Originally Posted by: RazboSo thinking (and reading and watching) about the Frankenstrat. The neck pick up wasn't working apparently, but I figured mine should.

... I had thought there was a middle pick up crammed in that center hole at least at some point. I might cram one in, or would it be overkill? I'm thinking go hard or go home. :)

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The red neck pickup was non-functional. And the middle cavity had a five-way switch that was also totally non-functional. At that point EVH was purposely (perhaps jokingly) misleading people who had been trying to copycat his guitars. :p

Originally Posted by: Razbo
A big question I have is the slanted humbucker. Would this not take the poles badly out of alignment with the strings? Whatever the case, I guess it worked for Eddie.

EVH originally slanted the HB because the string spacing on a Fender is wider than a Gibson.

Since the body, neck, and vibrato bridge was Fender sized, when he put a HB pickup in it from a Gibson he noticed that the pickup pole pieces didn't quite stretch far enough to be directly under the strings. He figured if he slanted it slightly it might catch a bit of each E string with an opposing bit of each pole piece.

Nowdays, pickups and bridges are manufactured in multiple sizes and configurations to make it easy to match. Hence the modern Fat Strats do not need to have a slanted bridge pickup.

BTW - the original Strat design of a slanted single-coil was in order to make the bridge pickup catch more treble on the treble strings and bass on the bass strings. This is a really peculiar thing when you think about it.

And it also factors into a good build: the pickups should be in a favorable position under the strings, right? But where is that and how does one determine it?

Usually, it happens that Fenders and Gibsons typically were designed so the pickups are right under the strings at a harmonic node. You might even find conversely that cheaper knock-off copies have the pickups in a place that is NOT under a node. Which is why sometimes they sound "dead" or "flat". Or just plain crappy, if you prefer. :)

Did you see the other stuff I posted about EVH guitars and the sonic qualities involved in VH1? I know people that have bought strat-style Franks thinking they will get a decent brown sound. But then they discover that the more "heavy crunch" sound they were aiming for was like in YRGM. And they can't really get that with their Frank copy.

Because ... oops! He was using the Shark on that song.

That guitar sounds much more heavy and "Gibsony" than the B&W Frank. Because of course it was a Gibson style guitar with a tune-o-matic stop tail piece bridge. The B&W Frank sounds much more like a screaming Strat, with the slightly natural "boinging" echo of a guitar with a Fender vibrato block and springs in the back.
[QUOTE=Razbo]
I've eliminated a woodshop project that was in my way, so I am good to go.