Testing victorious 24

Taylor gs mini rosewood testing (sorry about the "background noise")

After shooting out the Gs Mini vs. the 114e ... I realize that this mini has practically the same projection , and and sounds better to my ears regarding note separation and timbre ... Go figure... ! Do not even notice the lack of bass facing the 114 ... Connected with the pickup the 114 seemed more balanced tough ... but acoustically amplified think the mini sounds more interesting to my ears. when shopping around I noticed that the two rosewood mini's I tried, sounded different, obviously, I brought the one, that was a match to my taste, and had more bass and warmer tone.

Reilander Pickups review

 I found out about Reilanders recently and have been upgrading all my guitars with his sets. I find the touch very reactive to picking technics without becoming harsh.
Tight punchy bottoms with warm mids and snappy top end bite, thats how I describe them. In some cases I replaced pickups that where twice the price of Reilanders. Its not a metal or modern high gain type of pickups, but instead great classic sounding classic tones for blues, folk, jazz or classic rock.
I found out all pickups sound great in the mix, never becomming muddy or harsh and have a very organic feel. My s-1 hss strat sounds great and natural now (Texas styles / rh-2 humbucker), and my Nashville custom tele has the best tele pickups I have experienced.

Blue Strat Project

 I was in need of a maple neck strat with a more classic pickup configuration, so I decided to have some fun (and save some money)... and this strat plays great! quite addictive to play i must confess (my fingers are raw afther the test drive)

I decided to use copper foil for the shielding. used a pivot screw to link the bridge grounding and cavities.

I used Kulson vintage style tunners, and shapped a bone nut. string trees where added later as needed.
The neck need an adjustment for relief, so I gave it a slight turn before assembling and aligning.

The neck I used is a 50's style soft V shaped, with dual action rod adjust at heel. Afther a quick setup, left it rest for a few days, before readjusting the rod. Then readjusted the setup and left it resting for a week or two.

Started assembling the pickguard, also used some copper foil for shielding, a .047 paper oil cap for tone and a .001 bleeder, paralelled with a 220k resistor. 

 
Added someVintage style handwound pickups from Mike Reilander, with traditional stagger.

Finishing the pickguard wiring...  all with vintage cloth wire, both solid and stranded type (depending on the connection type, and flexibility needed.

Finishing the assembly and setup.

Fine tunning the pickup height, action and inotation.


Ready to rock!

Nashville Power Tele(Tweaking) + 300STER

Yes, The power bridge is a botch. Was reapired 3 times, and replaced one...besides, it kills the tone in many ways... no good.
I removed all the power bridge circuit and saddles, but kept the bridge...

With a little effort I was able to tightly fit the vintage saddles on the bridge. Ant there it was - instant sustain and clarity! I couldnt believe how bad the fishman saddles sounded.
Now this guitar sounds great... but there is allways more...
So while I was at it I decided I'd do a little more tweaking, and built my 300STER OD into the guitar... tight, but doable, and I used the battery compartment already offered.Afther removing the powerbridge circuit, Redid all the guitar wiring, and built the overdrive PTP on prefboard. Also added a treble bleed on the volume pot.
A switch fully bypasses the OD circuit, another one connects the bridge pickup with the 5 position switch, giving both the Tele classic switching or strat 5 way switching. The tone pot position is a level control for the drive, and the treble bleed lets me control the drive amount from the volume pot.
Now I don't have to carry an overdrive pedal anymore....

Guitar Tweaking (bridge saddles)

This is a very simple mod, that in my opinion has a great diference in sustain, clarity and high frequency response on an american strat guitar.
Usualy they come with cast, block saddles like the ones bellow:

Afther replacing them with vintage style, bent stainless steel saddles, I tested with the same (old) strings, and have to say it was very diferent tonewise. Almost like as if I replaced with fresh strings. In fact  block saddles tend to dull out the sound.. So I have to say that it is not a myth that quality vintage saddles sound better than modern block type. Also another simple trick I use, is to remove the cover of the back cavity, I realised it also dappens the sound a bit. Replacing the tremolo block may also help with sustain, has I noticed the original apears to be lame on design and material quality...It is a shame that this kind of attention was lost down the production line...
Here is a picture with the vintage saddles insataled.