Crazy Blue Flame Maple Strat! - FINISHED!!!

[croquet hoop]

I got part of the way through it, but other things came up and I set it aside. I still have everything I need to complete it, but I just haven't as of yet. What I did learn, as far as I went, was that there was no difference - at least in the sets I tested.

The funny (or sad) thing is that there will always be someone to say "because there is no physically measurable difference does not prove that you cannot hear a difference." A whole audio-related (musical instruments, hi-fi systems...) economic sector has been build on that. Which is just an extension of the good old snake oil business.

So yeah, JoshHPMusic, I think you'll be fine with "regular" springs. Nice to see that your body has been shipped!

 

[Cagey]

A whole audio-related (musical instruments, hi-fi systems...) economic sector has been build on that. Which is just an extension of the good old snake oil business.

Yeah, I know. The audiophiles are the worst. Practically criminal.

 

[JoshHPMusic]

Ladies and gentlemen, IT'S ARRIVED!!!!!!  :toothy10: :toothy10: :toothy10: :toothy12: :toothy12: :toothy12: :hello2: :laughing7: :cool01:

As usual, I kept my eye on the UPS tracking for the entire time, and despite a delay on Friday, the Warmoth box arrived on time today!

I set up my recording gear for the unboxing (I'm starting a new YouTube channel), and started opening it! I went through the parts, everything seemed good and well packed. They even included some Warmoth guitar picks!  :toothy10:

And then came the body... "HOLY F#*%ING S#!%!!!!!"

It's beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. More beautiful than I ever could have expected. It's perfect. Exactly the color I wanted, and the back is different but better than I expected. Everything is precise, polished, and prestigious. This is a keeper.

So folks, that was my first Warmothgasm experience.

Here's some pics!

 

[Cagey]

Few things are as satisfying as opening a box from Warmoth.

Congrats - that's a beautiful piece!

 

[stratamania]

:icon_thumright:

It's great the body surpassed your expectations.

 

[Ddbltrbl]

And then came the body... "HOLY F#*%ING S#!%!!!!!"

It's beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. More beautiful than I ever could have expected. It's perfect. Exactly the color I wanted, and the back is different but better than I expected. Everything is precise, polished, and prestigious. This is a keeper.

So folks, that was my first Warmothgasm experience.

I feel that way every time, and I just got my latest pair of boxes today!  :laughing7:

That really is beautiful! Love the Blue!!! ccasion14:

 

[Surf n Music]

:icon_thumright: She is a beaut!

 

[JoshHPMusic]

Thanks everyone, always love hearing positive feedback from the pros!  :cool01:

I'm getting the neck from a guy at CEG Hardtails. He goes to the Mighty Mite distributor, picks out the best necks they have, and then does some work on them. He's getting me a MM2900CR, which is the rosewood fingerboard, compound radius strat neck. He will then replace the nut with GraphTech TUSQ XL, paint the headstock face a glossy black, apply my satin silver "Fender Stratocaster" decal, shoot it over with Nitrocellulose gloss, and install my Sperzel satin silver locking staggered tuners. Oh and did I mention, a FULL fret job?! Mirror shine!  :toothy10:

And better yet, NO string tree!  :laughing7:

He said he will have the necks by this Friday, and then let me select the specific one I want! Around $200 total. Love this guy!

Once he gets the neck back to me, it's off to my assembly guy. I made him a PDF assembly guide, because of the particular things I'm having done. I would estimate the project being complete in a little over a month. Can't freaking wait!  :guitaristgif:

 

[croquet hoop]

And then came the body... "HOLY F#*%ING S#!%!!!!!"

I had the same reaction when I got my body. Warmoth really knows how to bring the most out of their figured bodies. Congrats, it looks really great!

 

[JoshHPMusic]

Well, things have begun moving again.

The neck supplier (Mighty Mite) has been delaying necks for months. But my guy, Stephen from CEG Hardtails, got his hands on TWO necks today, as the distributor near him finally got a few in the mail today. Maybe theres a shortage of woods by them, after this insane winter? Who knows.

One more thing about the neck... I know, some people are biased against Mighty Mite necks because they aren't as overpriced as others, or for whatever reasons... But this will be no ordinary neck when Stephen is done with it! First of all, it is compound radius, jumbo frets. I think that speaks for itself. But the really great things is that Stephen does a full fret job on it, including a final mirror shine. And for me, he will paint the headstock face a glossy black, apply my satin silver "Fender Stratocaster" decal, shoot it over with a nitro clear coat. Then install my satin silver, staggered, locking Sperzel tuners. And swap out the nut for GraphTech TUSQ XL.

