New White Korina Floyd Strat Project

johnnyj

Junior Member
Messages
57
Hi guys,

here are some build in progress pictures about my new project. it will be a white korina stratocaster with a schaller licensed floyd that i plan to finish on my own. while the body gets finished with a wudtone finish with the aim to get a black to red burst (thanks @stratamania for the hint to this product). the strat will be loaded with the eric johnson single coil set with a 4 way switch and volume and one tone poti.

the maple neck will just get a tru oil and birchwood wax finish.

the first challenge was already successfull: i wanted to have a contoured heel but was not satisfied by the warmoth contoured heel. so i decided to design the contour myself with a 11mm ferrule construction. this is the only step where i seeked assistance from a luthier since i didnt have the tools to drill a sunken screw surface as i wanted it. luckily, this operation was successful. it is impressive how awesome the reach to the 22nd fret is now, that is way better than the standard contoured heel on my other warmoth guitars. next step is the finish which. hope i will not mess this step up completly, will keep you posted. :)

neck and body ootb

IMG-5317.jpg
IMG-5319.jpg

heel after the operation
IMG-5322.jpg
heel with the sunken ferrules and the cut off short screw
IMG-5324.jpg

best
johnny
 
That's a great heel mod, I wish Warmoth would offer a nicer contour, either more like a fender elite/ultra or what you've done. Really nice parts + start here, looking forward to seeing how your build progresses!
 
after more than three weeks of work its finally done. i used in total about 8 or 9 coats of the wudtone finish over several days with drying pauses. originally i wanted to archive a dark red with black look. obviously the guitar came ootb sanded a bit too fine so the color was not penetrating that heavy it would have been neccessary to archive the intended color. but since i really liked the gritty fire look i got, i continued with it being rather darkbrown/orange. lessons learned for future projects: maybe sand down first to 220 or so before using wudtone finish.

this is how it looks now (color is a bit variing on my smartphone, back and front look pretty similar from color depth).

IMG-5467.jpgIMG-5487.jpg

for the neck i went with 5 coats of tru oil with one coat of casey wax in the end, also like this result.

IMG-5474.jpg

the strat is loaded with the eric johnson signature set and my favorite trem, the schaller licensed.

here is a little assembly video:

what i really like about this build:

- the neck is absolutely perfect. i chose experimentally the wolfgang profile with 43mm nut, and i like this profile better than my other one with the standard thin and the other one with the 59 roundback. in contrast to my other two warmoth necks, this one is also absolutely straight/even and will need no fretjob, everything is perfect (the other two warmoth builds i have are also good but will profit from a fretjob). for a reason i cannot understand i dont have the string slipping issue i have on my other guitars when bending heavily around 10th fret, tho the dimensions are the same. so whatever the reason is, it is great!
- the custom heel paid off big time, the guitar plays like a 90s korean superstrat in regards of upper access, i would not have believed that the effect of this little missing corner is really that big in the end.
- neck pocket/neck fit of this one was absolutely perfect, also string alignment from left to right edge is 100% perfect
- compared to my other builds, i just made one little cosmetic fuckup (little stupidity scratch at high e tuner hole plus some not that perfect drills under the tuners that are not visible).
- i was very happy that i chose the schaller licensed over the lockmeister. comparing the units in three guitars now, i find the licensed one way better in terms of fluttering behavior than my lockmeisters so using this on the new strat is pure fun.
- it is the first time i used shielding paint instead of copper and after applying two coats of this i have to say the guitar is REALLY silent, i was suprised by the result. this is way better than the copper stuff i used for my other builds.
- sound of the guitar is also very nice so far and the strat character luckily didnt get destroyed by the tremolo choice.

what is a bit strange:

- i have the feeling the schaller licensed routing could be optimized a bit from warmoth. it starts with being a 74mm post distance while the trem needs 74,3mm. the missing 0,3mm are not critical and are compensated by the posts which can move around a bit, but i wonder why you would use this failure tolerance that holes often have by default if they could do it precise in the planning. a more concerning issue is that the tremolo seems to be located a little bit too far behind. when adjusting the intonation, you end up with the low e being on the outer hole at maximum exposure. it is fine for my guitar now but if i would need to make a further correction, i would need to remove some metal from the string saddle. this is my only floyd/schaller that is located that extreme.

other than that i have no complains and i am again very happy with my new guitar. :) thanks everybody in the forum who responded me in my questions, your input was very valuable.

will now need to rebuild all my kemper profiles since they are optimized for 500k potis with heavy pickups and coming back soon with some sound impressions. :)

best regards and have a nice we
johnny
 
yes i read that many people use that much and that it is especially for non roasted maple recommended. lets see if i run into issues after some years with that thin coats.
 
Great build!
I am about to order a build myself, and one of the open questions I have is the tremolo. The fully (by Warmoth) supported one is the Floyd Rose Original, where I am planning to get the Schaller Lockmeister, as I live in Europe (= price).
I am trying to figure out IF they actually are the same thing, would you know? i am trying to make sure that I don’t run into issues trying to have installed a tremolo that does not fit the body.
Thank you!
 
Great build!
I am about to order a build myself, and one of the open questions I have is the tremolo. The fully (by Warmoth) supported one is the Floyd Rose Original, where I am planning to get the Schaller Lockmeister, as I live in Europe (= price).
I am trying to figure out IF they actually are the same thing, would you know? i am trying to make sure that I don’t run into issues trying to have installed a tremolo that does not fit the body.
Thank you!

See the answer I provided in the other thread. It is better to ask questions once in a thread opened for the purpose.
 
here a little sound sample with the final pickups (switched to SD fury and dimarzio tone zone for more metal usage).
 
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