Classic 70s Strat acquisition and pickup ID question

rexter

Last week I had a rare trip into town to look for emergency grain filler (fail of course) and chanced across a nice sunburst strat. The guy in the shop said it wasn't for sale as needed major work, but I asked to try it anyway. Sounded amazing and played nicely enough (better than most brand new guitars do in the big box stores) but definitely does need the frets levelling and crowning, which I'm about to do this morning. I said I wanted it anyway and he sold it to me for a stupid-low price with no warranty. 

It's a Classic 70s, quite a light (swamp?) ash body and I've spent the last week playing it and remembering that I have always really loved strats! I played one for a few years as my live guitar and this has reminded me why. I love the vivid burst and having owned a '78 strat for while I also have a soft spot for the bullet truss. Neck profile is nice too, very like the 78 with the so-called U shape.



I was surprised just quite how good it sounded so I popped the pickguard this morning when removing the neck.

Nice surprise there are some CS pickups in there - no wonder it sounded quite nice.

I think they may be Fat 50s - can anybody ID them for me?

rexter

Oh yeah - whoever upgraded the pickups obviously "shielded" it too - not so sure about how this work was carried out! 

thermionic

DC resistance measurements might help with identifying the pickups?

rexter

thermionic said:

DC resistance measurements might help with identifying the pickups?

True! I might wire in a PIO cap so I'll dig out the multimeter when I do - just wondered if anyone could identify from the undersides - although do all Fender CS pickups have the blue and red dots?

thermionic

A quick google suggests that the blue dot (neck) and red dot (bridge) markings are used both for Texas Specials and Fat 50s. Some other sets omit the blue dot because the neck and middle are the same. I think the yellow wire on the middle pickup denotes a RWRP set, which apparently both the Texas Specials and the Fat 50s have. 

• Fat 50s: Neck: 6.0K. Middle: 6.3K. Bridge: 6.2K
• Texas Specials: Neck Pickup: 6.2K. Middle: 6.5K. Bridge: 6.5-7.1K

Flametop

rexter said:

Oh yeah - whoever upgraded the pickups obviously "shielded" it too - not so sure about how this work was carried out! 

Was there also a baked potato in the there Jon?

rexter

Flametop said:

rexter said:

Oh yeah - whoever upgraded the pickups obviously "shielded" it too - not so sure about how this work was carried out! 

Was there also a baked potato in the there Jon?

Haha! Yeah I did expect to find a couple of Hovis crusts or a few crumbs of cheese falling out!

rexter

thermionic said:

A quick google suggests that the blue dot (neck) and red dot (bridge) markings are used both for Texas Specials and Fat 50s. Some other sets omit the blue dot because the neck and middle are the same. I think the yellow wire on the middle pickup denotes a RWRP set, which apparently both the Texas Specials and the Fat 50s have. 

• Fat 50s: Neck: 6.0K. Middle: 6.3K. Bridge: 6.2K
• Texas Specials: Neck Pickup: 6.2K. Middle: 6.5K. Bridge: 6.5-7.1K

Thank you very much! Yeah they seemed to be the common results. Multimeter time it is I think!
  

ICBM

rexter said:

I might wire in a PIO cap

Why?

rexter

ICBM said:

rexter said:

I might wire in a PIO cap

Why?

Because I'm stuck at home while builders rip out my bathroom?

And I have about 200 of them in my cupboard. No other real reason, I'm not a huge believer in the tone fairies, in fact I rarely use the tone or volume controls at all. But to some it's a bonus and while pickguard is off and I'm snooping I may as well. 

ICBM

rexter said:

Because I'm stuck at home while builders rip out my bathroom?

And I have about 200 of them in my cupboard. No other real reason, I'm not a huge believer in the tone fairies, in fact I rarely use the tone or volume controls at all. But to some it's a bonus and while pickguard is off and I'm snooping I may as well. 

Seriously, don't bother - its a sheer waste of time combined with a small risk of damaging a pot. Unless you use the tone controls it will make absolutely no difference, and even if you do then only the value matters.

rexter

ICBM said:

rexter said:

Because I'm stuck at home while builders rip out my bathroom?

And I have about 200 of them in my cupboard. No other real reason, I'm not a huge believer in the tone fairies, in fact I rarely use the tone or volume controls at all. But to some it's a bonus and while pickguard is off and I'm snooping I may as well. 

Seriously, don't bother - its a sheer waste of time combined with a small risk of damaging a pot. Unless you use the tone controls it will make absolutely no difference, and even if you do then only the value matters.

You know what, I'm going with you on that this time! Why complicate things? Heating up the solder to remove that cap from the pot is tedious and like you say fairly pointless!

I've just finished crowning and polishing and itching to get it set up!

I use the PIO caps for new builds just because I happened across a big bundle of them, but this guitar sounds great anyway.

I'm going to check the neck pickup with the multimeter to get an idea of what set might be in here (the ground wire from this was badly soldered to ground anyway and has come dislodged. Then all good.

rexter

Interesting results (depending on definition of interesting) on the pups

Neck  6.0
middle 6.2
Bridge 6.6

So I would have thought Fat 50s (which is what I was hoping for) but the bridge is a tad higher than the stock specs, would be in the low range for the Texas Specials though. 

I'm guessing these figures have to vary - so what would people say, most likely the 50s?

Whatever they are I like them so that's good.

CasperCaster

Dcr's for Texas Specials have changed quite a bit over the years - they are no longer the massively overwound pickups that originally built their reputation. The last set I had went from about 5.9k at the neck tomaround 6.7 for the bridge. However, the dark burgundy red wire used to wind Texas Specials is quite different from the typical copper coloured wire used on Fat 50's.

thermionic

Plain enamel (dark brown) vs Formvar (copper coloured) I guess.