That's how the project began!
The body:
The original body was routed for an aftermarket floyd type tremolo and painted black. I decided to finish it the way the original frankie-strat was finished. I sanded down the poly finish a bit in order to use it as a base for the black evh style stripes. Then, taped the body and applied the white coat. I let it dry, taped it again and applied the fuchsia red colour.
Once the body was dry, I removed all the tapes and voila! The body was ready to accept the new neck, electronics and hardware.
The neck:
The neck is a glossy finished ultra playable neck that I ordered from China. It came ready with a plastic nut and 10mm tuner holes. I drilled the neck to fit it on the strat body I had and put a set of black Sung IL tuners on it. Then, I filed and lubricated the nut and leveled the new frets a bit to ensure no dead notes or buzz appear.
The hardware:
The hardware had to match the finish of the guitar so we chose to use black tuners, tremolo and metal parts. The tremolo I used is a typical floyd licenced one and we agreed to lock it down so it can be used as standard tremolo, only for dives.
The electronics:
I wired a Rockfield "Fat Arse" humbucker on the single-pickup white pickguard, a 500K Alpha volume pot and a toggle switch that works as a "neck pickup simulator". It's basically a capacitor filter that makes the bridge pickup sound like a neck one, smoother and a bit bassy.
The final setup:
The guitar was finally set up with a 0.009" set of coated strings. The intonation is spot on and the action is low to ensure this instrument can be used as a "shredding" machine! Not only does it look good but it also feels and plays like a nice 80's superstrat.
Here are a few pictures of this project:
oh my gosh, this looks so awesome. i will do this also to one of my guitars since it is a cheap (99€) strat and the body is completly rooted so no need to root it again for the humbucker :) Looks killer the black humbucker and bridge on a white pickguard.
ΑπάντησηΔιαγραφήI have 2 questions: 1. where did you find this pickguard with place for only one humbucker?
2.Would it be possible to cut the fenderstlye head to a kramerstyle head(pointing downwards)? would look so awesome. keep up the good work. Greetings from Luxembourg :)
Hello David!
ΑπάντησηΔιαγραφήIt's a nice and easy guitar finish and it would be great to do it yourself!
1)The pickguard was ordered from TNT guitars USA
http://www.guitarpartsonline.com/
There are a few single-humbucker pickguards on ebay as well!
2)The headstock can be cut to any shape you like as long as it has the surface area required. I usually re-shape headstocks to my taste. I think a strat headstock could be cut and shaped into a "banana"/"hockey" kramer one. I'm not certain though...
First, you can print a "banana" head layout on a piece of paper or draw a few lines on the existing headstock to see what it would look like when cut.
Then, you can use a jigsaw and/or a dremmel tool to reshape the guitar head. Just be extra careful with that.
Finally, sand down the wooden surface using various paper grits for a smoother texture and finish the headstock in any clear/colour coat you like. That's it!
Thank you very much,
Thanos