1989 Fender American Standard Stratocaster

This was an ebay special I bought at the end of summer 2008. My second electric guitar. The previous owner was a working proffesional in the band Die Dorfer. No fake "relic'ed" guitar this one. The guitar had been heavily used and somewhat modified.

It's color is a deep blue, nearly midnight blue, with a slight metallic look.

Existing MODS

When I got it, the mods it was wearing included a MOTS blue pearloid pickguard installed with some nasty oversized brass slotted screws, a black Korean EMG Select neck pickup, some cheap aftermarket string trees, and a badly done rout at the bridge end of the pick up cavity (which was already a bathtube). I didn't measure the EMG, but it's output doesn't balance with the center pickup, so position 2 sounded really weak. (I didn't like the sound of the EMG alone either).

I am not a originality fanatic I bought it cheap, knowing it was in rough condition, to see if like the sound and feel of a strat. Despite the overall condition and poor set up, it was clear that this was basically a fantastic sounding instrument, with great sustain and a lovely balanced tone. I decided to fix the things I could fix, and make it how I want it. Unfortunately I don't have a photo of the condition it was in when I got it.

Existing Condition

The last owner had a pretty active stage set, and the sweat had got into the join between the skunk strip and the maple neck. Some of the steel hardware was also rusting. The body has plenty of dents and paint chips, and large belt buckle worn spot on the back. The maple has aged to a lovely honey color, and there are not too many dings to the headstock. The polyuerathane finished of this era are very thick and wear resistant.

The frets are toast. There is a deep grove in fret 1, and then bumpy wear on all up through about Fret 7. Interesting that there is even deep pitting corrosion on the first few frets.

The fretboard has dome pretty heavy divets from the last owners fingernails.

The action had been set very high with the saddles. The intonation was way off. One of the intonation setting screws had a stripped cross point, and the others were not much better..