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Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 11:46 am
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Herr Nutter, suddenly transforms to his alter ego, Mr Smith of Brighton. :D

A honour to have you in the country mate. :wink:

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Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 11:54 am
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Yes Niki, I, that is to say we, are schizophren, and we thank you dearly for that hearty welcome! 'tis an honour to be accepted on your beautiful Island!

Hope to get some building done myself soon, unfortunately I am stuck in a please-no-noise place with no tools and a gargling sink... Alas... uphill from here...

Oh, there it gargles again... very well... gargle on, my friend the sink... ^^


Right guys, let's see Andy & Randel wield their mighty Strat-building powers again! I need a fix, and to tell you the truth, the sight of that Fuzz ain't makin' it better...!

-Nutter


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Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 1:20 pm
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Put your guitar headstock up the door.

Worked for me! :lol:

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Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 2:40 pm
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:lol: I hope the door is made of good tone wood so I get a better sound...

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Posted: Sun Sep 26, 2010 4:23 pm
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Howdy!

Its just gone midnight where I am and i've been wiring since 5pm. :shock:

Believe it or not, it bloody worked first time!

.....IT'S ALIVE!!!

:D

I'll post an up date for you tomorrow.

Andy & Randel the Cat

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Posted: Sun Sep 26, 2010 7:05 pm
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Wow, been out of the loop on this thread...seems like if one missed to check an email notification, you just don't get any more! So Andy, I missed the guess the problem on the wiring diagram! RATS....and now you have this puppy wired up? Did you take some blow by blow pictures???? I want to see mate.......please!!

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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 2:33 am
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Dear lord! First time?

You sure u didn't leave the room and randel fixed up any mistakes?

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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 2:45 am
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Impulse7 wrote:
Dear lord! First time?


My thoughts exactly, quite the accomplishment there Andy.

Very impressed.

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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 6:37 am
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Howdy!

Playing live & Line 6 POD's

I was in a couple of bands in my late teens and early 20's and playing live was not something I enjoyed. I much prefer to record at home for my own pleasure. The only way I'd do a gig is if there was enough people who liked my music and they wanted to here it live. I'm done with trying to win people over in a gig situation. I'd much prefer playing front of people who wanted to listen to me play my music in the first place and with Myspace etc, its pretty easy to start up a fan base with out ever playing a gig.

Don't get me wrong, I love my POD X3! It totally rocks and for home recording is an absolute joy to use. Its my speakers that are the let down. I need to upgrade and gets a decent set of monitors. I just miss having a real amp to play through ever now and then. A nice small valve amp with a few choice pedals would be a great.

Shielding.

This subject crops up regularly on the forums so I'd like to do a small piece on the shielding for this project.

Image

I've shielded the control section of my pickguard with self adhesive copper foil. That's all the shielding this Strat is going to get. There will be no body cavity shielding. There's a sound reason for this.

Before I started this thread I had a chat with the forums celestial guitar guru Martian, on the pros and cons on shielding. There's a lot of valuable knowledge stored in that oversized alien cranium of his. :wink:

Here's a link to that thread. Martian on Shielding

Both Martian and Bill Laurence say pretty much the same thing. Basically all the extra conductive material that one would use to try and block out any unwanted frequencies also hinders the performance of the pickups to varying degrees. Its the pickups that need shielding and I'm sure none of us would totally rap our Abby Master wound pups in copper foil would we?

So to limit picking up any unwanted frequencies such as 60 cycle hum or 50 cycle if you are in the UK (our mains are different over here) then a set of well designed pups would be the smart move. Lace pickups IMO are the quietest pickups on the market today. Using a set of them makes cavity shielding pretty much pointless.

Now Martian did say he didn't invent this stuff but I have been reliably informed that he is responsible for the following: Laser Technology, Fibre optics, 3D holographic projection software, the popular American snack cake the “Twinky” and Elvis. :lol:

Thanks again, Martian! :D

Big Hairy Wiring – Continued

I've finished wiring up the pickguard. What a complete nightmare that was! I didn't take many pics as I went so apologies for that.

Its important to plan out where each wire will sit and seeing as space is an issue here I had to be a bit creative. First thing I had to do was move the cap on the bridge S-1 tone pot as it gets in the way of the DP/DT switch. You'll see what that looks like in a bit.

I've separated out the pickup wires that need to be grounded and the wires which would need to be attached to another component part and labelled them.

Image

This way I won't get lost and can make sure each wires goes to the right contact.

