Update time!
Right. (Whew), time for the pickguard assembly, wiring,
hole drilling ( :sad1: ), and
lots of test fitting... Here we go!
First off, I ordered no less than three different pickguards all with different materials as I didn't know what I'd go with in the end.
As previously mentioned, I decided to go with the .90 black gloss/white/black pickguard. In the initial planning stages, I wanted
to do a full copper shield of the inner cavity. After doing a lot of research and consulting peoples' opinions I trust, I decided
against the full shield. But since I had a whole bunch of adhesive copper sheets laying around , I decided to lay down one continuous
sheet across the entirety of the inside of the pickguard. All of the edges were carefully cut and de-burred, leaving about an 1/16th
of an inch from all edges including the pickup and control cutouts (except for where the 3-way switch and pots were to be mounted).
I had these perfect little washers that I used for the pickup mounting springs just so the tension of the springs wouldn't mess with
the copper shielding or pickguard plastic over time. Not needed, but hey, I had them - and I think it makes for a cleaner looking setup.
I work in IT by trade, and I build custom PC's for people - so I had this really cool black cable sleeving kit. It's sort of a black plastic
weave that looks like steel braided brake or hydraulic lines and it easily stretches to accomodate various wires and cables. I used the
sleeving kit and shrink tubing to make all the pickup wires neat and tidy up until things started splitting off to be soldered to the switch and pots.
For the components used:
1x RS Guitarworks 280K SuperPot - volume
2x CTS 250K audio-taper pots - tone controls
1x AP Vitamin Q Oil & Paper cap (.022uf, 400V)
1x Oak Grigsby 3-way blade swtich
1x DiMarzio Super Distortion (DP100), Blk/Blk, F-Spaced (Bridge)
1x Fender Custom Shop 'Texas Special' RWRP single coil, with black cap. (Middle)
1x DiMarzio PAF 36th Anni. Edition (DP103), Blk/Blk, F-Spaced (Neck)
Some may note that these aren't really 'proper' values for components to pair with the pickups in this build. But, these same values are found in Dave Murray's
'Kossoff' stratocaster, which in turn are the values found in a normal three single-coil strat; 250k controls all around. Dave never changed them when he added
the humbuckers to the 'Kossoff', so thats what I'm going to use. The only liberty (or departure, if you will) I've taken is the use of an RS Guitarworks 280k
'Superpot' in lieu of a standard Fender 250k volume control pot and I'm using the AP Vitamin Q cap instead of... whatever Fender used for a cap 'back in the day', 1963 in the case of the Kossoff.
I've never wired a guitar before (or ever messed with the innards of
any guitar for that matter), so I'm pretty happy with the result. Very clean IMHO, but I
had a lot of help from my friend Josh who's my soldering expert. Thanks Joooosh!
All done and ready to go:
The pickguard was taken downstairs and plugged into the amp and tested before installation into the body - and lo! everything worked perfectly!
Special thanks to Mr. Martian (aka Roy) who helped me with the wiring schematic, thanks Roy! Dave's control setup is a tad different from the regular
strat setup. Tone #1 controls the neck, and since Dave almost never uses the middle single coil, Tone #2 controls the middle and bridge pickups.
Here's a shot of the body with all of the holes (shudder) I had to make for the pickguard and input jack. Not a single power-tool (not counting the
soldering iron) was used on the guitar. I have a hand-held modeling or jewelers drill that I used for all the holes. Everything came out perfectly, much to my relief!
And here we have the completed pickguard and jack, installed and secured...
Another angle...
Here's a (bad) shot of the spring claw, and you can barely see the bridge ground (soldered on the reverse side of the claw for cleanliness), snaking
off to the control cavity on the left:
This is a shot of the body illustrating the tremolo rout. I had picked up a sheet of thin, self-adhesive neoprene padding that I intended to use to protect
to tremolo recess rout. When it came down to it, I couldn't decide if I should show the beautiful paint or protect it. Test fitting the trem, I found that
there was a good half-inch of painted area in the rout the trem didn't cover. I didn't want to cover that up, yet didn't want the trem leaf spring (according
to Schallers engineering schematic, called a 'Bronce spring') to mar the finish. So I compromised and cut a half-inch strip and placed that directly
under the leaf (or Bronce) spring and where it would contact the body if there was no string tension on the trem. That way, the paint is protected directly
under the spring, yet the entire route isn't covered allowing one to see the paint the trem doesn't cover. Works for me!
Here's a shot of my wicked Ruthenium trem and something I decided to try out: a 37mm bell-brass sustain block with stainless steel mounting screws.
I have Floyd's on all of my other (two) guitars and after reading the rave reviews on tone and sustain I figured I'd give it a shot. I should have taken some
pics of the OEM block for comparison as it looks really wimpy next to the brass one. Not in the pic's (I think) are also a set of 'Raw Vintage' tremolo
springs. Also designed to increase sustain and recommended by some fellow forumites, I thought those plus the sustain block would make for a nice one-two punch...
Previous to this stage of the build (I had eight months to kill), I bought and installed these nifty Floyd Rose saddle shims. The Schaller Floyd Rose
has saddle radius of 12 inches. Using the saddle shims, I correctly adjusted the saddle heights to match an approximate 18" radius at the bridge
to properly compensate for the curvature of my Warmoth compound radiused fretboard:
Test fitting the trem... here you can see the neoprene strip due to off-angle of the picture, but looking down from the top/front its completely hidden...
Another wierd angle, lol...but its my favorite of the bunch as it shows off the true colors very well.
And here's a final shot of the trem and pickguard before bed!
Allright, thats it for now - its 2:30 in the AM and work calls in the morning.
As always, comments and questions are welcome!
ORCRiST
arty07:
