Jackson Pro Series Mark Heylmun RR24-7

I was interested of buying this guitar since it was announced. There is not that many Jackson RR 7 string models out there.

I loved black / gold combination. Also Fishman pick ups is feature that i have been interested to try.

When i received package, it got pretty big hole in it and had to check it, but luckily Thomann's box was only thing damaged and guitar was fine. Big thanks for Thomann for double packing.

I write music mostly in D standard tuning, so first thing was tuning guitar to D standard and at first i was worried that guitar got some major intonation problems. I couldn't get it stay in tune. I noticed factory strings were somewhat thin, i think 009-52 set. When i tightened nut bolts, it caused strings to go somewhat out of tune, so much tuning from bridge screws was really hard, as i ended up turning them all the way in.

So i went and got me a set of 010-58. And it was like magic. Maybe 30 minutes later, guitar stays in tune very well and intonation was spot on. Didn't have to adjust at all. No matter how hard i do dive bombs and use whammy it keeps the tuning solidly.

Only thing i did was adjusting bridge height little higher because action was little too low, and there was some string buzz.

Fishman pick ups are really good specially for high gain extreme metal. Really hot output with minimum noise. Having two sounds modes with them is good feature. Neck is solid, much faster and easier to play than my previous Jeff Loomis Signature Schecter.

Overall this is guitar of my dreams and i am really happy with it. 10/10 from me.

The guitar looks amazing and is great to play. Quality control seems good and I found no visual defects or marks anywhere on the guitar, although the volume pot and jack nuts were a little loose, no biggie.

However, there is one thing that I need to address and that is the string thickness. I tuned to drop G and wanted to go with a .074" string but quickly found out that the floyd rose saddle is not made to accomodate such strings. The saddle groove is too tight and shallow and the string never seats in the groove at all, resulting in bad intonation and tuning instability. Also the string holding block that is screwed against the string, is too thick and any string larger than .070" won't go deep enough in the hole. I first tried a .074" and it unwound itself from the tremolo after 15 minutes of playing.

I contacted Jackson support, who in turn contacted Floyd Rose support and received an official answer that the maximum thickness that is accepted is an .062" string, which is really silly to be honest. Rumors say that Floyd Rose can hook you up with an custom saddle piece to accept thicker strings. I filed the saddle groove and string holding block and now the bridge happily accepts an 0.74 string. Also, the tuner peg can take around .074" string, a .078" won't go through it without drilling it larger first.

All in all, a great guitar but beware that the maximum string thickness is around .062" if you do not buy custom saddle or modify the existing one.

The Jackson Pro Series Mark Heylmun RR24-7 plays as good as it looks. None of the photos does this guitar justice. The gold hardware and the guitars shape gives it both a beautiful and menacing presence.

Sound:
The Fishman Fluence modern pick-ups gives you a pro sound straight out of the box. I was so surprised by the lack of noise that I thought a had a noise gate in my chain. They thump on the transient notes and stay quite on the pauses creating a insane punch. Sustain is however not a issue as you can boost the gain on your amp and still keep all your clarity.

Features:
Having played various V shapes over the years this is the first V that I have played that has perfect access to the 24th fret. You can comfortably sweep from the 24th fret without any obstruction. This is due to the fact that the guitar has a shredders cutaway behind the neck.
The guitar also features a belly cut away that furthers the comfort in playing the guitar. The neck plays incredibly smooth and fast.
The Floyd Rose stays in tune and I have not had any issues.

Quality:

The guitar came all the way to South Africa and was still perfectly setup straight out of the box. The frets are worked of as smooth as butter. And the finish feels extremely high end. Only thing that detracts from the quality is the volume knob moves a bit to easy so you have to check every now and then that you did not knock the volume down.

Conclusion:
If you are looking for a seven string I would highly suggest you go for this guitar. I was fortunate enough to get the Ibanez XPTB 720- bkf a month before this guitar and I can honestly say this guitar blows it out of the water in all aspects. The combination of the looks, playabillty and the pick-ups makes this a must have.

As soon as I saw that Jackson made a 7 string Rhoads I knew I had to get it. I've seen some of the bad press Jackson's QC has been getting online but the guitar I got is flawless and easily feels on par with other high quality guitars in the same range or even higher. I could not spot any noticeable QC issues and the guitar feels really smooth to play. It has no neck dive, the neck is thin and the Floyd is stable. I always associated Fishmans with a proggy djent tone but they can dial in pretty much any metal tone and give a high output active tone with a lot of clarity

I feel its lacking in some minor features like stainless steel frets, flush mount straplocks, stainless steel hardware on the Floyd, locking tuners, and satin back on the neck that many brands like Schecter, LTD and Solar have in a similar guitars. But given the price I got it for on Thomann was around 1100 USD, which is significantly lower than the standard 1600 USD price tag, I was okay with losing some small features since it beat out most competitors in price. Another downside is that the Rhoads shape is not the most comfortable to play while sitting down

Overall, I think if you want a pointy shaped 7 string with a Floyd this is one of the best options on the market (options are pretty limited) and it's Thomann price beats out most other similar guitars like Schecter SLS Elite, Dave Davidson Warrior and Ibanez Xiphos, so losing some minor features isn't a big deal