Return of the Red Strat

My old “Red Strat” is officially back in the rotation. I put this guitar together originally in Jan. 1988, as a sophomore in high school.

Originally it was a standard Strat style guitar. Over the years I reconfigured the electronics several times, installed a Floyd Rose, added a bridge humbucker, reshaped the neck, and scalloped the fretboard from the 15th fret up.

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I returned it to more of a standard Strat configuration, with a set of Seymour Duncan Vintage Staggered SLL-1 single coil pickups. All the wiring and electronics are new as well.

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I cleaned up a lot of the routing, which I’m thinking I originally did with a chainsaw. I added a white pearloid pickguard, and pearl-capped chrome knobs for the volume and tone controls. I gave the body a good buff & polish which took away most scratches and brightened it up a bit.

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I also reshaped the back of the neck to a more rounded profile and sanded out a few dents.

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It feels good to have this old friend (my oldest friend in fact) back in action again. This guitar and I have been through a lot together! I was a bit surprised how easily all the new parts came together, and how little setup time I needed. The only problem I had was I had to reshape part of the pickguard and drill new holes to align the pickups correctly.