Another project guitar – my third (I sold the first). I got the body from ebay – a nice two-piece walnut body.
It was built by somebody “known”, but I can’t recall who. It’s signed in the neck pocket, but I can’t read it.
The first neck I used I got from someone locally. It was solid rosewood with stainless steel frets – a real beauty. I could never get used to the 1 5/8″ nut width though.
I got a used Mighty Mite neck off of ebay and that neck has made all the difference. I know it’s a lower quality neck, but it is really comfortable. I love playing that guitar now. So much so, that I took the Kinman pickups out of my Fender American Strat and put them in this guitar. I also put in a ’59 Jr. in the bridge instead of the Hot Rails. Originally I put a hot wound set of GFS pickups, which actually sounded really good.
When I got the body it had a pretty thick, gloppy finish on it. I’m not sure what type. I was going to strip it off. When I began sanding it, the body started looking real nice. Not factory gloss nice, but very natural nice. I ended up sanding just enough to thin out the finish and get the drips and such out and I think it looks great. I thought putting a “relic” pickguard and controls on this guy would look good, so I tried to figure out how to do that.
I took the pickguard (a new inexpensive one), pickup covers and knobs and follow some directions I found on the internet. I soaked them in super-strong coffee for two or three days. Don’t try that. It’s a waste of time. As soon as I wiped the parts the brown patina came right off. I used a 3M pad (or is it Scotch??) to scuff the parts up a bit and tried again. Not much better. I tried tea next. Slightly better, but still not what I wanted. I tried coffee grounds directly on the parts. Nope. Finally, I got an old basin from the garage that had who knows what in it. I poured in a little Minwax wood stain and I let it sit for a day or two. The basin had dirt in it and remnants of many other projects that hadn’t been cleaned out. The parts were kind of sticky when I took them out, but the color was great. I let them dry out and then wiped them down and this time it kept looking pretty good. I used the 3M pad to put some “wear” into the parts and to my eye it looked every bit as authentic as most relics I’ve seen. Let me just say – the idea of paying extra for a fake relic is insane to me. Just my opinion.
Notice the color difference between the white paper towel and the pickguard. When I started the pickguard was just as white as the paper towel.
Ultimately, I swapped out the “relic’d” parts when I swapped pickups. The main reason is that I was not about to relic a set of Kinman Pickups. They are way too expensive. I could have swapped the pickup covers, but the ’59 Jr would still have been bright white and would have looked weird. By then I also had an old MOTS pickguard that had been naturally aged by smokey bars, so I used that.
I put the same switching system in that I had in my American Strat – a Mega Switch from Stew-Mac wired so the middle position is neck-bridge instead of the usual middle pickup only. I love the neck-bridge combination, and most strats don’t have it. The Mega switch lets you do that without changing how the guitar works or looks – no extra switches and no push-pull pots, which I’ve never been too keen on. Here are some sound samples:
Walnut Guitar – Neck Pickup (Kinman AVn Blues)
Walnut Guitar – Neck & Middle Pickup (Both Kinman AVn Blues)
Walnut Guitar – Neck & Bridge (Kinman AVn Blues and Seymour Duncan ’59 Jr.)
Walnut Guitar – Middle & Bridge Pickup (Kinman AVn Blues and Seymour Duncan ’59 Jr.)
Walnut Guitar – Bridge Pickup (Seymour Duncan ’59 Jr.)
Once again, I found a Fender Standard (MIM) Strat for a good price and snapped it up. As with the first MIM Strat I got, this guitar has a super comfortable neck and plays really well. The frets are medium sized, as opposed to the jumbo frets on my main home made strat. The pickups aren’t bad at all. They definitely have that Strat snap to them, but they are less full sounding and weaker than the Kinmans that I have in the neck and middle position of my main guitar. That makes sense though.
As of right now I use this guitar for recording, and it’s my back up for gigging. I haven’t decided yet if I’m going to hold on to this one or not.
Somebody locally was selling this guitar for a good price. It was very used. A veteran of the weekend warrior scene. This guitar sounded great and played great. Easily as good as my American strat. The neck is identical in size and feel. I ended up parting this guitar out (even though I hate that) because the frets were so worn. A fret job would have cost about the same as I paid for the guitar, so I didn’t think it was worth it. I probably would have done it if it were a combination I liked better, but the body had dulled to a less than attractive metallic red color.
