What makes a great sounding electric
guitar? The wood? The pickups? Whether it's a bolt-on or
set-neck? The strings? The truth is that it isn't any one component,
but all of them together - the type of wood, it's age, resonance, scale length,
type of construction, finish, bridge type and material, nut material, tuners,
pickups, wiring, strings and more. Some of these components may make only
a small contribution in the overall formula for great tone, while others have a
much more dramatic affect.
Without question, the part which has
the biggest say in how an electric guitar sounds is the ELECTRONICS.
This accounts for at least 50% of the guitar's tone and perhaps as high as 70%.
Certainly if you want to improve the guitars' tone you can do something as
simple as changing a pickup and get an immediate and noticeable change, but this
is really just scratching the surface.
We have taken a much more comprehensive
approach to this most critical part of the guitar. We treat the guitars'
electronics as an entire system and combine parts that are
designed to work with each other to bring out the performance, tone and
versatility that the instrument is capable of. Best of all, everything is
pre-wired in our shop making the installation extremely easy, even for
non-technically minded musicians.
Our Custom
Wiring Harnesses are the single, largest improvement you can make to your guitar
and prompts comments such as these from our customers:
"The Fralin
single-coils you sent to me in the wired harness are GREAT! I have
Fralins in another Stratocaster, but they don't sound like these! How did
you get them to be so loud and sweet/sparkling on the high end? I
especially like that advanced midrange control. You really seem to know
something nobody else knows about this. Thanks". - Mark
Williams, Philadelphia, PA
"I ordered,
received and installed my Custom Wiring Harness with Lindy Fralin pickups.
I was initially hesitant about ordering this kit due to it's high price and my
unfamiliarity with your company. My concerns were immediately put to rest
once I actually heard the guitar. I just wanted to send you a letter of
praise, (something I never do). The wiring was immaculate, tonal control
excellent, and the pickups....What can I say? You said they are, "the best
single coils on the planet." I agree. Rich, full, shimmering.
Magical is a word that comes to mind. Installation was a snap, even
without instructions. So, thanks for an excellent kit and keep up the good
work". - Daniel Mullen, Boston, MA
Here's why our harnesses sound so good:
Pickups - the first thing they must do is
capture the sound of an old, vintage Strat. This is the sound that we all
want, but can't find in off the shelf guitars. Additionally, each pickup
must sound good. We don't have a good sounding neck pickup coupled with a
harsh sounding bridge pickup. Each one has to offer something in and of
itself. In some cases, this requires having the pickups custom wound.
Since there are different types of Strat sounds, we offer different flavors in
our pickups. See the Pickups section in our site
for more information.
Pots - we use only high quality pots in
our harnesses and we use specific values for the volume and tone controls to
allow the circuits to not only work correctly, but just as important to control
the overall loading of the signal from each control which affects the overall
tonality of the guitar. Additionally, the pots are quite smooth in their
taper as you adjust the respective controls. They are firm enough to stay
where you put them, but loose enough to use techniques like volume swells.
Wiring - we use larger than normal gauge
wire for the simple reason that it sounds better. It's more expensive, but
it allows for a freer movement of electrons and better tone. We also wire
the harness immaculately with a well engineered layout of the wiring to be as
concise and noise free as possible. We even wire the 5-way selector a
specific way to further economize on the wiring needs of the circuit and to help
eliminate popping noises from the selector switch.
Treble Retention Circuit - All of our
Harnesses include a treble retention circuit (as does most of the guitars we
work on in-shop). Guitars that do not have this lose their top end as soon
as you turn the volume control to anything less than 10. This cures that
problem allowing you to take full advantage of your volume control.
Tone Controls - here is where we add to
the versatility of your guitar. The right tone controls can let you alter
the inherent voice of the guitar, possibly even to the degree that it seems like
a different instrument. We offer 2 different controls of our own creation
to allow you to do that. The Advanced Midrange Control allows you
do a couple of things. First it allows you to pull mids out leaving you a
tone that is reminiscent of an amplified acoustic - glassy,
transparent, great for rhythm or just a different type of lead tone. As a
side benefit some players like to use this control to clean up their tone if
they are using an overdrive pedal. Secondly, if you turn the control in
the opposite direction it gives you the effect of having extra windings on your
pickups, a little hotter sounding, a little fatter, slightly attenuated highs.
Gives a little more grind in your leads. The Woman Tone Control is
like a regular tone control except superior. It allows you to roll off the
high end of your guitar to make things smoother, jazzier, but does not muddy
your tone or cause a loss in volume as some conventional tone controls do.
When using this control in high gain settings it gives a creamy, "growling"
kind of tone that seems to help you find the sweet spots on your guitar that
love to feedback. Best of all both these controls can be used in
conjunction with each other (try using the Advanced Midrange on 10 with the
Woman Tone backed all the way off) and can be used with any of the pickups.
Ease of
Installation - incredibly simple. The Custom Harness has 2
wires, both of which get soldered to your output jack. Your guitar also
probably has a string ground wire which you can solder to the back of the volume
pot. That's it. You can remove your old harness as one piece making
it easy to re-install if you ever needed to, or to install in another guitar.
If you purchase a new pickguard from us (or send us one of your own) we will
even mount the Custom Harness on the pickguard at no charge to you making the
installation even simpler.
All of our
harnesses include the following: pickups, pickup covers (specify white or
black), 5-way selector, volume control with treble retention circuit, Advanced
Midrange Control, Woman Tone control and installation instructions.
