My Hendrix Woodstock Strat Project

[Brandon]

Yeah so I just went ahead and decided to "build" my Hendrix strat.

Bought a Vintage style bare Warmoth body (2 piece alder) that was on sale, and am currently painting it with nitro cellulose Olympic White from reranch.com (probably going to do some relicing too), and also picked up the gotoh trem bridge which is A LOT better then the fender one I had (but probably not as good as the callham from what I've heard).

I already have the Lindy Fralin Woodstock '69 pickups, so those are going in there.

Then I'm going to order a neck from this guy Joe Desperato who does custom maple cap necks ('68-'69 specs 7.25 neck radius, large head stock, 2 piece maple, heal adjustment truss rod etc. etc). Glad I found him because I'm saving a ton of money then what I thought I was going to have to pay for a CS neck, and apparently his necks are quality.

Then I'm going to get a fender 69' "waterslide" decal, and spray the neck myself with the reranch nitro clear. This is also a bonus because I can't find any necks sprayed in nitro by fender CS (all gloss CS necks I've ever seen are poly), and from all the studying I've been doing, hendrix's neck is definitely nitro cellulose. Don't know how big of a difference it makes, but nitro is spongier and softer than poly (wears and dings way easier than poly), so I believe if the nitro/poly things makes any difference in tone, it would have an effect on the neck.

And it's just nice to have everything exact!

I'll post pictures and all that jazz too. I'm stoked!

[Spitfire]

[Xplorer]

i think i'd have done something not so far from your plan. nice plan i think. it should be a nice strat.
i wish i could buy stuffs from reranch, but i live in France, and it's not allowed for flight shipping. too bad ......

[Brandon]

??

i think i'd have done something not so far from your plan. nice plan i think. it should be a nice strat.
i wish i could buy stuffs from reranch, but i live in France, and it's not allowed for flight shipping. too bad ......

Thanks man. So what did you end up deciding on?

That sucks about reranch not shipping to france though. Is it because it's too expensive or what? I know that some lacquer based things are actually illegal in Los Angeles where I live, I guess to protect the environment.

[vanhalen5150]

It's considered an explosive hazzard. I tried getting it into Canada, and it was a no as well.

[CrazyNinja8730]

Sounds awesome!

I think this is probably what I'll do!

[Ydna]

Yea. I plan on doing the same thing, but I'm gonna do the black strat. I think that thing is beautiful.

[Xplorer]

got one i made. love it.

[JimiJames]

You ain't kiddin' guys. ½ of my twangers are black and I'm adding a black ('69'd) LP Custom around the corner.
I do like Olympic White, though. After the LP possibly an SG or a Jr.... they ain't gonna' be black.
What were we talkin' about?
Oh yeah, a Jimi'fied bridge pickup/pickguard config.

[Brandon]

yeah black's pretty cool. I was thinking about black, but the raranch guys say that black is the hardest color to work with. Any slight imperfection in the finish will show up. For instance if the humidity is too high while painting, you end up with a milky haze underneath the finish when you do you final sanding caused from the water in the air

White (I believe) is the easiest to work with, and I'm a complete beginner and finishing guitars!

Xplorer did you paint that black strat?

[Xplorer]

no, i bought a two point bridge strat body, like a jeff beck strat, glossy. beautiful.
and an acrylic pickguard, one piece, with a magic switch installed, from a guy on ebay who did a nice job. buti don't see him anymore.slider's 69 pickups, waxed paper cap, 1975 strat neck , big headstock, great guitar. i prefer this one a lot more than the custom shop signature strat ; ) quite a lot more beautiful ! ; )
and it's a player. tuned like jeff beck tunes his bridge.

[Brandon]

Glad to hear that you're happy with it

My last strat was a total disaster, MIM 70s strat I bought online (bad idea).

When I got it, the frets were complete unleveled (sounded like utter shit, extremely irritating twangy fret buzz EVERYWHERE on the fret board, very high action etc.), the body was made up of heavy ash... that combination made the thing sound like a NIGHTMARE The only thing redeemable about it was the lindy fralin pickups I installed after buying it... but even then the middle and neck pickup were the only ones slightly useable.... forget about the bridge

I paid close to $800 for it, but realistically this thing was worth no more than $100, $200 at the very most in the condition I received it in. I would have been WAY better off going to the store and buying a squire. Total rip off and disappointment.

It's just one of those guitars you HATE right from the start, and nothing you do to it seems to help.

So yeah... I'm excited about this new strat build!

The first time around I thought it was going to be easy, just buy a 70s strat and thats that. I was innocent to all of the deceit of fender's "mass production". I'm going to ppl that do things right this time around!

[Brandon]

Glad to hear that you're happy with it

My last strat was a total disaster, MIM 70s strat I bought online (bad idea).

When I got it, the frets were complete unleveled (sounded like utter shit, extremely irritating twangy fret buzz EVERYWHERE on the fret board, very high action etc.), the body was made up of heavy ash... that combination made the thing sound like a NIGHTMARE The only thing redeemable about it was the lindy fralin pickups I installed after buying it... but even then the middle and neck pickup were the only ones slightly useable.... forget about the bridge

I paid close to $800 for it (over a grand counting all of the work I had done on it), but realistically this thing was worth no more than $100, $200 at the very most in the condition I received it in. I would have been WAY better off going to the store and buying a squire. Total rip off and disappointment.

It's just one of those guitars you HATE right from the start, and nothing you do to it seems to help.

So yeah... I'm excited about this new strat build!

The first time around I thought it was going to be easy, just buy a 70s strat and thats that. I was innocent to all of the deceit of fender's "mass production". I'm going to ppl that do things right this time around!

[GypsyEyes]

Hello Brandon,

I'm new here, but not at all a noob on Jimi!

You should indeed use any model between maybe 67 to 70. Get yourself a Souldier woodstock strap too, believe me, I know theyre not true spec to the originals but no other company has the original bolt cloth that Ace made, so how can they be that great!? At the Experience music project, when the woodstock strat was cloned, the original was given a souldier re-issue strap as a promotional product. Did you hear about Kenny Wayne Shepherd this week? He played Jimi's woodstock strat on live television! Btw, I, myself have an original ace strap exactly the same as one that Hendrix had, was sold for $8000 a few years ago.

If you are going for quite a bit of detail I suggest you get some era spec pick-ups and a 5 spring vintage tremolo (leave the backplate off )

If you wanna get really true spec, put in a 3 way switch too.

I hope this helps!

thankyou!

[yladrd61]

Hey Brandon how about some pictures of your Jimi Strat