Indeed.

Finding a luthier sufficiently familiar with the 7.25" fretboards can sometimes be a daunting proposition.

Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

Anyone know how high the action is on Hendrix, Clapton or other artists Strats with the 7.25 radius necks? Pushing against a steeper incline of the 7.25 radius is harder than the less steep incline of a 9.5 radius or a 12 radius, that part is simple enough. If you don't believe it, try pushing a car up an incline, vs a flat road. Just because someone can do it, doesn't mean it isn't difficult. Also, while bending on a 7.25 radius, the action has to be a little higher to prevent fretting out, as compared to a flatter radius. Once the string is bent, it is at an angle across the fretboard, and will fret out sooner on a 7.25 radius than it will on a flatter radius, assuming both are set with the same string height, particularly on the B and high E. Some people even have trouble with their fingers slipping off of the strings more often when bending using a 7.25 radius.

So it is definitely harder to bend, and the strings can fret out a little sooner on the 7.25, but the action can be raised a little bit to compensate for the fret out. I believe that it was artists, after re-fretting their necks a few times that came up with the flatter radius idea, and it became popular enough that Fender started offering different radius' necks.

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---> "The amp should be SWITCHED OFF AND UNPLUGGED before you do this!" <---

Por favor, disculpe mi español, no se llega a la práctica con mucha frecuencia.

I still maintain it to be a exaggerated marketing ploy. Clapton didn't switch to 9.5R necks on his strats till the 80's under FMIC. Hendrix didn't keep a strat long enough to have it refretted. A friend of mine worked on a number of Blackmores guitars in the 70's. All 7.25" with a normally set action. Nothing remarkable about it.

As for action, well that is the key. Funny how all the players with a sound held in high regard aren't scared to have their strings higher and do a bit more work themselves.

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You might be right nikininja, I just respectfully disagree. Clapton couldn't have switched to a 9.5 on his Strats until Fender offered them, which would have been in the 80s (I guess that he fell for the marketing ploy. ). The comment about the artist re-fretting as the cause of the flatter radius was from Mike Eldred.

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---> "The amp should be SWITCHED OFF AND UNPLUGGED before you do this!" <---

Por favor, disculpe mi español, no se llega a la práctica con mucha frecuencia.

Hahaha touche (tooshay, can't find the thingy for the e) Shim.

I seem to recall reading somewhere that Knopflers red (fake) strat as used on the first 2 albums was reboarded for a 10" fretboard. The guitar suposedly being a 62, he had the fretboard swapped to a 10" maple cap (just before the first album Dire Straits 79 ish). Later for the 2nd album he had a rosewood board put back on it. When Rudy Pensa and John Suhr got to see it, they told him it was a fake. A Schecter with a decal on it.
Knopfler then switched to using Schecters (Alchemy vid) and later Pensa's. Now he's on strats again.

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I played a '79 Strat for years... after taking a break from playing for a few years I went back to Strats and got a Am. Dlx. I thought the neck felt great at first but when I started to really play and do all the bends I usually do it drove me crazy! I could not get comfortable with it. It was a combination of things for me: neck profile, nut width and frets. I'm very comfortable with bends on my '79 which is 7.25" radius but it has jumbo frets, and I'm also very comfortable with a 12" radius on my 335. So it wasn't the radius for me, it was mostly the neck profile and nut width. My 79 has a nice chunky neck and a 1 9/16 nut width, the Dlx doesn't have a chunky neck and I hated the 1 11/16 nut width!

I contacted Musikraft and had them build me a neck as close to my '79 as possible, couldn't be happier with the results! This neck has become my favorite and if I ever want to replace a neck on another Strat I will make sure to order en exact copy of this neck

I'd be VERY interested to know more about Blackmore's action and set-up?!!

I think what you say in the following paragraph is SO true: BB King; SRV and many others!

I'd have to defer to Shimmilou, he makes a valid point. We don't fully know what was done to the guitars, do we? Ok SRV's guitar seems to have been disassembled, disected and findings published by plenty of people. That said I'd strongly doubt that the guitar for Layla had a re-radius'd neck. EC doesn;t strike me as the kind of bloke to get the tools out when he gets a guitar.

I'll try and get the Blackmore measurements over the holidays.

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Thanks Niki, I'd be very interested!