EJ02002 slight Relic

Heres one of the projects that took the most time and effort but which was worth the wait.

Long story short, the first fender body I purchased off ebay was this EJ two tone light weight. What I liked about the body was the cutback and flowing lines. Weighing in at around 4.1LBs also helps.

But that was it..I bought EJ pickups but didn't really like them as much as they were hyped.They're special but the scatterwounds from Oz blew them away.

So..time went by and the body had several set ups..at the end of the day it ended up stripped and naked in the corner..until I noticed an ad of a guy who had done what nobody else I'd seen done, and that was relic a "same year" neck of the body. This came with a "same year" EJ neck plate.

So, the body had the perfect neck as it was also in used condition and suited a relic'd neck.

The rest had to suit and what you see is a long list of correct year parts for a 50's Strat, in true geek fashion. The single-ply scratch plate has 50s style pup covers, knobs and of course the football style switch tip.You'll notice it isn't the same as the later switch tips. Ok, if your gonna do something right, do it right. It's quite difficult to get that reliced "bakelite" white across the board, but I managed without going down the usual routes of turning everything ivory colored.

The tuners are actually GOTOH that are reliced by a guy in the states, who has been doing the job for a long time.They look awesome.

Obviously a big difference with the EJ and other custom shop is the steel block which has more meat to it that its 60s cousins. Thats why you'll see the string ends near the base. More sustain.EJ demanded this on his custom shop. I however managed to sort out a reliced steel base with a reliced Gotoh saddle plate and add some steel Reissue saddles that looked used. Okay, the EJ doesn't have a rear cover, one of the points that makes it special, so you can't have a relic this and that without the block, springs and claw being reliced, as well as every screw.So, look at the pics, the springs and claw are also reliced as well as all the screws mounting the hardware and all the rest. The smaller details complete the bigger picture.

Now then, I'm not a huge fan of heavy relic, so what we're talking here is a clean guitar that looks a wee bit used but not over abused. That will happen through being used, as the thin nitro is already rubbing down.

The pickups are wrapped by 50's style round edged pup covers , the magnets are not reliced and too bad.But the pups are quite rare, a set of 1959 pups from the custom shop which could only be found in the thinskins '59 stratocaster. They sound awesome.

Quarter sawn neck really makes this one sing and I'm delighted with the finished project.The EJ neck is fantastic and I understand the 2800 dollar price tag on these guitars...But, I like mine more!