Making This Squier Stratocaster BETTER Than My Fender!
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- čas přidán 8. 02. 2021
- Having already addressed playability and hardware upgrades, today I do the "Gilmour Mod" and upgrade the electronics and pickups!
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Happy Mod day!
I think I may have found the perfect setup for this Squier! Enjoy :)
Great!
Looks like Logan Designs is kaput :-/
I WOULD LIKE YOUR OPINION ON THE SRV OR HENDRIX PICK GUARD FROM GUITARGET SORRY GUITAR CENTER. THEY RUN ABOUT $300 LOADED. I BOUGHT A 69 SG THAT THE NECK AND BODY ARE DESTORYED AND WONDER IF THE 69 HUMMBUCKERS MIGHT DO FOR THIS BUILD. I'M ON DISABILTY AND HAVE TO WATCH MY MONEY. THAT IS THE SWEETIST BUILD YOU DID BUT I'M ON A BUDGET. TO CLARIFY 1 ATOMIC 69 HUMM 2 SINGLES AND THE OBSIDIAN ON A OLD SQUIER I HAVE.
@@Hickeroar Yeah, I can't find them either. Website is gone, and they had a reverb store but it's empty too.
No fair you’re cheating using the obsidian!
Awesome to see a Squier mod. Can’t wait to see your next build.
Of all the guitars in your collection this is my favorite one. Beautiful to see and hear! Just stunning, congrats on the build!
The solderless kits are complete game changers.
not for the better imo. I get the impression it's the end all be all to modding since you further modify what you have. No kill switches, affects or anything of the sort with it being on a board.
I was thinking the same thing now I’ll def mod out a cheap squire which is what anyone I’ve known has done who has one
Gfs’s kwikplug system is really nice, they have a ton of different pickups that all sound great and you don’t need to solder anything to switch them, and you can still solder in freeway or 4 way or whatever switches, push pulls, and dual outputs and a ton other mods.
Looks and sounds killer Darrell! That’s a great playing Squier now for sure. Thanks for sharing your experience with the Grinder, we’re thrilled you love the tones!
I already have replaced the pickups in my 60s Classic Vide Tele and PRS Tremonti SE with your Blondie and Crema's respectfully, and after seeing this video, I see a Lambertones HSS setup for my MIM Strat in the near future. Great work guys! It was the Grinder Bridge and neck pickup sound that sold me.
These videos are great. I tend to think of my used Strat as a "priceless Steinway" or Stradivarius; when you show how easy (esp. solderless) and impactful these changes can be it's quite liberating!
That tone with all 3 pickups is INSANE!!!! Love it! Also, the pickguard is gorgeous with the Daphne Blue... Great mods!
In Kuwait where I'm from the only Strats available are the Squier Affinity Starter Pack ones which is what I bought as my first guitar. Watching all your videos has been really helpful in learning about all the different mods I can upgrade it with to bring it close to Fender level since I can't buy any of those here. So far I've bought new strings, setup kits, strap locks, locking tuners, nut, bridge set, saddles, pickups, knobs and now ObsidianWire electronics. Won't be anything left of the guitar other than the wood 😂 Thanks for all the great content, simple guides, and sound demos.
I did a very similar thing to a Squier Strat I have. Upgraded all electronics/Pickups and used a Tone Shaper Blender kit. So I have a single volume and single tone and the 2nd "tone" knob is a blender knob to blend the neck pickup or bridge pickup depending on what position you're in, so many tonal options. It's an awesome setup and no additional switches or push/pull pots.
Fender ought to offer that exact wiring config and pickup combination as a stock build. That is the perfect pickup compliment to any Strat. Looks and sounds amazing. That same pickguard look could be achieved in plastic to save some money. HSS is also my preferred Strat setup. The Gilmore mod and Obsidian wiring sends it over the top. Great stuff Darrell. God bless and rock on 😎👍🎸
Look at yamaha pacifica
They do in their American Pro II series. Just bought one and the 7 way switch is standard with that series.
Watched literally hundreds of your vids during all these years. Talking aesthetics , this is my favorite guitar of them all.
I’m in PA, in the USA, and I LOVE that Squier. I ADORE the circuit layout, and those pickups all sound INCREDIBLY sweet. Not to mention how beautiful it is. Your builds are deadly, Darrell! Cheers, and thanks!
It looks beautiful Darrell! I really like the look of the cream components against the blue of the body and the maple fretboard too.
That pickguard looks fantastic, and a great mod to boot. You’re inspiring me to perform some mods to my Partscaster Strat.
I really like the pickguard. It's got the classic tortoise shell look at first glance, but has so much subtle detail
Such a great build and sounding guitar. Like always, love the channel. Keep doing what you do
That’s a great tone! Love the cleanliness of the wiring.