I got the Powerhouse Strat used because it looked cool. One of my favorite colors – Candy Apple Red. This guitar wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either. It was like new when I got it. Fret ends were very sharp, the sounds were ok. The Powerhouse electronics use a battery and allow you to go from standard single coil sounds to thicker, more humbucker-like sounds. I was going to gut the electronics and put in something I liked better, but I decided it just wasn’t worth it and sold it again.
I finally bought one of my dream guitars – and a very reasonable one at that. I had always wanted a Strat strictly from an appearance standpoint – either Candy Apple Red with a Maple finger board, or Natural Ash with a Maple fingerboard. Maybe it’s just me, but the newer Candy Apple Strats don’t seem to have the same vibrant color I remember. And the older ones are insanely priced. Strat prices definitely suffered (and continue to suffer to a degree) from the vintage craze of a few years back. Anyway, I found a great used natural ash strat.
I love Strats for much the same reason I liked the old VW Beetle – they’re basic and parts are readily available and easy to replace. And they’re nearly indestructable! What a deal. The problem for me is that they are way overpriced for what you get – especially if you buy the name brand: “Fender”. Of course, I wanted a Fender American Strat. I wanted to have the “real” thing, after all.
Strats are very comfortable to play – the 25.5″ scale and neck shape work well together. The particular model I got had the two-point trem, but it was blocked with a rosewood block ala Eric Clapton (from what I read at least). I removed the block at one point and set up the trem, but I ended up blocking it again. I’ve really gotten away from using the trem.
There are a few weaknesses in Strats in my mind: Pickups are a biggie. Stock strats just aren’t that flexible. I know, I know, they’ve been used for all sorts of music, but I wasn’t able to get my sound out of it. And the original pickups are noisy. Yes, that’s to be expected, but I had been completely spoiled by humbuckers over the years – they’re dead quiet. First thing I did was get a set of Kinman pickups, which were purported to be among the best. They are outstanding. Huge difference from the originals. I opted for the AvN Blues set, which is a bit hotter than stock. Sound great, completely noiseless.
Still…something was missing…It’s that darned bridge pickup. I just couldn’t get it to really “dig in” like I needed to on a solo. I could plug in my Les Paul or my Carvin and, wow, there it was! But not on the strat. And I really was hoping to make the strat my one-size-fits-all guitar. Soo…First I popped in a tele pickup in the bridge. Not so great by itself (not as good as a real tele), but wait…if I re-wire the switch to get that neck-bridge combination..yes! That’s nice! But still not it. Sooo…swap the bridge for a Seymour Duncan Little ’59. Crap. Sounded awful. Something wrong with the pickup? Maybe. I didn’t care to try that type again. Swapped for a Hot Rails…not bad. Not as rich and full sounding as I’d like, but it certainly is hot. And it drives the amp pretty well. Still not like the Carvin or Les Paul, but much better than before. So, that’s what I stuck with.
My favorite mod that I did on the strat (and have done on every strat I’ve owned since) is to swap the standard 5-way switch for a “mega switch” from Stew-Mac. I wire is so the following pickup combinations are available: Neck, Neck-Middle, Neck-Bridge, Middle-Bridge, Bridge. That has become my favorite Strat switching scheme, and the neck-bridge combo is probably my most used position. Sorta tele-ish, sorta Gretsch-ish, some jangle with some fullness. Real nice even with the Hot Rails in there. And the Hot Rails lets me get into that Richie Sambora/EVH territory a little when needed too. Bonus.
Probably what I love most about Strat-type guitars is that everything is removable. Shim the neck? No problem! Adjust the bridge? Ok! Adjust the truss rod? No problem! New pickups? Easy. New pots and a switch? Sure! I have no fear! Set necks…well…I’ll swap electronics and tuners, but I’m not so certain about adjusting the neck and all properly. My own paranoia.
Eventually I decided that I liked my home assembled strat better than the “real deal” Fender American. I returned the American to it’s original state – original pickups and switching and I sold it. The nice thing about the name brands is that they hold their value – and sometimes even increase over time. I know my home made won’t, but I had to do in favor of the guitar I thought played and sounded better.