I have a 1995 Fender Strat, made in Mexico. To make it play and sound better, I decided to make a few upgrades.
The easiest upgrade was to replace the stock tuners with Chrome Fender Locking Tuners. I’ve never had a guitar with locking tuners before, but everyone raves about them, and I figured at least they would help with tuning stability.
Installation was very easy. Remove one nut and the old tuner dropped out, and the new tuner fit exactly into the same hole. I just had to make sure to put the tuners with the shorter pegs for the higher strings, to help with the string angle coming over the guitar nut.
The Fender locking tuners feel heavy in the hand and I like the “F” on the back of the tuners. I haven’t had a chance to play it enough to tell about the tuning stability, but I can report that re-stringing the guitar is very fast and simple now. Locking tuners are definitely the way to go.
Next, I had wanted to upgrade the stock pickups. I decided to go with a set of Seymour Duncan Vintage Rails, because I wanted the hum-bucking improvement over the single coils, and the Vintage Rails offer coil-splitting, which would give me some tonal flexibility.
For the neck pickup, I went with the Seymour Duncan SCR-1n Cool Rails Pickup. For the middle pickup I went with the Seymour Duncan SVR-1N Vintage Rails Pickup. And for the bridge pickup I went with the Seymour Duncan SVR-1b Vintage Rails Pickup.
For the coil split, I chose the DiMarzio 250K Custom Taper Split Shaft Push/Pull Pot.
Installation wasn’t too difficult, but when looking inside the strat for the first time, I was a little shocked at the components used. I think if I open the strat up again I’ll also want to upgrade the switch, tone potentiometers, and perhaps even the output jack. I think it will be worth totally gutting the guitar! Evidently 1995 MIM Fender Strats weren’t known for top-end components.
After putting everything back together and plugging it in, I was a little hesitant if I’d hear anything at all. But evidently my soldering job was fine and the sound was a big improvement over the stock tuners. Another big win was the DiMarzio potentiometer–push/pull works great and the feel is so smooth compared to the stock pot. This has convinced me to also replace the other components.
I’m very much looking forward to experimenting with all the sounds I’ll now be able to get from this strat. This was a fun project–looking forward to making my guitars play and sound better. If you have any suggested upgrades, please let me know! And check back in, because at some point I’ll have a part 2, where I’ll perhaps replace the output jack and tone potentiometers, and install strap locks.
Equipment used in this upgrade–availability and pricing on Amazon: