Frankenstein

The cheeky answer to this is to watch dealers as these replica editions are often discounted, you could pick it up for a mere $14,000!

However here's the nitty gritty from Harmony Central;

"The guitar that appears on the cover of Van Halen was Eddie's first "super guitar." He bought a factory-second guitar body for $50 and a neck for $80, made in 1975. This new guitar body came pre-routed for three single-coil pickups, so Van Halen took up a chisel and soldering iron to install a fat-sounding humbucking pickup from an older semi-hollow body guitar, rotating it slightly to accommodate the wider string spacing of the original Fender bridge.

In an unintentional stroke of genius borne out of necessity, Eddie conceived of the idea of dipping the humbucking pickup into an empty Yuban coffee can full of molten paraffin wax to reduce feedback once the wax cooled and solidified, a technique now known as "potting" a pickup. He also adjusted the vibrato bridge plate to lie flat against the body, preventing upward bends while increasing tuning stability. Also to his preference, the unfinished neck was wider and flatter; Eddie also replaced the original frets with larger fret wire.

It was this guitar body that first received the distinctive and soon-to-be-iconic striped paint job; Van Halen sprayed it with black and white Schwinn® acrylic lacquer bicycle paint. He cut out and mounted his own homemade black pickguard, covering the neck and middle pickup routings, and installed a single master volume knob (although the knob itself, famously, was a "Tone" knob), brass nut and an original Fender tremolo tailpiece.

Although it didn't take long to build, and although the whole shebang cost him less than $150, this was the guitar that would change the world. It became Van Halen's main instrument for the first several albums and tours, and he soon striped it one last time and added a top coat of red; with the addition of orange and red truck reflectors, Eddie was now complete in creating one of the most iconic guitars in rock 'n' roll history.

During Van Halen's second world tour, he replaced the original tremolo with an odd device—a prototype locking tremolo system built by Seattle designer Floyd Rose. To fill the gap between the top surface of the guitar body and the bottom side of the tremolo plate, Eddie's modest-but-efficient solution was to permanently mount a quarter under the unit's top-back side. A succession of replacement necks all maintained the use of Schaller® tuners after Van Halen broke the original neck."

"The maple fingerboard has a 12" to 16" compound radius, with 21 Dunlop® 6100 jumbo frets. The guitar features a Seymour Duncan® Custom Shop EVH® humbucking pickup, with a single master volume knob (that says "Tone") mounted on a single-ply partial black pickguard, identical to the original. Other features include Schaller® tuners, aged chrome hardware, and a limited edition, fully "relic-ed" EVH® road case. Leaving no stone unturned, the guitar is complete with a non-functional three-way switch and single-coil pickup that occupy two of the three pickup routs."

But wait, Eddie also tinkered with his amps and his sound has been emulated by amp modellers. For instance my Behringer Vamp2 has a model called 'Custom Hi-Gain' based on the 1969 50w Marshall Plexi modified by Jose Arrendondo for Van Halen, I think Marshall still have an amp in their range that comes close to this custom vintage amp.

The Edge's sound comes from the clean Vox AC30 amplifier and yet again the Vamp2 has several presets that allow you instant access to a U2 sound.

However to truly emulate your hero I guess you need to get into scratch building guitars and see what results. Bootlegger & guitardocphil should be able to give tips on hot-rodding etc.

Hi Guys,
Thanks for the input.  I'm a novice guitar player so I'm not expecting to pick up any guitar and sound like Eddie Van Halen, I've only been playing for 5 months.  I do practice everyday but at my age (40), I'm not looking to be a rock star, I play for the enjoyment of it after years of thinking I could never do it because it would be too hard.  My interest in a mass produced cheaper version of his guitar is would be more of an homage to someone who gave me a lot of joy growing up than an expectation of sounding like him.  To answer your other question Bootleger my budget would not be very considerable at this point in time.
Thanks,
EF

It all depends on your skill level and strat kits can be had for $125.00 (basswood) $175.00 (alder) $229.00 for (american made Alder or Swamp ash). Then you have a Seymour Duncan pick up (they are winding pickups for the 59 P.A.F. type as EV'S) assembly, paint, new pick guard and pots. The pick up will cost about as much as the kit. This also keep in mind with the standard vintage tremolo in the kit, Eddie later got a Floyd Rose and routed a 1/4" recess to accomidate the string height of the Floyd and put a brass nut. But as Jaygordon75 said you can retrofit an existing guitar. Find a red or white strat in a pawn shop, place some electrical tape all over it change the pickup and you have a imitation EVH frankenstein. What are you going to do with the $24,600.00 you just saved .

Bootlegger.