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The Mike Candidus MSS Edition Custom Guitar:


This great looking custom guitar body was made for Mike Candidus and features construction
of a spalted maple top, butternut back wings, wenge wood center trim, and a butternut control cover. The neck is a Moses Graphite headless, and the bridge is an original T-Trem
transposing tremolo unit.

Not seen here, but the head piece (a drop D unit made by Phil Langley) works really well
and was ordered with the neck at the time (he makes them for Bass as well, and I've installed
them on a few basses already, and they work great).

The edge is protected by tortoise shell style binding, and the maple along with some walnut
veneer trim sandwiched between the top and the back yield a stunning edge affect.

The pickups are passive Seymour Duncans, and they never disappoint you!

Style and comfort combined with the warmth of richly grained wood!

The Danish oiled finish provides a satiny smooth soft luster that brings out the beauty of wood grain, and provides protection and appealing good looks. High gloss finishes are nice, but
nothing compliments fine wood as well as an oiled finish! The back also features a cavity
control cover matching the butternut wings -- death to plastic!

The weight of this instrument is light and well balanced by the combination of the woods
selected, and results in an extremely comfortable guitar with excellent sustain and tone, & feel.
The spalted maple top brightens the sound and the looks!

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Mike's Review:
Bill,

Great job!, I love it!!

Its a heavy little thing but it seems to balance well on the strap, I had a chance to play it loud for a
half an hour& it sounds great! (the most important thing right)Its a little intimidating though because the neck feels strange the seventh fret (b) feels like it should be the fifth fret (a) W/out the headstock, I have to get use to it all over again & thats the fun part. I haven't putzed around w/ the bridge yet but the dhead drops to d# no biggie, the body itself is a masterpiece its so pretty I'm afraid to scuff it up.

I LOVE IT!

THANK YOU VERY MUCH! EXCELLENT WORK!
Mike

Bill's Reply:
This was my first experience with a T-Trem, and while it worked beautifully in regular mode, I
could not get the transposing feature to work correctly. This being an older unit, I was not sure of the cause, but Mike later sent it off to Peekamoose, and they made some repairs and adjustments to the guitar and the bridge, and Mike changed out the neck for an original Steinberger one. There had been some suspicion that the different graphite compounds may have affected the performance of T-Trem, but I understand that with the newer compounds there is no concern about this any more. I'm working on another guitar that will feature a new T-Trem unit and a Steinberger original neck, and I will work together with Peekamoose to ensure that there are no surprises with this one. Regardless, Mike's guitar was a fun and challenging project and it turned out great!

Notes: Seymour Duncan, Moses Graphite, Phil Langley, Peekamoose, and Steinberger, etc. are registered trade names of the manufacturers and are not affiliated with Wilkat Guitars in any way.

Spalted Maple: For those of you who don't know, spalted maple is maple that has a splendid looking grain with lines that often resemble ink lines, and variance in the colour within the same piece. These are caused by a fungus that is a natural occurrence. This variety of maple tends to be a bit more brittle than eastern or figured maple, but has become very popular as a top wood for guitars and basses.

Special Thanks to Ned Steinberger for his words of wisdom, & for creating the "original" Steinberger guitars, tuners, and bridges. His ingenious designs will live on!