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 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