Black guard

New guitar! Of course not. I'm barely employed, moving around looking wasted with hardly any cash in hand. That's how it is these days; tough times, tougher than what others perceived it to be. Anyway, I decided to mod the American Special Strat you see above:

• Pick guard: Black 3-ply with painted edges to make it look like a single ply
• Pickups: All Seymour Duncan affair - Psychedelic (n) / SSL-1 (m) / Red Devil (b)
• Electronics: A500K volume + 2x A250K tone, HOSCO .022uf capacitor + 5-way selector
• All plastic parts replaced with white version

Since I have a few Strats, I have assigned this one to sport an HSS config. The humbucking RD is not wired to any tone knob, it's giving off that raw, punchy tone which I really favour for aggressive music. The other single coils here are simply doing their job well; twang clarity under tremendous amount of gain / drive. This is my first experience with the Psychedelic (n), would give it a few rounds of tone rigour before a deserving appraisal. Initial impressions - positive.

Also, I have decided to black guard this guitar for a simple reason; the light background with a contrasting dark pick guard makes the instrument look a little bolder, especially with the edges blacked out.