Also, SRV attributed a good amount of his tone to his huge frets he put on it.

It was not until SRV that I even associated tone with fret type ...

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Laughing out loud with fear and hope, I have a desperate plan ...

I recently read somewhere that moving the pickups closer to the strings provides for more gain at the expense of sustain. For more sustain, pickups should be lowered. Not an expert, but that is what I read.

Also, SRV's pickups (which had to contribute to his sound) were low output, debunking the popular misconception that that kind of tone must have high output pickups. Again, not and expert. I would be interested in comments about this, because I would like to understand those relationships.

You're right about the output vs sustain relation and right about his pickups. Apparently they were stock, not over wound.

I was surprised to read that although he used very heavy strings, he used medium picks. I read somewhere that back in the 50's and early 60's, all strings were extremely heavy, average where like 15-17 gauge, they didnt make light guage strings untill later. Eric Clapton got his first set of lighter gauge strings from George Harrison. This is also why when you listen to guitar in the 50's, you very rarely heard any string bends, you just couldnt really do it. Some say its because blues hadnt influenced the rock at the time to the degree it did in the later 60's, I dont buy that though. I think it had more to do that its hard to do full step bends on the tow ropes they used back then.

Interesting, I never new that info about the strings in 50's and 60's. I think Hendrix also used a medium pick as well. I've always used a heavy pick myself up until recently. Found an old medium one and decided to give it a try and now it's my favorite.

I use heavy Fender pearoid, that I shape with a file. i grind it down so its about 1/3 the size of the original, then bevel the sides so they arent flat, then I have a pocket knife sharpener that has a groove that I run it through that rounds out the bevel. I like the pearloid over the tortise because i feel even though its the same thickness, its a harder plastic. I use those for blues, and dunlop jazz III for more intricate lead playing.

I read that about the strings in I believe the book about the history of the Stratocaster, really informative. It surprised me too about the heavy strings. After I read it, i listened to a bunch of older 50's era rock, and it was true that I heard hardly any bending, usually only vibrato from the tremolo. Thats what probably made a tremolo so popular, the fender and bigsby, the fact they could actually bend notes. Now that they make 9 gauge strings, people can bend individual notes.

Necessity, mother of inventions?

Let's ask Chuck Berry, the man's been around that block a few times.

Your hands need to be as big as a catchers mit also. 11s are fine but you have to play as load as hell and bend like a mad man. If your not tearin the crap out of your fingers and pickin hard your not ever going to the sound you want. Good luck.

"Number One" had a neck relief of .012" at the 7th and 9th frets, and leveled out through the remainder of the fingerboard. The fingerboard radius is 10" and used Dunlop 6100 fretwire. String height was measured to be 5/64" on the high E string and 7/64" on the low E string. Each string had 3 full winds for the best angle at the bone nut.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRV_guitars

BigJay, if you're looking for the scientific answer, I'm sorry to disappoint. I will tell you what I know though. It has been my experience that on an electric guitar, particularly when you're playing it hard, the string vibration carries through a fairly big chunk of air. If you're really thrashing it and your action is low, it is quite possible that you will incur some level of buzz from the madly vibrating string hitting the frets -- this may not be noticeable when you're setting up or checking out a guitar because you're not hitting it hard. SRV and many others knew this and set the action high (with a commensurate pickup height) so as to avoid the strings coming in contact with the fretboard at all. Indeed, it also makes fretted notes sound more "pure" as the angle between the string and the next fret is bigger, making a buzz that much more unlikely. Does that make sense?

I have a guitar set withlow action and my srv is set with action that is quite higher.My observations are i have to have a lighter touch with the strat with the lower action otherwise there is buzzing.Also it is harder to do bends,i feel like when i bend the note ,its harder to catch the string with my finger because it is closer to the fretboard. I notice with the higher action it is alot easier to catch the string on the way up to bend it.I also notice that vibrato sounds better tonewise with higher action.Again,less contact with the fretboard.Not really a science type, but i can share with you my observations.

But what about the PU height? One question in this thread is the distance between the strings and the PUs. High action creates distance from the PUs. Maybe he did this to get more tone and he left the PUs where they were and did not raise them for the higher action??? Comments?

Taken from http://www.stevieray.com/gear.htm

Pickup height: on the treble side - very high. Laying a metal rule on the frets, the bridge pickup touched the rule, the middle pickup almost touched it, and the neck pickup was 1/16" from the rule. On the bass side, bridge 1/32", middle 1/16", and 1/32" neck.