NGD - 2015 Fender Blackout Stratocaster with Ebony Fretboard

Believe me ... the original pick guard and electrical components and wiring are all intact and safely stowed away for future restoration. I like the build and sound of this Strat (with the exception of the usual Fender single coil hum) - unfortunately, I like to pull shit apart too! ;)


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I settled on a Kinmon-style treble bleed mod (Timmons purportedly uses a series circuit with .001uf cap and 150K resistor located between the non-ground terminals of 500K CTS vol pot) which I installed last night (see center of pic below just under the pot-to-pot ground jumper wire passing above it):

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I'm still getting used to the sound of the treble bleed and I have not had a chance to tweak any presets to accommodate for the hi-freqs from the mod with the vol pot rolled back. Also, this is my first time playing DiMarzios so I have to get used to the character of the AT-1 and Cruisers (all humbucking).

All-in-all, it sounded pretty good with very little hum, but I had a moment when I got some sputtering fizzle with soft volume dips - like a cap was repeatedly discharging and recharging - that appeared for a minute and then was gone.

I'm thinking that I'd like a little less treble so I may try to either redesign the bleed circuit and or put in a switch ... or just go ahead and live without it - I'll keep you posted. :)

Is that an orange drop on the tone cap? I had one on my singlecut at first.. I hated the sound of it. It made all my notes sound weird when rolling it back. It was like it rolled mids off instead of trebel. I kept it for almost a year before I put the PIO caps in it and it made 150% difference in the tone with it on full blast or rolled off just like the tone is supposed to do. Some people say tone cap material doesn't matter, but I did clips before and after and it was very noticeable!

The orange drops on full made both the bridge and neck sound nasally to the point it was annoying. The PIO caps made it sound full, natural, and round like a guitar should sound.
 
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Is that an orange drop on the tone cap? I had one on my singlecut at first.. I hated the sound of it. It made all my notes sound weird when rolling it back. It was like it rolled mids off instead of trebel. I kept it for almost a year before I put the PIO caps in it and it made 150% difference in the tone with it on full blast or rolled off just like the tone is supposed to do. Some people say tone cap material doesn't matter, but I did clips before and after and it was very noticeable!

What values did you use?


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The orange drop was the same value as the the PIO caps. I believe .22k or something like that. The standard tone cap rating for humbuckers.
 
It does - thanks Jakel. :encouragement:

The tech at Sigler Music (the source of the pre-assembled Timmons pick guard) talked me into ordering it without the bleed circuit installed as "most of their customers don't like it."

But, the tech included a serially-wired resistor and cap in the shipment for me to experiment (Timmons purportedly uses the resistor and cap configuration in series).

Hmm, I should probably run a pair of testing wires out of the cavity between the pick guard and body so I can experiment on cap and resistor values in parallel and series to see what, if anything, I want in the way of a bleed circuit. Any suggestions for cap and resister ranges and pairings?

I'm really looking forward to using the DiMarzio AT-1 and Cruisers in positions 1, 3 and 5 without suffering that annoying single coil hum. ;)

That would be Jimmy Darr I( guess. Great guy-very fine at putting together nice professional stuff. Put my Lindy Fralin Blues specials in wired and all - I mean he sent me the finished Pickguard.

May I ask the price of the Strat a it was bought without the add ons

Ebony on an electric.........30+ years an I have never even played one. Played many acoustic with ebo0ny
 
smcrosby,

I pulled the cavity cover off of my singlecut to make sure I got the right ratings on the caps. The 2 PRS volume knobs have a 180pf ceramic cap for the treble bleeds. The 2 Bournes Push/Pull tone pots have Paper In Oil caps with a .022uf from Emerson Custom Guitars. My other custom guitar has the same pots except the tone pot is a PRS tone pot with the same rated PIO cap.

Edit: Single cut has DiMarzio AT-1 bridge, PAF 36th Anniversary neck. The Kustom 24 has PRS Dragon II pickups.
 
Ebony is great for bending strings accurately, etc., as your fingertips tend not to bite into the fingerboard as much.

I paid $1312 for the Time Square GC display model, discounted from the regular price of $1495 IIRC.

GC warehouse had 10 more units at the regular price as of Sunday (according to a sales person at their East Brunswick store).

Either Musicians Friend or Sweetwater IIRC. may have some left too. But I believe the Blackout Strat guitar was part of the 2015 limited monthly runs of differently configured Strats, Teles and Jazz Masters. Fender released the Blackout Strat in April 2015. Not many left.

The tech at Sigler that I spoke with was Eric Mathews. He included his business card in the shipment.

I would order another pickguard from Sigler again, maybe with a different configuration/brand of pickups just to swap back and forth. I love setting the action and doing intonation setups for some reason. Go figure.


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smcrosby,

I pulled the cavity cover off of my singlecut to make sure I got the right ratings on the caps. The 2 PRS volume knobs have a 180pf ceramic cap for the treble bleeds. The 2 Bournes Push/Pull tone pots have Paper In Oil caps with a .022uf from Emerson Custom Guitars. My other custom guitar has the same pots except the tone pot is a PRS tone pot with the same rated PIO cap.

Edit: Single cut has DiMarzio AT-1 bridge, PAF 36th Anniversary neck. The Kustom 24 has PRS Dragon II pickups.

I'm going back in under the hood at some point to experiment with the Kinmon .001uf - 150K treble bleed circuit (which I really like, but don't entirely love, which means I need a tad less bleed) so I will check out your suggestions for tone caps (.022uf PIOs).

Q: did the Orange Drops sound "nasally" or screechy? I'm liking the sound through Fender style amps , but through some other amps in the AXE this guitar as-modded sounds incredibly screechy.

Q: also, are your treble bleed circuits in parallel or series Kinmon-style circuits.
 
thats nice. don't think I have seen a strat with an ebony board before

my locally made 7 string has an ebony board and I like it allot . like the soudn and feel and best of all the tighter grain doesnt gunk up as much as my rosewood boards
 
I'm going back in under the hood at some point to experiment with the Kinmon .001uf - 150K treble bleed circuit (which I really like, but don't entirely love, which means I need a tad less bleed) so I will check out your suggestions for tone caps (.022uf PIOs).

Q: did the Orange Drops sound "nasally" or screechy? I'm liking the sound through Fender style amps , but through some other amps in the AXE this guitar as-modded sounds incredibly screechy.

Q: also, are your treble bleed circuits in parallel or series Kinmon-style circuits.

Yes they sounded nasally to the point I couldn't deal with them anymore. The PIO made it sound beautiful and full and smooth. As far as the bleed being parallel or series I have no clue.
 
Capacitor material does make a subtle difference in tone, but you also have to remember that many capacitors have tolerances of up to +/- 20%. You can have two identically marked caps and the two can actually measure as far as 40% difference in the value if one is high and the other is low. You can spring for higher tolerance modern production caps, but vintage style components usually have terrible tolerances.

Also be very cautious of expensive "vintage" caps. People have cut open super expensive NOS bumble bee, tropical fish, paper in oil, etc. caps to find cheap generic caps hidden inside a fake outer case. Buyer beware. Use reputable sources that stand behind their products.
 
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