Here's a really well put-together Stratocaster style guitar with what appears to be a very high-end Musikraft neck. This guitar features many hard to find, or no longer produced items, and would therefore be nearly impossible to replicate. The Neck is Heavily flamed and is one of the best looking and feeling strat necks I've ever seen and played. This is a quality build with some very expensive hardware-I know from personal experience that this level of quality neck costs over $1000 from Musikraft. The Schaller Gold Elite Fender XGE-1G tuning machines are near impossible to find and sell between $450-600 if you can find a set...The pickups are no longer made and unavailable-unless you can find someone that doesn't know what they have; otherwise-on one wants to part with them-more on that later. I did not build this guitar so I do not know some specifics-but I did break it down to give you the following information.
The body appears to be the standard size 50's style Stratocaster shape with vintage deep contours front and rear. It appears to be made from Alder wood. The finish is Fiesta red and looks super nice. It is glossy and in excellent condition. It is a really nice grand piano-gloss quality. It is very well done. The neck joint and fitment are top notch. The neck angle is perfect. The maple neck is straight as an arrow and truly is an amazing piece. The high contrast flame figuring in the wood is really gorgeous-see photos. The feel is rather smooth and drag-free. The nut measures the classic Stratocaster width: 1.65". It has a vintage C profile. The neck depth measures .881" at the 1st fret and .930" at the 12th fret. It feels like a vintage '59-'60 strat neck.
The tuning machines are the previously mentioned Schaller XGE-1G Fender edition units. They have a superbly smooth action. The same tuners were used on Fender special edition SRV's number 1 and John Mayer's Black1 strat. The headstock is the typical Pre-CBS size and shape. The Pre-CBS Fender Spaghetti logo is accurate and looks killer. The fingerboard is just as flakey as the back of the neck-it looks amazing. The fingerboard is super clean and has abalone position markers. The frets are medium Jumbo sized. The frets are like new condition & height-see photos.
The action is set lowish for an easy playing experience. The string height is currently set at .010" at the 1st fret and .055" at the 12th fret. The guitar plays lights out with no dead spots whatsoever. You can really bend like an animal with this one.
The pickups are probably the most enigmatic part of this build: they are Dragonfire DG-SA units with the active 9V source. Back in 2012, these pickups used to sell for just $150 with the potentiometers and wiring harness! Despite the affordability-they really have an excellent full-bodied tone. It appears that these pickups were designed either exactly like or close enough to the EMG David Gilmour signature models that a cease and desist order was sent and they are not longer available or even talked about! No surprise there-they sound fantastic. The Alnico V magnets deliver the vintage tone through and through and the active power provides a loud clear signal that is hard to get enough of. Once you pick up and play this guitar through any quality tube amp-You won't want to put it down again. You can find videos on YouTube if you search for Dragonfire DG-SA. Dragonfire does still offer similar pickups-but none quite like these. The outputs measure 11.6 ohms in the neck position, 21.2 ohms in the middle position, and 21.3 ohms in the bridge position. At full signal-all of the pickups' volumes balance excellently.
The 5-way pickup selector is the standard Bridge/combo/Middle/combo/Neck schematic. The volume is a master volume and the middle tone control actually is a volume control for the neck position. The lower tone control is a traditional tone control for the middle and/or bridge pickup positions. This setup confirms to me that the builder of this guitar was really into SRV. This wiring schematic is designed so you can quickly switch from bridge or middle position pickup with full volume to a neck position with the volume already rolled back to 7 or 8 and get that cleaned up "super-woody" tone that SRV and Jimi Hendrix used so often. It eliminates the need to roll back the volume trying to find the sweet spot while your singing! It is a killer setup.
The bridge features the vintage style 6-screw mounting with slightly oversized screws for added sustain and resonance-and the full bodied saddles help to pile on said resonance and sustain. The Vibrato arm is included also-it is a push-pull release style for easy management.
The gold hardware throughout goes together with the Fiesta red finish like Peanut Butter on Jelly on Gold. Snoop Dogg totally ripped that one off of me-just ask him.
The guitar is loads of fun to play and looks, sounds and feels stellar whether in the studio, on stage or just hanging out on the couch writing songs.
As far as what year this guitar was assembled-I am not for sure. I do know that the Dragonfire pickups were discontinued long ago and they are the earlier direct wired lead versions-so I am guessing no later than 2012.
Guitar comes with a soft case.
