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Hey guys! New member here!
(Complete Day-1 image gallery with commentary here: Guitar Build Day 1
https://imgur.com/gallery/Pstb0QD )
I decided to do an ultralight build after finding a 3 Lbs. 1 Oz. strat body from another manufacturer, that shall be un-named out of respect for Warmoth. I ordered a showroom Warmoth maple/maple neck in the Vintage/Modern construction with the Standard Thin neck profile, 1.650 nut width, 10-16 radius, and SS6150 frets.
This is the guitar that I'm going to learn how to play on, so I had no preferences. The options selected represent a "dead middle", or conservative approach.
A Kludson aluminum tremolo block was procured for a "whopping" $30. First impressions: extremely tight tremolo arm fit with zero arm-wobble. I actually was concerned that I was cross-threading the arm, but after reverse-threading the arm until the threads "jump" and resets multiple times, I concluded that the female screw of the trem block was undersized. With faith, I screwed in the trem arm and it ended up extremely tight at maximal depth (but not man-handling it). I also added a Fender trem block spring afterwards to keep the arm 100% slack free long term. One thing to note: use the trem plate-to-block screws supplied by Kludson. The stock Gotoh ones felt like they were going to cross-thread.
Also, I have a granite countertop, and dropped both the stock steel block (8.0 Oz), and the aluminum block (3.4 Oz), on the countertop for tone comparison. The steel trem block has a much lower resonant frequency. Aluminum sounded like it had none of the lows, but slightly higher treble. Fine with me, as I've selected very dark pickups for this build. (SSL-6 Calibrated Set, very similar to P90's).
The Maple neck went through a fret-end rounding process with a P220 grit foam sanding block. You just run it up and down the fret ends at an angle that will round the tops of the stock fret-end bevel. It was then burnished from P400-P2500 with wet/dry sandpaper from the "W" superstore.
Before:
After:
Burnishing:
The Body was wetted to pop the grain... but I didn't have any P320 or similar. Instead I used a Maroon 3M scotchbrite pad (equivalent to "1" grade steel wool) to level out the popped grain. The body was then hand-rubbed sunburst-ed on top with TransTint Dyes. I used coffee filters to apply the Dyes.
Only picture I have of the body before dyeing (Btw- the weight in this picture is the neck + body + Callaham SS neck plate and SS neck screws. No other hardware)
(Complete Day-1 image gallery with commentary here: Guitar Build Day 1
https://imgur.com/gallery/Pstb0QD )
I decided to do an ultralight build after finding a 3 Lbs. 1 Oz. strat body from another manufacturer, that shall be un-named out of respect for Warmoth. I ordered a showroom Warmoth maple/maple neck in the Vintage/Modern construction with the Standard Thin neck profile, 1.650 nut width, 10-16 radius, and SS6150 frets.
This is the guitar that I'm going to learn how to play on, so I had no preferences. The options selected represent a "dead middle", or conservative approach.
A Kludson aluminum tremolo block was procured for a "whopping" $30. First impressions: extremely tight tremolo arm fit with zero arm-wobble. I actually was concerned that I was cross-threading the arm, but after reverse-threading the arm until the threads "jump" and resets multiple times, I concluded that the female screw of the trem block was undersized. With faith, I screwed in the trem arm and it ended up extremely tight at maximal depth (but not man-handling it). I also added a Fender trem block spring afterwards to keep the arm 100% slack free long term. One thing to note: use the trem plate-to-block screws supplied by Kludson. The stock Gotoh ones felt like they were going to cross-thread.


Also, I have a granite countertop, and dropped both the stock steel block (8.0 Oz), and the aluminum block (3.4 Oz), on the countertop for tone comparison. The steel trem block has a much lower resonant frequency. Aluminum sounded like it had none of the lows, but slightly higher treble. Fine with me, as I've selected very dark pickups for this build. (SSL-6 Calibrated Set, very similar to P90's).
The Maple neck went through a fret-end rounding process with a P220 grit foam sanding block. You just run it up and down the fret ends at an angle that will round the tops of the stock fret-end bevel. It was then burnished from P400-P2500 with wet/dry sandpaper from the "W" superstore.
Before:

After:

Burnishing:

The Body was wetted to pop the grain... but I didn't have any P320 or similar. Instead I used a Maroon 3M scotchbrite pad (equivalent to "1" grade steel wool) to level out the popped grain. The body was then hand-rubbed sunburst-ed on top with TransTint Dyes. I used coffee filters to apply the Dyes.
Only picture I have of the body before dyeing (Btw- the weight in this picture is the neck + body + Callaham SS neck plate and SS neck screws. No other hardware)