Nice build. Looks great and the multitude of sounds you can get out of it is impressive.
I installed a similar setup by Emerson Custom in my US Highway One Strat. instead of the push pull pot, there is a blender knob that blends the neck pickup in with any setting that normally wouldn't include the neck pickup. The other two knobs are a master volume and master tone. It made my Strat much more versatile. The Emerson Custom prewired harness isn't solderless though.
Enjoyed this build. Looking to buy my first electric and now I have even more questions and ideas!
Fantastic mod! The Lambertones pickup sounds amazing. I might have to try this mod to one of my strats.
Such a great mod. The Braun Squier Custom Shop. What phenomenal and versatile tones and sound.
I did a total upgrade on my fender highway one. I replaced the tuner with fender locking tuners, the nut with tusq nut, jescar ss frets, pots caps switch to obsidian wiring, bridge to gotoh wilkinson bridge, trem spring with a brass stopper stabilizer and lastly texas pickups. I really think it is really close to american elite. I definetely loving it more than ever
My 1991 MIM Strat is Hum/(blank)/single with a 3 way switch. I also ordered a new pickguard after I deleted a tone pot and moved the volume pot down a hole. My favorite set up.
That is a sweet-sounding Squier; a bit of a looker. One of my Strats is a Squier 50th Anniversary, picked up on eBay years back for $85. Excellent player that now yearns for a bridge HB.
Fascinating series of mods!
Thanks for posting.
Thanks Darrell! No matter what, I always make an effort to watch your videos!
Amazing video, amazing tone options. Thanks for making this! Very educational!
Thanks for the pickguard maker info, I really love the look of that thing!
I have 2 squier strats I have built up and 2 squier teles... I appreciate your videos they have helped me out a lot... Thanks
The daphne blue and copper pickguard look fantastic, perfect contrast.
Obsidianwire is great. Thanks to a prior vid of yours I bought a wiring harness for my epi LP and couldn’t be happier. Service was very responsive too to email.
Really nice 👍🏻 aesthetically pleasing and sounds amazing too! I know what I want to build next 😃
Beautiful mods! The look and sound quality are great!
Just ordered this very module from Obsidian earlier today, so your video was quite topical! FrankenSquier is gonna be awesome with it!
Love Love Love the pickguard! Beautiful guitar!!! Sounds amazing.
Man, I'm loving everything about this guitar!!
Wow, Im Loving the sound, thanks for this video. Absolutely killer sounding.
Sounds fantastic! I might try that combo in one of my strats.
This is a great build for a newbie I'm impressed with the sound great job
Great mod thanks Darrell. I bought a Squier Paranormal Cabronita 2 months ago and, straight out of the box, it plays and sounds wonderful. It's actually better sounding than my Fender Cabronita which was my number one gigging guitar for 8 years.
Looks really nice, and sounds even better! Very versatile!
Wow that pick guard is gorgeous. Guitar looks great, and sounds fantastic.
I did a very similar mod to a Squier Telecaster with a solderless Obsidian wire kit and some Planet Tone pickups....turned out pretty badass
That's one of the coolest pickguards I've seen. Very nice looking to say the least.
My last Strat wiring job has a Lindy Fralin blend pot for the bridge pickup and a TBX master tone control and I know how to solder. It's cool to be able to blend in some bridge pickup into the mix. If I use a push pull pot it turns on the the bridge pickup and turns off the bridge tone control so I can still get the original unloaded bridge pickup sound in the 5th position with the push pull pot pulled up.
The thing I'm most impressed about is how Obsidian Wire THINKS ABOUT EVERYTHING AND EVERY POSSIBILITY. It's amazing
A dark neck like roasted maple, walnut or rosewood would look sick with that body and pickguard, maybe a fancy warmoth one with flamed maple fingerboard?
It would, but after adding flame maple, you'd probably want to upgrade the body too. Roasted flame maple is pretty expensive.
While I respect your opinion, I tend to like the contrast the clear colour of the neck provides here
My first thought was a r/w fretboard would look much better with the copper p/g.
Yes it would👍🏼
@@kitoyobeni1 - Roasted non-figured maple Warmoth necks look great and are still are cheaper than equivalent unroasted lacquer-finished necks. Less manual labour to produce, and the torrefaction permanently seals out moisture so you can leave it unfinished.
I'd personally avoid figured necks unless I knew they were made years ago and the wood was completely stable, it's a pain in the $#% for something that just looks pretty. Maple figure can theoretically release all kinds of stresses after it is cut and shaped, and I heard some early Fender CS flamed maple necks had to be warranty replaced. A neck should just be solid and not turn into a pretzel.
