Making progress, but there’s going to be a lot of damage control coming up. I may have bit off more than I could chew, but I’m going to finish this damn it!
The Good: I got pretty much everything in the right spot (sort of), and all the wires fed through the routes. I’m pleased with how it looks aesthetically. Continuity between the cavities’ shielding, and all of the grounding of the electronics and the bridge seem fine.
The Bad: Oh boy, where to start.
- I’m not as good at soldering as I thought I was.
- Upon my first attempt of soldiering the wires to the Free Way, and testing it, the neck and middle pickup were working but the bridge wasn’t. Tapping a screwdriver against the neck pickup indicated it was only working as a Humbucker and none of the split positions were working right.
- Upon my second attempt none of them were working at all. I have no idea how I’m going to begin with trouble shooting this.
- Between the first and second attempt with the Free Way Switch, I did go into the control cavity to adjust the pots and attach the knobs, so maybe I knocked a hot wire off one of the pots or the output jack. I need to go back in there to check. The cable management situation in there is a mess.
- The heads of both of the screws in the middle pickup broke off when attaching it. I think the screws may have been too long. I need to first find a way to safely extract a #6 screw from a plastic pickup bobbin, and then find the exact dimensions of an EZ-LOK brass threaded insert plus the sides of a Seymour Duncan pickup bobbin and find screws in that length. It looks like the best height for that pickup would be to just have it flush to the body so there’s no need for foam, springs or silicon anymore. If the pickup wasn’t so lopsided the way it is now, I’d probably just say "F It" and leave it as is.
- I’m pretty sure one or two of the soldering pads on the Free Way have burned off completely. Probably gonna need to throw another $60 out for a new one.
The Ugly
- My soldering iron burned a little bit of the satin clear coat on the rear by where the toggle switch cavity is.
- I’m noticing tiny little microscopic silver specs here and there from not being more careful with the shielding paint. They’re not very visible to the naked eye, but it’s going to bother me.
- Do those plastic Strat knobs look kind of tacky to anyone else?
