[B1shop]

Hi Guys,

i am going to build my own Strat guitar with the help of my guitar teacher, as he also has his own small guitar workshop.The body is made of paulownia wood with maple neck and 21 frets ( i am buying a Guitar kit but only using the body/neck).

It should have some versatility, bridge pickup should handle high gain distortion without being muddy. I want the humbucker to have some balance with the two single coils, so it doesn't need to be too extreme. I can make some compromises here.

Middle and Neck pickup should be strat like to play (funk/pop/clean stuff--Ruben Wan covers/polyphia just to name a few). I´m not looking for something vintage, could be something modern but with the strat "feel". I´ve almost no knowledge about pickups because i always used the stock pickups on my budget ibanez guitars. Right know i feel like Dimarzio pickups would fit best but i am still not sure. Oh and i also want to use a tremolo, i don´t know whether this is important to know for the selection.

I would appreciate any recommendations for each position regardless of the pickup brand.

Thanks in advance !

[darkbluemurder]

Hi,

Area 67 for neck/middle or Area 67 neck/58 middle (the latter being my personal favorite).

Bridge - I have used in HSS configurations the DiMarzio Virtual PAF (no longer available), the Air Norton and the Breed neck (only available from the custom shop). I used a 250k volume pot with all these pickups and overall, I liked the Air Norton best because the output was a close enough match with the singles, yet the split tone was a bit more robust than the VPAF. The Breed neck is a bit too dark with the 250k volume pot for my taste but that may be due to the particular guitar.

If you use a 500k volume pot, I can recommend the Mo' Joe bright but not shrill, no mud in the lows, solid but not overwhelming output. However, in that case I would go for Injector neck in the neck and middle since they work well with a 500k volume pot. Not as funky as the Area 67/58 but still bright and very stratish.

Cheers Stephan

[RayBarbeeMusic]

HSS my current favorite is a PAF Master bridge with a couple 67s or a 58 and 67.  500k pots.  The Master blends better with the singles than the 36th I think because it's a little brighter, a little tighter, and less "agressive/rock" sounding.  I always split in position 2 so that the bridge side coil on the Master is in parallel with the middle split Area.  You'll need a reverse polarity Area or just reverse the magnet in the Master if you want to do that, but it' worth it.