Fender Strat Pickups

Categorized | Learn To Play Rock Guitar

Posted on 03 September 2010. Tags: electronics, fender, fender strat pickups, fender strat pickups compared, fender strat pickups review, fender strat pickups seymour duncan, fender strat pickups uk, guitar, music, pickups

Fender Strat Pickups

Upgrade pickups, etc, for a Fender "Bullet" strat electric guitar?

I bought my son a Fender Strat "Bullet" guitar for his first electric guitar. It's great, he loves it and is doing well.

I would soon like to upgrade its components. Is it worth it and is it do-able?

There is one set of standard pick ups on there now. Would better pick ups sound much better, or will the construction of the body limit the sound's quality? (I am familiar with acoustic guitar work, but not electric.)

Can extra knobs be added? There is only a volume knob on it now. If I take off the body plate, are there cut outs or spaces in the body which allow me to wire it to have more features, like two pick up volume knobs and two tone knobs for two sets of new pick ups?

Or, is it a waste of time and money; is it more cost effective to buy a used guitar with all the components already there?

Thanks for any help you can provide!

Well , in a strat the body is routed for the configuration of the existing controls. There isn't any extra space, and you'd also need the knowledge of electronics to rewire for two volume control, plus routing out the body.
The pickup config. is this.
1 Bridge pickup-No tone control
2 .Middle pickup-lower tone control
3. Neck pickup-upper tone control.

The reason strats only have one volume is because of the 5 position pickup selector switch. the 2 and 4th positions blend the bridge and middle pickup and the the middle and neck position.
Having more than one volume knob would complicate those blends.
(although I could see where that actually might be pretty cool for more varied tonal mixes)

If he likes the way the guitar plays..(I'm assuming your talking a "Squier" bullet strat. which is like the cheapest one they make.)
And some of them "feel" really nice.
I have a Squier Affinity Strat that cost like 150 bucks. After I gave it a thorough "pro " setup, it plays almost as well as my $1800 1978 Fender strat.
Unless he's planning to go pro sometime soon, then just upgrading the pickups and the tuning machines would improve the quality of the guitar as much as you really need. Unless he's got dead spots in the volume and tone knobs, I'd leave em alone for now, no biggie there.

Get him a good set of locking Schaller tuners, or the ones I love that make restringing a breeze is the Fender "Vintage" tuners. The strings mount straight down into the tuning peg and then folds over the slot to wind. No more loose string ends looped around or sticking out and poking you. I love those.

Also try the Seymour Duncan Hot Rails pickups. they are high gain pickups for better ooomph. There are also "noiseless" single coil pickups like humbuckers, that will stop the slight hum you hear in the amp from a strat.

If you search the internet you can also find complete Fender pickguards with better pickups and volume knobs and everything prewired. all to so is pop it on and you're good to go.Only need to connect the phone jack to it.

One more little hint: Check to make sure that the tremolo bridge is properly adjusted. The rear of the bridge should be "floating" about 1/8" above the body. If the bridge is flush against the body, it needs to be adjusted by loosening the two spring anchor screws under the backside. You can get the instruction on the Fender Website for the Stratocaster manual for all the proper set ups.
They come from the factory unadjusted to prevent damage. So lots of folks have no idea the bridge tremolo is supposed to go up and down.

The most recent Ebay auctions for Fender Strat Pickups are listed below. You can now search through the results and find great low prices on Fender Strat Pickups.