This video came at the right time. I am currently planning to upgrade my Squier Telecaster
Omg the pickguard!!! Phenomenal like always
I also have a red and black with the turtle shell pick guard standard squier stat.i like the squier standards the most out of all the squier line. I love the black pick guard mod you did changes the whole look of the guitar much better.
Thanks Darrell! Absolutely brilliant! I have SO many projects you wouldn't believe at standstill because of my long term inability to get to grips with soldering. Despite the fact that they aren't cheap, I'm going to get one of these to get a Strat Seymour Duncan project finished, which will hopefully inspire me to knuckle down and learn to solder properly and get the many others completed. TBH, I don't know why all guitars aren't shipped with solderless now, solder is ancient technology.
I am really liking the Squier. The maple finger board is a winner with me and the bakelite pickguard is nice too. I am in Canada.
Iv got stacked coils in mine with 3 push pull post essentially when att knobs are pulled up i have a strat with 3 humbuckers it sounds mean 🤘🏻👍🏻
Sounds Great! 🤘🏻That pick-guard is Stunning.✌🏼
My friend did the HSS mod on his Squier Affinity back in 1985. It remains his go to guitar.
unfortunately, it appears Logan Designs is out of business... but i have one of their pickguards on a tele project and it's gorgeous!
That's too bad. My favorite thing on the build was the gorgeous pickguard.
Try brad adgrove not sure if spelt right but on here and does customize pickguards and from Canada
Yeah, I got all excited about the design of this pickguard but I can't find them either
Greasy Groove Inc. Out of Canada has a great selection, might have one similar!
I wish I could give someone my guitar to do all this for me . Sounds so good !!!
Great mods, it really sounds phenomenal, congratulations great job and great info 👍
What a beautiful guitar! Love the way you modded it! 👌
That is a very cool Squire mod , I have a couple Squires I have done lots of mods on and they are both really nice playing and sounding guitars . Lent one to my friend who is a studio player and he wants to keep it LOL. Good job on that and it's real eye candy as well I would not hesitate to play live with that . Cheers!
I've got a Squire HSS and love it. I don't have the push pull setup but my ears aren't that defined yet anyways. Nice guitar Darrell, love it, looks great.🎸🎶🎹🎵🎧
Wow. Love that pick guard!
My Michael Kelly CC60BB came with this pickup switching, but it also has a splittable humbucker in the bridge. This offers even more tones. For me, the CC60BB is one of my two favorite guitars, handily beating out damn near every other guitar I'd ever played. Not just for the tone coming from the HSS with this mod, but also because of the amazing neck, frets, and hardware.
Looks great and sounds amazing too! Nice build👌🏽🔥
I'm becoming obsessive with this video, coming at least once a day just to see the beauty of the upgrade.
Absolute brilliant job you did here, man I'd even consider this over a standard US at some point.
I just installed this drop in mod on my MIM Strat. Also, I switched the stock humbucker with a Seymour Duncan SH4 JB.
I cannot stress enough just how good this sounds. It is nice to have the ability to have a tone knob for the bridge pickup. Also the two extra configuration options are neat
Hi, did you use "trembucker" spaced JB humbucker or normal?
@@juhazz Tbh I dont know. I just know it sounds good
I've been using a different wiring mod, for years, that also gives 7 combinations off a 3-way switch with master tone control. It works by turning the middle pot into dedicated volume for the middle pickup. No toggle switches or push/pull pots. It works with a bridge humbucker but there's no option for coil splitting. Gotta use a soldering iron but, still, it's a whole lot cheaper than the Obsidian rig.
That's similar to the blender mod that let's you blend in either the neck or bridge pickup using what was the second tone knob. The blender mod is available in a solderless harness too.
So you are rolling the middle pickup in and out but wouldn't that give you 6 combinations? 1 Front, 2 front/middle, 3 middle, 4 middle/back, 5 back, and 6 front/middle/back. What would the other one be?
@@neutrodyne front/back (neck/bridge)
I live in Canada, as does Darrell. I ended having to pay duty on The Obsidian...even though they do their shipping form the US. Made a very expensive unit even more so, and didn't find out until delivery.
The wiring points and wires are TINY, and your eyes don't come with a macro setting like the camera here.
There are a LOT of alternatives...
The 7 way switch pre-dates Gilmore by many years. I've done it on all my strats. The Bridge-Neck combo has been my favorite for a long time. My '97 ('57) MIJ has just the neck and bridge pickups (Fender custom shop AY '69s) volume only (moved to middle hole, out of the way). MODS ARE FUN !
Super Awesome. Thx Darrell. I’m building a offset style kit at the moment. This mod would be great. Have a Blessed Day!
Darrell I've Done about 20 mods like this on strat's and tele's this is a awesome video and the kits are as well cool thanks for the video.
Did the s/s/s with solder of course on 08 ameri st, sounds great with 7 positions, also added a dummy coil. Nice mod Darrel!
