settled down. 

Peach Guitars did a good job on the setup - unlike the guitar shop I purchased a previous Gretsch this year from, that one had not been checked at all. So top marks for Peach Guitars for their efforts.

A great addition is this Anniversary nameplate for the 6118

The Bigsby B60 vibrato works well but I do prefer the B6C version, see my review of and upgrade on my other Electromatics to the Bigsby B6C unit here. 

I found the B60 worked on this guitar nicely and stayed quite well in tune, given the strings may not be completely new. I have a B6C ready to fit which will make it look more like the 6118T and improve the appearance.

This really sets off the headstock!

The 5420T retails with a retail price at around £899 GBP although I have seen an RRP of £1040 quoted in one place and this guitar was on offer at £673 GBP including delivery and I was very pleased with this deal, having paid about £550 for my blue 5420T in lightly used but as new  condition in 2016 when the Korean made guitars were often around £750 GBP. Delivery was quick and it was very well packed for shipping.

The green 5420T is when taken overall with considerations such as price and specification a very nice guitar, sounds good, looks the part and is open to upgrading if you desire. Certainly at the deal price, it leaves you a lot of scope and headroom to upgrade.

Get the 6118 look for Electromatic money

For those looking for an occasional arch top for example for band use and can't justify a pro series Gretsch, buy this. Even as another guitar in your collection, it will open up possibilities perhaps to other musical styles. 

It is good value for money, the build and finish are excellent even at this ticket price and it does play and sound the part. The striking colour stands out too. 

My template for lining up the Nameplate -

made from 2mm artboard card

the spacing was 46mm wide by 15mm tall

15mm was the spacing measurement on my 6120 Hot Rods

between the Gretsch name and the Nameplate

For those finding the 5420T body deeper than they prefer, try out the 5422 type guitars, more in line with a 335 style and even played by established artists.

So, overall I have no real issues with the guitar and it looks plays and sounds great, for the money it is a really reasonably priced Gretsch guitar. They have really done a good job on this edition. Its a winner. 

Thanks to Peach Guitars for a great buying experience.

I have now done an upgrade on the guitar with the B6C Bigsby and Roller Bridge.

And with the new Bigsby with green paint in-filling, below

This 5420T in 2 Tone Anniversary Green is a great guitar, 6118 Anniversary guitars are hard to find used and this is what prompted me to buy this 5420T version, with a few simple upgrades you get a much improved guitar. The colours really grab the attention too.