For many years I had my eye on the Vigier Excalibur Shawn Lane signature guitar. Shawn was one of my favorite players and I loved his tone. After owning mine for 8 years, I don’t think I will ever sell it.
While researching the Vigier I noticed few videos or in depth reviews so I thought I would put this one together. So if you are in the market for a guitar that has a completely flat fingerboard, extremely low action and basically plays itself, read on.
The Vigier Shawn Lane signature guitar is loaded with many innovative features and signature touches that make this guitar stand out among all the rest. So is this the one for you?
Vigier’s build quality
Vigier guitars are not well known in the states but well known elsewhere. The craftsmanship of their guitars is top quality in every aspect and is up there with brands like Suhr, PRS and Tom Anderson. Every Vigier guitar is handmade custom out of France.
As they are not mass produced this means that every guitar can be verified individually by skilled luthiers. With their hands and their eyes, they make sure nothing is overlooked. And with your hands you’ll feel it!
Alder, maple, or ash wood can be selected for your guitar’s body and is dried naturally for years before being cut. The body is made up of only 2 center-joined pieces. Not 4, or even 7 like other makers.
A shielder is sprayed inside the electronic cavity as well as on the pickguard to reduce hum when playing at high volumes. Wiring of the pickups is meticulously done with most guitars coming with DiMarzio pickups and Switchcraft parts.
Vigier Shawn Lane specs
Here are the specs taken directly from Vigiers website.
Type: Solid body
Number of strings: 6
Neck
Type: Bolt-on featuring the 10/90 System
Wood: Maple naturally dried for 3 years
Shape: D
Finish: Matte varnish
Width of neck at nut: 42mm / 1.65″
Width of neck at last fret: 56,5mm / 2.22″
Depth of neck at first fret: 19,5mm / .76″
Depth of neck at 12th fret: 23mm / .90″
String spacing at nut: 35mm / 1.38″
String spacing at bridge: 53mm / 2.08″
Action as supplied at 12th fret, treble: 0,7 mm / .0275″
Action as supplied at 12th fret, bass: 1,0 mm / .0393″
Type of nut: Teflon nut + hardened zero fret technology
Fingerboard
Wood: Rosewood
Radius: Flat fingerboard
Type of frets: Medium
Number of frets: 24 + zero fret
Scale length: 630 mm / 24.8″
Inlay: Dots
Body
Wood: Two center-joined pieces of solid, naturally aged alder.
Finish: Varnish dries for 5 weeks’ minimum
Accessories
Machine heads brand name: Vigier
Type of machine heads: Oversized locking machine heads
Bridge brand name: Vigier
Type of bridge: 2011 non locking tremolo, pivoting on needles bearings
End pin: Brass casing that inserts deep into the body and locks the strap button in place.
Finish: Chrome
Electronic
Pickup brand name: DiMarzio
Type of pickup: H/S/H
Pickup model: Air Classic/FS1/Air Classic
Switch: 5 positions
Controls: Volume
Tone
Pickup selector:
1 Humbucker in neck position
2 Single-coil in neck & middle position
3 Single-coil in neck & bridge position
4 Single-coil in bridge & middle position
5 Humbucker in bridge position
Shielding: Yes
Miscellaneous
Weight: 3.5Kg / 7.7LBS
No traditional metal truss rod in the neck
As with all Vigier guitars the neck is designed with a unique dense carbon strip taking the place of the traditional metal truss rod.
“This exclusive advanced concept of 10% carbon and 90% wood replaces the traditional metal truss rod with a dense carbon strip to reinforce the neck. This concept makes the neck strong and stable during climate change. We never believed it was logical to drill a hole through a neck and then insert a rod of metal inside.
Because wood necks vibrate, they can absorb the energy of the string and shorten sustain. The 10/90 neck is solid, notes ring longer and your sound is precise and powerful.”
That’s right, no constant adjusting of your guitar’s neck. I have owned the guitar for 8 years and have not had to do a thing to the action. It has been through major climate changes. Many times I pick it up and it is still in perfect tune.
D shape neck with 24 stainless steel frets
The neck is a very comfortable “D shape” maple neck with a Rosewood fingerboard and 24 medium stainless steel frets. This does not include the “zero fret.”
The neck is similar to an Ibanez but slightly thicker. The stainless steel frets will not ware out nearly as fast as regular nickel.
