Cheap Strat Tricks

[astrobass]

hey!

So I've got a '96 MIM Fender Stratocaster. The pots are oxidized as all hell so it's gotta be opened up. Again.

I just finished opening it up and opening the pots and cleaning them and re-assembling and it's still scratchy and there are dead spots. No good. But while I was in there I did replace my stock 0.033 uF tone cap with a 0.047 uF, yes, orange drop cap. I had it laying around from a grab bag of loose parts, I didn't spend $15 ordering it from some slime bag online.

Mojo aside, the change in cap value did have a distinct and enjoyable affect on the tonal possibilities available on my middle pickup.

So next time I open her up, I want to do some more mods. I'm going to replace the pots with same value, but 24mm pots because I feel like they're a little heavier duty and will last longer. Who knows if they will, but they cost about the same as the small ones so let's roll the dice.

While I have the pickguard off, I'm thinking about taking it over to the drill press and adding on/off switches for each pickup, bypassing the 5-way switch entirely. While I'm doing that, I'm thinking the 5 way gets re-purposed as a cap selector for the second tone knob, with 0.01, 0.022, 0.033, 0.047 and 0.068 uF on the menu.

In the same vein, does anyone have any advice on Strat mods? Ideally mods that don't involve buying new pickups or active electronics. I don't want to put new holes in the wood either.

[CHEEZOR]

I personally like the tone caps even smaller than the values you listed. You can see some mod ideas in this thread that I started a while ago: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18134.

Have fun modding it and let us know how it turns out!

[phatt]

Arrh,, another one who wants to reinvent the wheel.
I suggest you save yourself the time and go with what has been done before.

Any mods to Strats have likely already been done so it might pay to go have a hunt around for all the mods that have been done before and you may well find a few that work well.

I've messed with strats for most of my Adult life and only a few are worth the bother (IMO). What you suggest is unlikely to add use or value.
but don't let me stop you
Phil.

[mictester]

The only Strat mods I've ever found worthwhile involve fixing the crappy intonation, replacing the weedy pickups with something with a bit of zip and fitting active electronics.

However, the most effective mod of all involves trading it in for a proper guitar......

<Ducks>

[kaludjerko]

The only Strat mods I've ever found worthwhile involve fixing the crappy intonation, replacing the weedy pickups with something with a bit of zip and fitting active electronics.

However, the most effective mod of all involves trading it in for a proper guitar......

<Ducks>

That is evil.
Strat is a proper guitar ...
or it's supposed to be

[kaludjerko]

Jokes aside, good mods are to include parallel/series switching of pickups. This will give you beefier sound comparing to traditional single-coil one.
Also, option of neck+bridge pickup, similar like telecaster is in my opinion very nice one.

Search for "armstrong wiring", this is very cheap option (3 x cheap toggle switches) that will give you all these sounds and traditional ones as well.
It comes on the expenses of the 5-way switch though.

If you want to go further, you can wire it like Brian May guitar, all pickups in series and also options for out-of phase sounds (like sound on Bohemian Rhapsody).
There is a video of a guy that has done it on a start (using cheap toggle switches):

[astrobass]

I personally like the tone caps even smaller than the values you listed. You can see some mod ideas in this thread that I started a while ago: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18134.

Have fun modding it and let us know how it turns out!

I read the thread but I didn't see notes about specific cap values. Can you post what you found worked best?

Arrh,, another one who wants to reinvent the wheel.
I suggest you save yourself the time and go with what has been done before.

Any mods to Strats have likely already been done so it might pay to go have a hunt around for all the mods that have been done before and you may well find a few that work well.

I've messed with strats for most of my Adult life and only a few are worth the bother (IMO). What you suggest is unlikely to add use or value.
but don't let me stop you
Phil.

Super helpful, Phil. I mean, clearly by asking for advice on which mods are most worthwhile I made it clear that I intend to reinvent the wheel, right? I couldn't have possibly done some googling, found a mountain of conflicting suggestions, and decided to ask around on some of the forums I personally frequent where I trust the other users to have a relatively no-nonsense approach to tone for what they found was useful vs. garbage. I mean, if I'd done that, I might have written something really fucking similar to what I wrote here.