Hey Darrell. Yup, a strat isn't complete unless it has the tele pup and all 3 positions. I install a mini toggle (easier on the fly switching for me) and put it in one of the tone pot positions. I prefer one tone for all and SSS pickups. Thanks!
Heel mod next? I got my first strat about 6 months ago and couldn't believe how intrusive strat heels are so I routed/rebated the neck plate 13mm lower. Works sweet.
Darrell, that is one sweet pickguard amd gilmour upgrade nice and sweet. And just what i was looking for.
Man that has to be the most gorgeous strat i have ever seen truly.
Perfect timing. I just ordered a black/maple neck Affinity to mess around with and make into something a bit different. Think I'm going to go with Fishman Fluence... black on black and darken the maple. Always loved those all black 70s-mid 80s Strats - but not enough to pay what they seem to be going for.
An important-to-know item that was not mentioned here, nor by Obsidian, is that if you have an HSS configuration, check to see if the humbucker has two wires, or four. Obsidian's 7-way Strat harness for HSS requires a 4-wire pickup. Having a two-wire unit is as good an excuse to buy a new humbucker pickup as it gets. The Obsidian harness is really nice.
very nice. Rather than the push pull, I am a fun of the S1 switches, I find that even more elegant!
Absolutely gorgeous Darrell!!!
Been away from your channel bro...nice to feel like listening to a friend talking bout guitar gear 💯💯💯✌🏼✌🏼✌🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
I have this mod but with a blender pot instead of a switch, and a single tone control for all pickups. I like the blender because i will tend to roll off the neck pickup a bit to fatten up the sound as full on neck and bridge can sound pretty thin.
By the way, that pickguard with the blue strat is divine!
"I ordered years ago with good intentions"
I have a whole reverb of bizarre essoteric accessories
Absolute favorite guitar that you have played on your channel. Hss is really the only way to fly. I enjoy your channel 😊
Man, that guitar looks like a piece of art. Great playing btw.
My collection of Squier Strats is going to grow exponentially, just to keep up with your mod videos!
Nice one!... ive been thinking of putting a JB Jr in the bridge of my strat....
And I have been tinkering with mine for a while (25 years)...just had 6105 frets put in....and thats been absolutely magical!.
Not a Squire tho, not sure I would commit to that on one of those....but a great idea for the higher end modders....
I did a mod like this on my affinity strat, I dropped a fender blacktop loaded pickguard on it, I think it the black pickguard with gold hardware against red looks really striking.
After watching your video, I ordered a Gilmore switch from Obsidian and a set of SSS Triple Shot pickups from Lamberttones, along with a new pickguard cover. Just finished the mod to my $99 Squire with a perfect neck. It sounds awesome. Thanks for the video. It in spired me.
What do you mean perfect neck? I’m thinking about doing exactly what you did but I’m concerned that the playability won’t be as high quality as an American made fender
@@owenpipes8735 probably by accident of manufacture. It has no fret buzz. The fret wire is smooth, the surface is unblemished, the finish is satin and not glossy, so that the hand slides along effortlessly. It just fits my hand really well. It truly is amazing. I've picked up a lot of guitars and don't get the same feeling. I have my genuine Corona made strat which is awesome, but this squire neck is just as good. I found a diamond in a coal heap.
Wow, it sounds amazing
This is something I must do
Wouldn't the cheaper way be to just smash your fender up with a hammer, making the perfectly functional playing squier the better guitar out of the two
Lolol, Well that's one way about it...
You can save money on the hammer and just go smash it on the ground outside... or just not buy the damn fender if that's what you're gonna do with it....
Just buy a better guitar with a full thickness body to start with or sell what it you have and buy a good used one.
Not really. A USA Strat is about £1000 minimum. A Squire is about £150. Obsidian wire set is about £100, hipshot locking tuning machines are about £100 and a new roasted maple neck is £150. And all of those things can be bought item by item as and when the money becomes available. So you can get something very close to the sound for half the price. And no effort with a hammer
@@maxkalba5197 but if the fender doesent work it doesent work no matter how fancy it's bells and whistles are
I just installed an ObsidianWire HH with coil splitting in my heavily modded Squire Affinity. High recommended. If you sell the guitar just put the stock pickguard back in.
Probably one of the best sounding strat bridge pickups I've heard.
Turned out great ! Sounds awesome !
YUMMY! What an absolute beauty ~ aesthetically and tone. Makes me HAPPY!! : )
I did enjoy this video, very much! Thankyou, Darrell.
Looks absolutely beautiful, I'm a fan.
Now that's a great-looking nice sounding Strat !!
I'd like to see a mexincan strat againts this squier. It looks awesome Darrell, great Job!
That's beautiful and so versatile!