So it'll be pretty nice. He sent a few pictures of the two necks. We both chose the 2nd neck, the bottom one. And I happen to think the figuring of the maple on the back is pretty cool.

The only other news is that my plastic neck plate gasket arrived, from Japan. In a very legit Japanese envelope.

And, the knobs I had originally chosen were "Small J Bass" knobs. The real reason I chose them was because I was worried about space between the "DeLonge" positioned volume rout, and the 5 way switch. After placing the actual knob on the pickguard when it arrived, it became clear that I can still probably use a bigger knob. So I just ordered those sweet Gibson Top Hat knobs, the Chrome Metal Insert type.

This all means that I will probably be able to hand all the parts into my builder sometime next weekend, the 17th or 18th. Super excited!

-Josh

 

[JoshHPMusic]

Alright people, say this post is unnecessary, I don't care. I'm EXCITED  :toothy10:

So my neck guy will continue working tomorrow after we made a few decisions...

First of all, I believe he has already applied the black laquer coat to the headstock face. He will soon apply my decal, and shoot it over with clear nitrocellulose gloss. Yum!

Now, since the back of the neck already has a very thin satin poly coat, I figured I would be fine with it. But on Saturday I was surprised to open an email from the neck guy about possibly applying a coat of yellow-tinted nitrocellulose to the back. Hmm, that's an idea... But I do NOT want gloss on the back. And I don't want that super yellow-looking tint either. Maybe something to look like an oil finish, but satin feel?

Well, after a few emails, we decided on this: A very slightly tinted nitrocellulose finish on the back, made to feel satin. Perfect!

He also mentioned that he can get it to look like an "ultra deep glass magnified finish"... Sounds exciting to me!

This neck will be one piece of work! And of course theres his signature mirror shine full fret job!

He will try to have it done by May 31st, so hopefully I will have pictures within a few weeks, and be sending off parts to my builder! Couldn't be more excited!  :toothy12:

Nobody will even know it's a Mighty Mite...  :glasses10:

 

[JoshHPMusic]

Big news people! The neck has arrived  :toothy12:

It's beautiful. The headstock is just as I wanted it, and the staggered tuners seems like they will do their job well. The tint on the rear of the neck is absolutely perfect, just what I wanted. And it feels great! The mirror shine fret job is also quite remarkable.

Here are some pictures.

And I talked to my builder. I will hand off all the parts to him most likely tomorrow, and he claims it will only take him a few days. (See last picture). So expect something big next week...  :guitarplayer2: :laughing7:

-Josh

 

[ORCRiST]

Looks sweet man!

You know what I liked to do at this stage?  When everything is done, and you stand back and look at the finished product - with that proud new parent gleam in your eyes...
I like to put on a cheshire grin, and think: "I wonder what Fender would have charged me to put this exact guitar in my hands?"

Then I giggle like a school girl.

 

[JoshHPMusic]

True true true... I think this one would probably come out to be right around $4000 on the Fender Custom Shop scale... and maybe not with all the options I require either!

Handed the parts off to my builder today, and he says it may be done by Saturday!  :toothy10:

Pics coming soon

-Josh

 

[JoshHPMusic]

IT'S ALIVE!  :toothy12:

You heard it right, this thing is done!

Picked it up today, and been playing her ever since.

Here's my first impressions. First thing I noticed is how resonant and defined she is, even acoustically. The low E-string is amazingly defined, and the same goes for all the other strings. Very open, and will sustain for days!

Looks very nice, of course, and came out just like I had envisioned.

The battery box is installed on the back, and will come in handy in the future I'm sure. The backplate looks very nice, and has been cut to allow access to the Tremol-no mechanism, which is sweet. There is a little warping on a small portion of the backplate, because the Tremol-no claw was sticking up a bit and he cut some plastic from the inside. (Someone mentioned this! Was it Dbdltrbl?)

Contoured heel is awesome, neck plate beautiful with a nice gasket underneath, and I'm really liking that smooth contour on the back between the lower horn and neck!

The neck is great, feels nice, and I'm sure will feel even nicer once it's been played with more. Glad with how the staggered tuners are working to eliminate any need for a string tree. Holy sh*t I can play the 22nd fret!