My favourite thing about your post? I love how you described what an experienced expert you are on Stratocasters and modifications to them without providing a single usable suggestion. Thanks so much for chiming in to basically say "don't bother, I know everything, and you're just going to waste your time". I have a guitar that I like and I want to play with it because I think it's fun to tinker and oh ps fuck off thanks!

Mictester: har har har. The intonation on mine is pretty good. Active electronics on a guitar are something I've never been too impressed by, I find they tend to lack character. Sort of like how most every guitar with EMG 81/85s installed in it sounds almost identical.

The pickups, I can somewhat grant that. I'd like to go to Lace Alumitones eventually, but for now I've found a pickguard locally for $20 and I'm looking to have some cheap fun.

Kaludjerko: Yeah, I'm definitely going to individual on/off switches for each pickup, and having access to the neck+bridge combo is a big part of that. I'll look into the armstrong wiring.

Since the pickguard I'm picking up tomorrow has a slot for the five-way, I was thinking of using it to toggle between different capacitance values for the tone pot.

[phatt]

@astrobass,
If you choose to take offense at a bit of banter then that is your choice and yes I've messed with pu's since very young so I'm aware of a lot of the mods.
Clearly you don't want my advice so I won't bother you with my boring mods,, and please note I loose interest very fast when people swear at me.
Go in peace, hope you find what you are looking for.
Phil.

[kaludjerko]

I personally like the tone caps even smaller than the values you listed. You can see some mod ideas in this thread that I started a while ago: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18134.

Have fun modding it and let us know how it turns out!

I read the thread but I didn't see notes about specific cap values. Can you post what you found worked best?

Arrh,, another one who wants to reinvent the wheel.
I suggest you save yourself the time and go with what has been done before.

Any mods to Strats have likely already been done so it might pay to go have a hunt around for all the mods that have been done before and you may well find a few that work well.

I've messed with strats for most of my Adult life and only a few are worth the bother (IMO). What you suggest is unlikely to add use or value.
but don't let me stop you
Phil.

Super helpful, Phil. I mean, clearly by asking for advice on which mods are most worthwhile I made it clear that I intend to reinvent the wheel, right? I couldn't have possibly done some googling, found a mountain of conflicting suggestions, and decided to ask around on some of the forums I personally frequent where I trust the other users to have a relatively no-nonsense approach to tone for what they found was useful vs. garbage. I mean, if I'd done that, I might have written something really fucking similar to what I wrote here.

My favourite thing about your post? I love how you described what an experienced expert you are on Stratocasters and modifications to them without providing a single usable suggestion. Thanks so much for chiming in to basically say "don't bother, I know everything, and you're just going to waste your time". I have a guitar that I like and I want to play with it because I think it's fun to tinker and oh ps fuck off thanks!

Mictester: har har har. The intonation on mine is pretty good. Active electronics on a guitar are something I've never been too impressed by, I find they tend to lack character. Sort of like how most every guitar with EMG 81/85s installed in it sounds almost identical.

The pickups, I can somewhat grant that. I'd like to go to Lace Alumitones eventually, but for now I've found a pickguard locally for $20 and I'm looking to have some cheap fun.

Kaludjerko: Yeah, I'm definitely going to individual on/off switches for each pickup, and having access to the neck+bridge combo is a big part of that. I'll look into the armstrong wiring.

Since the pickguard I'm picking up tomorrow has a slot for the five-way, I was thinking of using it to toggle between different capacitance values for the tone pot.

It's a pity this discussion went this way over what it seems to be misunderstanding.
I tried few modifications in 90's when (for me at least) was not easy to find info on this and I "invented" few switching schemes myself, only to find it has been done before. However, it was fun for what it was.

On more practical note, Dan Armstrong scheme can be performed in pickguard with a 5-way switch slot. Exactly in this slot you can place toggles, if they are small enough. You'll just need to widen them a bit.

here is a bit more info, to save you some search:

http://www.dominocs.com/ToneWorks/armstrongstrat.html

If you are interested to know, my "switch scheme" involved 4PDT and allowed me to get bridge+neck, both in parallel and series. I love it's sound, but it's not logical, so if I would do it again I would go Armstrong-way.

