Just joining the forum community and thought I'd share a few Strat photos.

1957 Surf Green Reissue - with Heywood Vintage wound pickups.
2004 Players Deluxe - with Area Series Pickups
2009 Fender Customcaster - with Texas Custom Specials.

All redone with CTS pots, cloth wiring and PIO caps.

Nice collection! Really diggin that Players Deluxe!

EDIT: Also, how do you like those PIO caps? Ive read great things about them. Did you notice much of a difference?

Welcome to the forum.

Redone with cloth wiring? Does that mean that you replace the pickup leads with cloth wire if they come with plastic wire?

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Member #26797
My other guitar is a Strat.

Some might complain or say it's stupid, but Yes. I pull off the poly wire and replace it with cloth if the pickups don't have cloth wiring. The Texas Customs had cloth so I didn't need to but the Heywood and the Area series did and si I replaced them with cloth. Most sane people wouldn't do that though and I don't blame them.

Do you have to re-pot pickups when you replace the wire with cloth? I dont have a set in front of me right now so I cant quite remember where the wire actually solders in.. Also, how much difference did the PIO caps make?

Nice!! Welcome to the forums!!

In my opinion, the PIO are incredible caps. I use the Russian K40-y9 series in my Strat guitars. I swapped out the Orange Drops that I had in them. The OD weren't bad caps - the PIO just smooths things out though. In the 57' I have a .1uf, in the Deluxe I have a .022uf and in the Customcaster I have it wired ala Jimmy V. and have a .015uf and a .22uf. For the longest time I used the Orange Drops, Blue Drops, and Chocolate Drops in my guitars - I just like the PIOs better now. If you don't mess with your tone knob though - neither will make a difference but that goes without saying.

Carefull soldering on the pups. Right were the leads come off currently. I personally wouldn't recommend it as it does immediately void any warranty and people will debate you to the end of the Earth as to if it makes a difference. Also - I've messed up a lot of pickups in this manner but it's something I like to do... I'm just weird that way though.

Welcome to the forum. May I ask where you got the body for the Customcaster...it is beautiful.

What he said!

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You dig?

+1 Let me give you a special welcome from all fender lounge guys!

Cheers!

Welcome, the girls look marvelous!

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Support your local guitar shop.

About the CustomCaster...

I picked the body up off of eBay. $150 - Brand New. Some guy had it laying around - not sure where he got it anymore... he never used it and no one had even bid on it. I made him an offer and he took it. It's solid Mahagony w/maple cap. He had all the holes drilled for everything already too when he had it built - twas a breeze to put together.

The Neck is from CEG Hartails (great work for a great price)

Most of the parts are from Craigslist - I just had great luck in finding exactly what I was looking for.