A mat varnish finish is applied and all frets have hand rolled edges giving the neck a smooth feel in your hand. The hand rolled frets may seem like a small detail but you can really feel the difference!
And with its 24.5-inch scale large stretches are easier on the hands.
Purpose of the “zero” fret
A zero fret has always been fitted on Vigier guitars. This slightly higher fret’s role is to even open or fretted string notes, ensure perfect string height, minimize string friction and help avoid detuning, especially when using the tremolo.
I have not had to replace the zero fret as it is made out of a long lasting hard material. But it is easily removable after removing your strings. The zero fret combined with a completely flat fingerboard allows the guitar to have a much lower action than other guitars.
Zero radius, completely flat fretboard
One major feature that sets this guitar apart is the zero radius, completely flat fretboard. Normally your guitars fingerboard has a convex arc to fit the natural curve of your fingers. The shape of that arc is the fingerboard radius (sometimes called fretboard radius).
Fingerboard radius is the curvature of the fingerboard across the neck, from the lowest string to the highest string.
And just like the radius of a circle, it can be described by a number. In this case the number is zero because the fingerboard is completely flat from the lowest string to the highest.
Most guitars have a particular radius to the fretboard giving each guitar a slightly different feel. A rounder radius tends to be comfortable for playing chords, bar chords and tends to follow the natural curve of your fingers better. While a flatter radius gives you a consistent and even playing surface for string bending and faster playing.
To learn more about fingerboard radius, check out this article by Sweetwater
When Shawn designed this guitar he wanted a completely flat fretboard because it allows for much lower action. Many of Shawn’s techniques required doing a “hammer on from nowhere” where a note is played with the left hand and no pick.
The lower the action the easier it is to play with this kind of technique. So, if you love guitars with low action this is as low as it gets.
Before purchasing I tried to find something similar to a flat fingerboard. The only guitar that was “supposed to be similar” was a classical acoustic. Since most classicals have a very flat fretboard I thought I could get a good idea of what this guitar felt like.
After purchasing the Vigier, that proved to be only slightly accurate. Classical guitars have much wider necks and string spacing.
The only thing that translated from the classical acoustic to the Vigier was the feel of bar chords. It is slightly harder to do bar chords on a flat fingerboard. But don’t let that scare you away from it, after a while you don’t even notice it. The flat radius makes the neck insanely fast and comfortable.
From simple chords to face melting solos, the flat fretboard and super low action provides added control and makes this guitar a joy to play.
The body
The Vigier Shawn Lane model is very light weight weighing in at 3.5Kg / 7.7LBS. You will be able to play for hours while wearing a strap with no muscle pain.
Because of its body design, it could be considered a “super Strat”. So if you love Strats the contoured Strat-style body will give you instant comfort and a familiar feel.
The guitar is manufactured with two different body styles with all other specs remaining the same. The basic design is a body made of two center-joined pieces of solid, naturally aged alder. The “master” has the body designed in flamed alder instead. There is around a $400 price difference between the two guitars so you can decide if the flamed finish is worth the difference.
Restringing the guitar
Restringing the Vigier Shawn Lane guitar could not be easier. Although this guitar has an excellent trem system that we will talk about later, it does not have a locking nut. The annoying locking nut is replaced with locking tuners!
This makes it very easy to change strings since you do not have to worry about removing the locking nut with a wrench. The locking tuners are easy to tighten and untighten with the use of large thump screws.
To restring the guitar just pull the new string in to the tuning key hole until it has tension on it. Then tighten the thumb screw so that the locking tuner grips the string. No need to wrap the string around multiple times as The locking tuner holds it tightly in place. Just cut your remaining wire off and you are good to go.
The excellent stability of Vigiers trem system
Vigier has their own patented designed trem system that pivots on ball bearings instead of knife edges. Traditional knife edges ware down over time causing tuning issues. When the edges ware out, the trem cannot return to its original position because of friction.
I have seen this on older guitars that have had a lot of trem use and the only fix is to replace the entire system. Vigier’s ball bearings can turn 10,000 times per minute so are impossible to ware and they give the trem a smooth feel.
There is no locking nut so no unscrewing with an allen wrench when you have to tune! Now where did you put that small allen wrench again?
