so i am debating on bolting my bridge pickup on my strat directly to the body hoping to get better tone and sustain. its a MIM strat with a duncan hotrails in the neck and a duncan distortion in the bridge.

any input is much appreciated

i don't think you have a clear understanding of how pick ups work, if you think this will make a difference.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

well diffirent wood and mounting types effect the vibration of the guitar which gives them diffirent. if you have a top routed strat and a rear routed strat with the same electronics the will sound different from eachother. if this changes nothing why do people do it? why did eddie do it?

Eddie did it because he was broke, and went all apeshit crazy modding. Thre reflectors all over the back did nothing for his tone either, or the spare change he glued to it.

The rear route is strictly for cosmetic purposes. To show more wood.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

hmmm...

I'm not saying for you to not do it. I am all for hacking the hell out of your axe, if you want to./ just don't expect it to sound radically different.

I've completely stripped down bodies, and repainted, just for the hell of it. I've added pickups to some guitars, or changed wiring schemes.

Actually if you want to delve into tone altering, that is an avenue to explore. You can really change how a guitar sounds by changing how it's wired. And it might not even cost you anything.

One thing i guess i should add, which i think might be a plus for what you were planning, I like my strat pickups set pretty low, like far away from the strings. I think it affects the way the string interacts with the magnetic field of the pickups, and adds properties i like, and you can make up any signal loss by turning up your amp. mounting direct to the body would be as low as you can get, but the pitfalls of doing so may be that it might be harder to adjust the pickup so their balanced volume wise, none of mine sit truly flat or parallel to the plane of the body, and depending on the strength of the pickup, and the depth of the pickup cavity, you might end up creating too much space from the strings to pickup, you might lose a lot of signal strength, and thus sustain.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

yeah i have thought about doing the ej thing and moving my middle tone to my bridge but i need to get a new soldering iron haha, but thank you for the imput it is great to have diffirent opinions before i drill into my guitar.

you could experiment with different value capacitors too. Ridiculously easy, and cheap to do, and can have a dramatic effect on your sound. easy to change back too.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

my plan was to screw a piece of wood (probably maple) to the body first and then the pickup ontop so that it would sit at the height that i have currently, and i would be just lining it up with the pickguard hole so that i could still keep it on and have my other two pups on the pick guard as usual. i just read somethings on strat mods and one suggested this and said it would bring out more of the wood's tone and slightly boost sustain

Well, try it and see, I guess. i would be surprised if it made much difference, but it sure wont hurt anything to give it a shot.

I have a couple guitars and basses that have pickups attached directly to the body, and i don't hear a lot of difference, taking into account the differing qualities of electronics., but as always i say, let your ears decide, experimenting is fun.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

cool thanks

My Stagemaster has no pickguard. The pups are direct mount to the body. Has a warmer and "woodier" tone than my Strat.

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Stagemaster
Roadhouse Strat
Epi Traditional Pro Les Paul
Ovation Celeb
Esteban Celestial Night(nicely tweeked)
Blackheart tube amp

are the both the same wood?

Yes, the bridge pickup in the GE Smith Telecaster is indeed mounted that way.

He discusses that guitar in this video.

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I really like all them "Aster" guitars. You know, like the Stratoc, Telec and Jazzm.

what is the advantage of it?