Finished recombining pickups to bodies and neck swaps of my partscasters.
ten vintage styled partscaster collection, cost less to build than a single Custom Shop Strat.
I had experienced how different pups can change a guitars tone. Made sense many years ago.
A few years ago I got more into buying raw bodies and necks for new strat builds and would try to pay attention to the bodies tapping sound and differences in final tone of the resulting guitar. I still had not ever tried to fine tune the mix with neck swaps, other than paying attention to general neck characteristics i.e., fretboard type, headstock type, and neck contour and thickness. I assumed that with same characteristics they'd be similar.
This last several weeks I had a dozen strat necks layed out. Started tapping and lining them up from darker tap to brighter. Combining them to different bodies and with swapping different pickup sets.
Current impression is generalities can hold true to a point, but individual differences vary alot.
Maple necks did seem to considerably brighten the mix relative to RW.
But one particular maple neck was darker than almost all the RW's. I'ld put it on a body and hear drastic darkening of whichever guitar's tone. And some RW's were much brighter than others.
I think 3 piece bodies with a fat center piece a good bit wider than the pup cavities, might more likely lead to a lively resonant body vs 2 or 3 pieces with seam running under pups.
Veneer RW vs Slab over maple, in varying contours, it was a mixed bag. It was more important to listen to the tap tone. My contours were all medium C to soft-V, starting anywhere from .82 to .88 roughly.
My one maple /maple fb cap neck is a warm maple neck, but not dark.
Anyway, now I have my fleet of single coil strats, too many of course, all which sound wonderfully big and open. Klein, Amalfitano, Chubtone, Fatpups.
Kleins are the most open, and I've tried many of their models. They vary in voicings from model to model, but all have the most big open quality. My 63 Chubtone set is open with thicker potential. Amalfitano set similar. Fatpups FatLittleWing set are less open than the others, but they'll cover up a body that might tend to not sound so good. And they're still fairly open compared to many other brands I've tried.
"The man that hath no music in himself, nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils. The motions of his spirit are dull as night, and his affections dark as Erebus. Let no such man be trusted."
