A Guitar And Gear Support Forum

I didn't originally set out to buy any kind of Strat, but... You know how sometimes you start out lusting over a guitar you see advertised, but the more you hold off, the less appealing it seems? And then sometimes you see something that doesn't grab you at first, but the longer you wait, the better it seems? That second one is what happened here. I originally had my eye on some Les Pauls, and I ran across this on FB Marketplace while I was looking around, and ultimately none of the LPs really grabbed me, and the more I thought about this one the more I liked the idea. And the price was very fair, and I'd just done some extra consulting gigs, so...

This is actually my first MIM Fender, and only my second real Fender of any kind, not counting some Squiers I've had in the past. Everything on it feels very well made, with maybe a slight exception for the tuners, which feel a trifle sloppy. The reviews I read of the pickups are accurate: they're on the dark and wooly side, although not unusably so. I haven't had a lot of chance to play around with positions 2 and 4, which are the weird ones - both inner coils or both outer coils - but the little I have, they sound pretty decent too.

The things I like are pretty much the things I expected to like: the Strat body shape, the humbuckers, the looks. The only thing I don't especially like is the wretched traditional Strat bridge, with its hand-shredding setscrews poking out. Some Highwood contoured saddles might be on order soon, plus maybe some locking tuners if I feel rich. I may even get myself a mirrored pickguard for the Phil Lynott look!

Furiosa is not impressed.

I own that exact guitar with the exception that mine came with a Floyd Rose and the pickups are uncovered. It was ordered new from Sweetwater around 2014. At the same time I ordered a Charvel So Cal (which cost significantly more), knowing that after A/B-ing them at home one of them would be sent back to Indiana. The Charvel was sent back . . . which says a lot about how I felt about the quality, playability, and value of the MIM Fender Blacktop.

I agree that the pickups are somewhat dark and muffled. Don't expect that removing the pickup covers will "remove the blanket." However, here's what worked for me: I approached the problem by experimenting with different magnets, finally settling on A4. Between the way in which A4 shifted the eq, along with some careful pickup height and pole screw adjustment, I was able to get a more nuanced, PAFish voice out of the stock Blacktop pickups.

With both outer coils engaged I now get a very convincing Tele tone. With both inner coils engaged the guitar conjures something approximating a “phased position” Strat. It doesn’t sound exactly like position 2 or position 4 on a single coil Strat, though it does produce that distinctive “quack,” giving the feeling of a Strat.

I also replaced those amp style knobs with regular Stratocaster knobs. The knobs on a Strat tend to interfere with my picking hand and those taller knobs exacerbated the problem.

One other nitpicking thing about my Blacktop HH Strat is that the back of the neck was super glossy and grabby. The Scotch-Brite treatment addressed that in short order.

Being completely honest here, I think I've only played my Blacktop Strat on one gig. It's not that it isn't a great guitar. On the bar gigs which have made up a substantial portion of my bookings in the last decade I've always strove to bring the minimal amount of gear to the job, the goal being able to make one trip in with everything and one trip back out at the end of the night. This means bringing only one guitar. An instrument with a Floyd Rose cannot be that guitar. It's gotta be a fixed bridge or decked Strat bridge that allows me to change a string and be back up and running in less than two minutes.

Don't worry about Furiosa's indifference. It's hard to impress a cat with a guitar. Grey cats are also very self contained. If you pluck the strings above the nut like a harp, or sound a triad of dissonant harmonics (G string 5th fret, B string 7th fret, High E string 12th fret), then their ears might perk up for a minute. But basically don't expect them to give a sh*t about your new guitar.

Happy new guitar day!

@toomanycats When I was doing my research, I ran across a few people mentioning BTs with Floyds, and at first I thought they must be confused, but apparently those were a thing but were simply rarer than the traditional-trem versions.

Agreed about the super glossy neck. It doesn't bother me, but I did definitely notice it.

Digging around through my parts box, I realized I still had a Railhammer Hyper Vintage pickup (which I got from someone else here, can't remember who right now), so I might throw that in for fun. I've seen some mentions that the original pickups may be wired or phased in some unusual way to allow for the BT switching scheme and you lose that if you switch out pickups, though.

I will probably deck or block the trem after I get a bit more used to this guitar. I'm not a huge fan of the traditional Strat trem, and while I haven't broken a string in a while, I don't use the trem much and don't see much reason to risk it - but for now I figure I might try living with a traditional trem for a while!

My brother owns the same guitar, but the blue one. I absolutely love it. Especially the neck. But I prefer glossy necks.

I took this picture the other day when I was doing some work on the guitar, and figured I'd drop it in for posterity. Some interesting things to note:

* swimming pool rout
* nice shielding on the pickguard!
* a wire running to a ground tab on the body? does that mean the cavity is painted with conductive paint?
* I wonder what that number on the bar code sticker is. It's not the serial number for the guitar.

glasshand wrote: ↑Fri Nov 15, 2024 12:13 am I didn't originally set out to buy any kind of Strat, but... You know how sometimes you start out lusting over a guitar you see advertised, but the more you hold off, the less appealing it seems? And then sometimes you see something that doesn't grab you at first, but the longer you wait, the better it seems? That second one is what happened here. I originally had my eye on some Les Pauls, and I ran across this on FB Marketplace while I was looking around, and ultimately none of the LPs really grabbed me, and the more I thought about this one the more I liked the idea. And the price was very fair, and I'd just done some extra consulting gigs, so...

This is actually my first MIM Fender, and only my second real Fender of any kind, not counting some Squiers I've had in the past. Everything on it feels very well made, with maybe a slight exception for the tuners, which feel a trifle sloppy. The reviews I read of the pickups are accurate: they're on the dark and wooly side, although not unusably so. I haven't had a lot of chance to play around with positions 2 and 4, which are the weird ones - both inner coils or both outer coils - but the little I have, they sound pretty decent too.

The things I like are pretty much the things I expected to like: the Strat body shape, the humbuckers, the looks. The only thing I don't especially like is the wretched traditional Strat bridge, with its hand-shredding setscrews poking out. Some Highwood contoured saddles might be on order soon, plus maybe some locking tuners if I feel rich. I may even get myself a mirrored pickguard for the Phil Lynott look!

Furiosa is not impressed.
PXL_20241115_042737804.PORTRAIT.jpg

HGD glasshand! I missed this post.

Hope you like it.

I think I´m definitely a HB guy because that's how I like Strats: the two HB type ones.

The thing I don't like about those BTs is the very limited color offering, but they definitively look good.

I also hope upper fret access is good. The Strat I have, DIYed by Mossman, with a MIM Fender neck and a body he bought, doesn´t definitely have the better upper fret access I thought it'd have. Better than on the Agile AL3000 yes, for sure, but for some licks I feel my fretting hand somewhat struggling to do things right and comfortabe there. I admit that poor technique on my side might be a factor, but I can definitely see a good chunk of 90° wood there to clear before landing on the fretboard.

Anyway, make it your own, replace what you think you should, and enjoy it!

Congrats!