Something a little different that seems like something familiar...

[MakeAJazzNoiseHere]

So, this little idea I had came out pretty well. I'm going to explain it as I show the pics, because you will see the pics and think "Big fucking deal, dude, it's a Strat copy."

But I assure you... It's not a Strat copy, it just looks like one.

This is a Warmoth 10 - 16 compound radius neck. It's got Super Jumbo 6100 stainless frets and plain old clay dots.

And no, that is NOT the dryest, crappiest piece of Rosewood you've ever seen... It's Pau Ferro!



And, no, that isn't a butterscotch-tinted Maple neck.. It's Goncalo Alvez. No finish on that, just the peghead face... It's all raw wood on the back, fully warrantied by Warmoth not to warp.



The usual Schaller locking tuners are installed, and a Graph Tech nut.

You may recognize a certain resemblance to a certain guitarist's signature guitar in the overall shot. I'll let you geniuses figure that one out. Let's just say he's an influence, I'm a fan, and I always liked that guitar, so it was something of an inspiration here, but not a direct copy.



Other "little stuff"

- Contoured heel option on the Ash Strat body
- A pickguard with the "SRV countersink" option
- Hot Rails bridge, Hot Rails neck (in the middle, almost flush with the pickguard) and a Cool Rails in the neck.
- The lowest tone knob is a push-push switch that changes the phase of the middle pickup.
- The guitar is wired with a Schaller Megaswitch that gives Neck, Neck + Middle, Neck + Bridge, Middle + Bridge, and Bridge - no middle pickup alone, I prefer to have Neck + Bridge.
- The upper volume does nothing, as does the lower tone. The middle tone is actually the volume.
- The bridge is a narrow-spaced bridge (modern American Standard spacing) with vintage mounting hole spacing and a set of Graph Tech String Saver Classic saddles.

So, while it just looks like a yellowed old Strat from 10 feet away, the action is about 1.1 mm and the sound will tear your head off. It's a great sleeper.

[Twitch]

Looks good, I understand the frustration with the shit pots now. Not that shit pots didnt warrant frustration.

[Ward]

Very nice.

I need to look into that megaswitch. I never use just middle on my 3 pup guitars, but always wanted the neck & bridge option. Very cool info, thanks!

[Hellbat]

- Contoured heel option on the Ash Strat body ; pic of the heel area please?

- A pickguard with the "SRV countersink" option ; quick explanation? does it let you lower the middle pickup further or something?

- The guitar is wired with a Schaller Megaswitch that gives Neck, Neck + Middle, Neck + Bridge, Middle + Bridge, and Neck ; assuming last option is bridge...

- The bridge is a narrow-spaced bridge (modern American Standard spacing) with vintage mounting hole spacing and a set of Graph Tech String Saver Classic saddles. ; feedback on the nut/saddles? I have a friend starting to work for graphtech soon and I'm thinking of trying one of their bridges on my RR1T.

Questions in quote. - = Killer strat! = -

[MakeAJazzNoiseHere]

Twitch, it's funny, when I bought those pots I knew the top one wouldn't even be connected and I was thinking I felt kind of dumb buying a brand new pot to do nothing... Looks like it wasn't so dumb, now.

Hellbat, the contoured heel is just the standard Warmoth contoured heel option, like this:



It's pretty subtle in the pic and IRL but it does make a nice difference when you play.

"SRV countersink" is just a countersink on the switch mount screws and the pickup mounting screws, so instead of having the typical Strat round-head screws above the pickguard they are more flush. Functionally it doesn't do much, it's a free option and you need some different screws and it just looks nice.

Yes, that should have been N, N+M, N+B, M+B, B.

I like the Graph Tech nuts, they don't bind much, and the saddles I like because I just don't get along with those s-bend steel things for palm muting, they do change the tone slightly warming up the sound, which isn't bad. I have another guitar set up similar that was kind of a "test" for this one and I really like it, too.



That one is also Goncalo Alves (one piece neck) but obviously you can see it has a lot of figuring where this one is really plain. But I knew it would sound good.

[Hellbat]

Ah cool, I thought the contoured heel might have been more like an Ibanez AANJ or something.

[MakeAJazzNoiseHere]

Nope, nothing that radical.

No guesses on the famous guitar it's similar to?

[Hellbat]

I dunno, whenever I see the body color I think "The Duck" but nothing else matches.

[MakeAJazzNoiseHere]

That's very close. The original would also be a yellowed 70's Olympic White Strat and have the CBS headstock. I thought for sure the black pickups and knobs would give it away!

[VitaminG]

very cool. A real sleeper. I'd love something like that, even though no one else would pick up on it's subtle features.

[MakeAJazzNoiseHere]

Thanks! Yeah, I considered ordering the pickguard without control holes and doing it H/S or whatever but I decided I really wanted to do the "incognito" thing. The Hot Rails has a pretty good tone to it, this thing rips for metal.