I have Alumitones on another guitar. I find them great, but keep in mind that I never played with alnico single-coils pickups, just cheap ceramic Squier copies, so I might be biassed.
They are dead quiet, much quieter than any traditional humbucker that i ever tried (which is only few to be fair).

have fun with it, whatever you decide to do...

[astrobass]

@astrobass,
If you choose to take offense at a bit of banter then that is your choice and yes I've messed with pu's since very young so I'm aware of a lot of the mods.
Clearly you don't want my advice so I won't bother you with my boring mods,, and please note I loose interest very fast when people swear at me.
Go in peace, hope you find what you are looking for.
Phil.

If you had anything of use to say, you would've said it rather than posting simply to brag about how much you know. Thanks for a second super helpful contribution.

Kaludjerko:
That is some fancy ass wiring. I'm going to give it a try initially and see if I can remember what each switching combination is, and if it turns out to be too much I might just re-purpose them as simple on/off switches. For the toggles though, since I'm picking up a black pickguard and it's a black strat, I was thinking of going with something along these lines, though ideally somewhat smaller:
http://ca.mouser.com/ProductDetail/NKK- ... QVzfGE0%3d


Still have some shopping around to do to nail down exactly which switches I want to use, but small black pushbutton toggles would be ideal. The less protrusion through the surface the better too, but we'll see what I can scrounge up. The idea would be to also use black anodized screws for securing the pickguard to the body.

[JiM]

Before drilling holes for those Dan Armstrong-style switches, you could try this wiring scheme : http://www.geocities.jp/dgb_studio/3svari_e.htm#16
It brings two series and two half-out-of-phase positions to a strat, using only the stock components (and a couple of caps).
And it blends !

[DrNomis]

Here's a couple of mods I can suggest, in fact I've done them on my Mexican Fender Standard Strat and they do work well:


1, Firstly, remove the stock pickups and replace them with Noiseless ones ( I have three Vintage Noiseless pickups installed on my strat), you'll get the strat sound without the annoying mains hum.


2,Secondly, Fender wire the tone controls so that they work on the neck and middle pickups on a standard strat, in my opinion this is all well and good when you select either the neck or middle pickup, but it's a bit of an overkill when you select both the middle and neck, to sort this out you could do what Eric Johnson does and move the middle tone control to the bridge pickup, you can use a 47nF cap for the tone cap, I think Eric Johnson uses a 100nF but you can try any tone cap value, the smaller the cap the brighter your strat will sound.

Replacing all the pots is a good idea as the originals sound like they are well and truly worn out, you should be able to fit a set of 24mm pots as long as there's room in the body routing, hope it all goes well....


Also, try seeing if you can find a schematic for Brian May's Red Special pickup wiring for some more ideas.....

[deltafred]

Back in the 80s I tried every Strat mod going, the guitar magazines at the time were full of them.

Only 2 survived the test of time - bridge humbucker (series wired), and master tone control. A lot of the others maybe sounded ok or good when playing at home but on stage the subtlety disappeared in the mix.

[phatt]

Back in the 80s I tried every Strat mod going, the guitar magazines at the time were full of them.

Only 2 survived the test of time - bridge humbucker (series wired), and master tone control. A lot of the others maybe sounded ok or good when playing at home but on stage the subtlety disappeared in the mix.

LOL,, funny I've only ended up with 2 as well,, actually very similar to those.

Phil.

[MoonWatcher]

and also options for out-of phase sounds (like sound on Bohemian Rhapsody).

This is the neck and middle pickups out of phase, and if you like what is going on with Bohemian Rhapsody, it is a surefire way to get it.

I've noticed that things are kind of falling apart with the replies in this thread, and I think that might be partly because many of these Strat tweaks give you a whole kitchen sink of things, but many of us will only bond with a few of them.

For instance, I like bridge and middle pickups in parallel, but don't care for neck and middle in parallel as much (can be muddy with some stuff). I do like neck and middle out of phase as indicated above.