I followed my diagram to the letter crossing each correctly secured wire as I went. Now its not the prettiest bit of wiring ever but it all worked first time. S-1 switching, Mid- boost and bridge on/off, everything works perfectly. I'm very smug about that. :D

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

You'll notice on the pic above that my PCB wiring wasn't very neat at all. I really should have used a smaller soldering iron for that bit but i don't have one so speed was the key. Its improtant not to over heat the board as you can ruin the components so as soon as the join is made i got the soldering iron out of there pronto. The joins are not tidy but they're secure and they work at treat.

Image

Now that is some seriously Big Hairy Wiring! I had planned to put the mid boost on its side in-between the 5 way and the S-1 but there wasn't room so I had to put it on stilts!

Image

Well, I reckon this has got to be a Fender Forum first. Three S-1 switches, a mid boost and 4 single coils pickups.

There is 70 soldered connections in total. That's right, 70.

If there is anyone else who has managed to fit more in a standard Strat cavity I'd like to know about it, otherwise I'll be taking home 50 points for that thanks! :D

Thats all I've got for today but I'll be back soon with the final finishing update for the body very soon.

Thanks again for all the quallity posts folks! :D

Enjoy!

Andy & Randel the Cat

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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 7:08 am
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Hey Andy, wow, that is like crazy! I would like to see what kind of soldering iron you used! Amazing it worked on the 1st time. Will we get some sound bits on YouTube or something like that?? So often it is easy to have one bad solder joint or a crossed wire. I use a magnifying glass to examine every solder joint to make sure it is not only connected, but will stay connected. A few times they worked when I was done, but a week later, after it was installed one position would stop working. Turned out to be an almost soldered joint that was not making a connection. I had a Tele that was kind of wired like this, but used a 3-way rotary switch. It was a real job getting that into a Tele!

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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 7:18 am
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YOU GUYS ARE NUTS! (in a good way) :D

That is INSANE, I can't believe that fits in a guitar! Big and Hairy indeed :) great job man!

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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 3:15 pm
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Uhhhgh, Andy, that wiring is so friggin' Big and Hairy it makes my (admittedly also quite large) hair stand on end! But you succeeded! In one (listen up folks: ONE!) go! Well done! 50 points well earned! :)

AndyBigHair wrote:
I was in a couple of bands in my late teens and early 20's and playing live was not something I enjoyed. I much prefer to record at home for my own pleasure. The only way I'd do a gig is if there was enough people who liked my music and they wanted to here it live. I'm done with trying to win people over in a gig situation. I'd much prefer playing front of people who wanted to listen to me play my music in the first place and with Myspace etc, its pretty easy to start up a fan base with out ever playing a gig.


Are you completely sure you're not talking about me, there? :shock:

AndyBigHair wrote:
Don't get me wrong, I love my POD X3! It totally rocks and for home recording is an absolute joy to use. Its my speakers that are the let down. I need to upgrade and gets a decent set of monitors


I recommend Yamaha HS80 monitors, they have a very clean, flat response, and I have used mine now for 3 years and am very happy with them. I have recorded and mixed many different styles of music on them from grindcore to singer/songwriter, and they did a good job on all of them.
For the more slender budget I suggest the KRK Rokit series, they are well worth their money and I have used them quite a few times. Don't go for small cones though, I think the Rokit 6 are a good place to start.

AndyBigHair wrote:
I just miss having a real amp to play through ever now and then. A nice small valve amp with a few choice pedals would be a great.


As soon as I have decent accommodation I will get a build done with my electronics-friend, he has promised me to build me a Pro-Jr kind of amp, "but only better";-) I am looking forward to that; should it purr like a kitten and growl like a lion I will recommend his services. 8)

Cheers!

-Nutter


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Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2010 4:06 pm
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Nutter

I strongly recommend you install one of these on any valve amp build

http://www.hallamplification.com/main.html?src=%2F#2,2

Great tool.

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Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2010 4:32 am
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oh that looks nifty! Thanks for pointing that out, Niki! I'll confer with my allied electro-guru and see what he says. Cheers! :)

-Nutter

edit: listened to wrong music while posting. Hereby corrected.


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Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2010 5:06 am
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Your mate will likely tell you that running at reduced voltage strips the Getter (silver coating at the top of the valve) from the valves.
If you run amps hot you'll plough through valves anyways, so it's a score draw either way.

My VibrochampXD's 6V6 has been completely missing it's Getter for a while now. It don't sound great, but works and isn't microphonic like most valves when they wear out.

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