My Butterscotch blonde MIA Tele, tobacco burst Epi LP standard, and sonic blue MIM stratocaster.
It had some of the worst fret sprout I’ve ever seen and needed a level, too. The G string was rattling at the nut, so I asked the tech to just put in a new one since he was doing the fretwork anyway.
I didn’t like the stock player HSS set, so I put in SSL 1s and a 59 bridge, which I changed out for the JB later. 59 was great but I just wanted something that had a tighter high gain tone without losing the low/mid gain rock and roll sound. I also did the wiring so the humbucker has 500k resistance while the single coils get 250k, and it auto splits in position 2. JB isn’t great clean on its own (not that I ever use the bridge clean anyway), but it is when split with the middle pickup.
Aesthetically, I changed out the pickguard, pickup covers, and knobs. This was the “special” 75th anniversary edition which came with the black mirror pickguard. Personally I really don’t like that look, but I knew sonic blue would be beautiful with white, and the body was the perfect color. Sonic blue Fenders seem to all be slightly different. The fact that this one struck me was the reason for the impulse buy. I definitely didn’t need a third guitar but I’m happy I have it now. It feels like all the things I like about my Tele and LP combined.
I got the guitar for $700 and spent probably $500+ on it. Utterly worthless for value, but now it’s perfect (for me).
Really cool instrument, and its awesome that you’ve made it exactly your own.
Out of curiosity, was the strat new or used when you bought it with all those fret and nut issues?
Brand new, right off the rack at GC. Manufacturing date was 3 months prior.
This is anecdotal, but most of the MIM strats and teles I saw there had pretty bad fret sprout. The Squiers didn’t. I was thinking it must have been due to the humidity/temperature difference between the manufacturing location and New England in winter.