Now the body! Freaking beautiful, of course, and looks great with everything mounted on the pickguard. The one thing that bothered me a little at first was that the tone knobs are maybe 1/4 of an inch above the pickguard, and the volume, being a push-push, is even higher... The pot shafts are a little bit long, so I might end up putting some washers or something on the shaft under the pickguard, to lower the knobs down closer. Not a big issue though.

Love the Wilkinson trem. A beautiful thing. Can do a really nice shimmer or some crazy stuff. And it goes up!  :hello2:

And the pickups, the exciting part! They are AMAZING. To say the least.
Neck pickup is nice and full, beautiful cleans. Also great with some overdrive! Real bluesy/solo tone  :guitarplayer2:
Middle pickup is actually a viable option now! I would be happy playing some jazz on that.
Bridge is gonna melt some faces. It's loud and hard-hitting. Chaos.

Now the wiring is a bit funky... The volume pot, as I mentioned, is a push-push pot. When pushed up, the neck pickup comes into play. Meaning that I can have the bridge-neck combo, or all 3 pups! A 7-way Strat!

The bridge-neck combo is sweet, the best way to describe it I think is "jangly". Probably very good for strumming out some jangly, open tunes. Or solos I suppose.

The all-3-pups combo has its fair share of quack when used intentionally, but would also work well with some heavy distortion.

I'm glad I went with the 500K tone pots. It sings nicely, with more than enough highs. I actually like it best with the neck tone rolled back to about 7 or 8. Perfect!


Well, that's as much as I feel I need to describe. In other words, I LOVE HER!  :headbang: :icon_biggrin: :laughing7: :toothy10: :toothy12: :hello2: :guitaristgif: :cool01: arty07: :guitarplayer2: :headbang1:

A "Credits" pose will soon follow...

And PICTURES!:

 

[stratamania]

Congratulations, good that you are happy with the instrument, especially after nudging you to just get the body ordered up and go for it when you were making your choices.

By the way it was me that mentioned the tremel-no. Another way to get rid of the slight warping would be to have a slot cut out of the back cover that exposes the claw itself as a sort of feature, then you would have no warp and the claw would still be below the level of the surrounding plastic.

 

[Cagey]

That is a gorgeous piece of work!

 

[JoshHPMusic]

CREDITS:

Warmoth: These guys clearly deserve a huge thanks. They are the reason this came to life, and their absolutely amazing craftsmanship, care, and professionalism has not gone unnoticed. Thanks guys!

Ken Calvet - Roadhouse Pickups: I'm not sure where to start... Well, first, let me say, this guy is super nice. One of the nicest people in this industry. He gave me a price for 3 P90 pickups that could only be beat by maybe GFS. And did I mention, HE CUSTOM WOUND THEM?! Yep, he just let me tell him exactly what I wanted from each pickup, and he did it. They're AWESOME. Exactly what I wanted! Thanks Ken!

Stephen - CEG Hardtails: Less than an hour outside Chicago, he's got a great business with Mighty Mite necks, "making good necks into great necks". He did exactly what I wanted with spraying the gloss black on the headstock face, installing my decal, nut, and tuners. And he perfectly matched the exact tint of satin nitrocellulose finish on the back of the neck! And wow, the mirror-shine fret job is SWEET! Only cost me $230 for the entire neck, finished and ready to go! Thanks Stephen!

Phil Fensel - Fast Action Music: To put it simply, he's great. North side of Chicago, pretty accessible, and easily one of the best guitar techs in Chicagoland. He assembled the entire guitar, shielding, wiring, and all. Super knowledgable, nice, cool, and totally not condescending. Oh, and NOBODY would match his price. I'm not even going to say it. Thanks a ton Phil!

StewMac: Just glad they exist, with plenty of helping guides that I will definitely be using in the near future, and all the guitar parts I could dream of. Thanks guys!


And last but not least... YOU GUYS! - Unofficial Warmoth: It's hard to thank every one of you enough. This guitar is the best it could be, and only because of the help and expertise I found on this wonderful corner of the interwebs. Look at the pictures below, you will find the progression of the guitar design before, throughout, and after I got the help I needed from everyone here. Thanks everyone!

:rock-on:

-Josh

 

[Fat Pete]

Very nice indeed. Good for you spending the time working out exactly what you wanted. Love the look of the hog under the trans blue.

 

[bagman67]

Congrats, she's a real beauty. May you rock in happiness for years to come!