Instead The excellent tuning stability comes from the locking machine heads that are precisely aligned with the strings and the zero fret that eliminates friction at the nut. This means when you use the trem it will always return to its original position.
Vigier also created their own string tree called a Flexretainer. String trees are normally used to keep the strings from jumping out of the nut. Vigier’s string retainer is an actual eyelet that floats in the headstock of the guitar, for the E and B strings. This also provides zero friction when using the tremolo and helps with tuning stability.
Another important detail, is the short distance between the bridge saddle and where the string is anchored. Each saddle can be locked into position once intonation is set and a small roller is located at the string break point to minimize friction.
The trem on this guitar stays in tune very well and I use it constantly for adding vibrato to notes and chords. The trem can be set up to be floating or rest against the body. So if doing vibrato with the trem isn’t your thing it can be set up to be like a strat.
While the trem can float you can’t pull up on it very far, maybe a half step or so. So if you are looking to pull up two whole steps like Steve Vai this may not be the guitar for you.
The trem stays in tune extremely well even when doing dive bombs. But as I don’t use the trem aggressively for that kind of thing I can’t say how well it works for extreme use. But I suppose it would work well.
Pickups and wiring
“Before any pickup is mounted on an Excalibur it’s entirely controlled. Each pole is adjusted so that it has a balanced output level. Another small but important detail is that most standard humbuckers have two adjustment screws, but we took the time to add a third screw so that height or tilt adjustments can be made easily and an equal distance between the strings and the coils can be achieved.”
The Vigier Shawn Lane comes in a standard HSH configuration with DiMarzio pickups: Air Classic in the neck, FS1 in the middle, and Air Classic in the bridge. The controls are simple with a volume, tone control and a 5-way pickup selector. And like a strat, the volume control is easily accessible for quick pinky volume swells. You can select or combine the pickups in the following ways
1 Humbucker in neck position
2 Single-coil in neck & middle position
3 Single-coil in neck & bridge position
4 Single-coil in bridge & middle position
5 Humbucker in bridge position
Instead of having just the middle pickup alone (position 3), the 5-way switch has been wired to connect the bridge and neck pickup together. This is a clever wiring scheme because if wired to run alone the single pickup would be lower in volume and introduce some hum.
So how does the Vigier Shawn Lane sound?
When playing with a clean tone the PAF Classic in the neck provides a very round tone without getting muddy. Turning the tone knob down a bit will give you an excellent tone for jazz and ballads. And with overdrive the neck pickup remains clear and mellow providing a nice singing sustain.
The Air Classic in the bridge gives you a nice defined clean tone that is not to bright. With overdrive it is well balanced, punchy and provides great sustain.
The other middle positions give you different configurations using the middle FS-1 single-coil pickup in combination with a split single coil from either the bridge or neck pickup. All three positions give you an excellent bell like tone for RMB or funk.
The pickup positions that I seem to use the most are the neck and bridge as I find them to be the most useful. I do find these pickups can sound a bit bright and thin so I do roll off the tone knob a bit. The pickups are the only thing that most do not find to their liking.
I would recommend changing out the stock pickups especially if you are looking for more gain. The stock DiMarzio pickups are pretty low output. Apparently some of the extra brightness has to do with the 1meg pots of the electronics. The guitar does sound good as is but I will change out the pots and pickups just to see how the tone changes.
Here are a few demos of the guitar.
Consider getting strap locks
For such a high quality guitar you would be doing yourself a favor by purchasing a cheap set of strap locks. Consider them as good insurance in case your regular strap decided to slip off. Ask me how I know… luckily I caught mine before it hit the floor! And yes I am referring to the Vigier!
You can easily purchase a cheap set of strap locks from Zzounds
check them out here
Any purchases that are made through links on our site helps to support us at no extra cost to you.
Where to purchase
Vigier has a dealer list on their website. If anyone is close enough to your location, I would recommend giving the guitar a test drive before purchasing. Unless you are like me and already knew this was the guitar for you. 🙂
Final thoughts
It is said that with this guitar you will love it or hate it. If you bond with it, you will never sell it even if you have many other guitars. Even though you should change the stock pickups, the exceptionally high quality build along with its unique features make the Vigier Shawn Lane signature an instrument worth keeping for the long hall.
If you have any questions about this guitar post them in the comments.
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