I like bridge and neck in parallel, because I play Telecasters. I also got to try a 4 way switch and like bridge and neck in series.

So I think part of it comes down to determining which of all the super/mega/ultra tweaks you might actually use, and just wiring up the guitar for them.

Part of why so many seem to gravitate towards the Strat is because of what it offers stock out of the box. So adding to that should just be a bit of augmentation and no more. If you have to throw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater, it might be better to choose another guitar.

There was a period where I was heavy into the Blackmore thing of just bridge/neck back and forth, to the point where I just re-wired a Strat to give me only those two pickup choices. Since I don't use a trem that much, I realized that a Telecaster was a better fit (with the right pickups).

There are now so many pickup choices that it compounds the issue. You could conceivably choose single coil sized humbuckers, which would allow you to combine coils of other pickups to eliminate hum. If you only go with a reverse wound/reverse polarity middle pickup (that is a true single coil), you can't take advantage of hum canceling combos with the bridge and neck pickups.

...Again, you might be able to focus on a subset of hum canceling needs. I only use or used certain pickup combinations with overdrive, and others only with clean sounds, or not higher gain stuff. So I wouldn't need the advantages of a humbucker for everything, and I'd imagine that others might conclude the same thing.

The bottom line is that you only need to make this as complex as you want.

[CHEEZOR]

I personally like the tone caps even smaller than the values you listed. You can see some mod ideas in this thread that I started a while ago: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18134.

Have fun modding it and let us know how it turns out!

I read the thread but I didn't see notes about specific cap values. Can you post what you found worked best?

You can find specific values listed in the first post of the thread:

Best mod I have ever done was lower the tone cap to a more usable value. Something like 0.0022uF or 0.0068uF. I use cheap ceramics. With the 0.0068uF you get a hint of cocked wah sound when you turn it down all the way. Cool sound.

It might be cool to have a master volume and 2 master tones with separate cap values. I'll have to try that next time I open my strat up.

[.Mike]

In the same vein, does anyone have any advice on Strat mods? Ideally mods that don't involve buying new pickups or active electronics. I don't want to put new holes in the wood either.

My favorite Strat mod is to switch the middle knob over to a master tone control, and replace the other tone knob with a no-load pot wired to the bridge/neck pickups.

That way, you still end up with all the Strat sounds in all positions, but if you turn the knob up when bridge only is selected, it blends in the neck, if you turn the knob up when neck is selected, it blends in the bridge, and if you turn it up in either the neck/mid or mid/bridge, it blends in the other until you get all 3 pickups at once.

Lots of fun, cheap, and reversible.

Mike

[deltafred]

My favorite Strat mod is to switch the middle knob over to a master tone control, and replace the other tone knob with a no-load pot wired to the bridge/neck pickups.

That way, you still end up with all the Strat sounds in all positions, but if you turn the knob up when bridge only is selected, it blends in the neck, if you turn the knob up when neck is selected, it blends in the bridge, and if you turn it up in either the neck/mid or mid/bridge, it blends in the other until you get all 3 pickups at once.

Lots of fun, cheap, and reversible.

Mike

Sounds good! Next time I have my Strat open I will definitely try it. (I already have the master tone control and a pot that does nothing).

What value pot did you use? By no-load I presume you mean you connect it across the hot ends of the neck and bridge pickups as a variable resistor.

[.Mike]

The no-load pot is a specific pot. CTS makes them, as does Bourns. Type "no load pot" into Google, and you'll see tons of places that sell them.

Basically, it is a 250k (or 500k) audio pot, but when it hits the full clockwise point, the wiper is completely disconnected from the lugs. Some have a detent in the no-load position. That way, it is completely out of the circuit unless you are using it.

Here is a wiring diagram. It is simple: http://www.fralinpickups.com/images/blendschem2.jpg

I think the pots run between $6 - $8. Of course, you could make one by disassembling a pot and removing the conductive material from the end of the wafer.

Mike

[trjones1]

You could also use a potentiometer with a switch like this: http://www.futurlec.com/Potentiometers/ ... CHpr.shtml

Wire it so that it disconnects the pot when the switch is open. This will give you a really good, unmistakeable click when you switch it in and out.