Building a strat

[blazer]

I am the proud owner of a late eighties Squier Stratocaster which I bought new on my fifteenth birthday back in 1991, this old girl, lovingly called the Veteran has been through a LOT of modifications but now I'm restoring her to strathood.
 
But as to take three dimensional photograph I'm building a closely matching replica of how the Veteran used to look with the mods and all. I'm thinking of naming that one The rookie
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/TheVeteran.jpg
The Veteran before the restoration, the Rookie wil look just like this.
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie1.jpg
Here's the raw maple with the strat routing template.
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie2.jpg
After sawing off the exess wood, ready for routing.
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie3.jpg
After routing, a nice clean maple strat body to be.
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie4.jpg
Routing out the neck pocket, I put in the neck to check if I haven't routed it too dep, luckely, I got it right.
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie5.jpg
And so I started working on the vibrato channel.
 
And while doing so I completely forgot that I had a camera with me and failed to document the routing of the pickup and control routs, and of me bevelling the body. I only remembered my camera when I put the thing together to see how it looked.
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie6.jpg
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/Rookie8.jpg
The Rookie at home. The neck, Kahler Vibrato, pickups and pickguard all come from the Veteran as you can see I am FAR from finished, I need to drill the holes for the bushes of the vibrato and spray the body in sealer before I can add the first layers of red.  
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/Veteranandrookie.jpg
The Veteran and the Rookie together, I still need to find a good bridge pickup for the Veteran as you can see I put the Kahler back in because I love the smooth feeling of that bridge so much. Luckely I have a second one. Compare the Rookie to the picture of the Veteran at the beginning of this post.
 
It'll be a long time before I can play the Rookie but bot I'm having a ball just making it.

[lbpesq]

Wouter:
 
Very cool and impressive.  I'm looking forward to the completed pictures and a full review.  It this the first guitar that you've built?
 
Bill, tgo.

[gtrguy]

I picked up a garage sale Strat clone with a full set of Fender noiseless pickups for $20 this summer. Turns out that with those pickups, it sounds better than my vintage Strat! They turn up on Ebay all the time. Dave

[blazer]

I did the last sanding job and put the body in primer. Now I need to start wet sanding (after the primer has dried of course) and then I can start applying the layers of color.
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/Rookie12.jpg
 
Boy I'm having fun with this.

[blazer]

Okay you guys, I finished Building the Rookie compare it with the Picture of the Veteran in the beginning of this thread.
 
 
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/P1010098.jpg
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e22/guitarman91/My%20musical%20instruments/P1010099.jpg
 
As you guys can see, I went with a different neck. I could get this gorgeous Birdseye maple neck for a bargain price and I went for it. Apart from the headstock shape I suceeded in making a matching copy of the Veteran They look so similar that I have to catch myself sometimes. The swimmingpool rout of the Rookie gives it a very airy open sound, I figured that the all maple construction would result is a very bright sound but that's not the case, it has a very tight low end and it nails that David Gilmour tone when overdriven.  All in all this project was a success.

[dannobasso]

Congrats! It should give you a lot of satisfaction. Love the tele style neck. This weekend i'm embarking on milling out a jap strat for a Fernandes Sustainer kit. I'm also putting on Sperzels. I'm not ambitious enough to work on finishes. Also have to figure out how to make a second single coil work with the kit.  
 Can you hear the sustain?...... Well if it was plugged in.....