I have a 1996 TexMex Strat and while the sound was good for the most part, I've been toying with the idea of swapping out the pups for some time for something with a little less gain. I finally got that chance when I found a fully loaded pickguard with surf pups on eBay from a company Metal Shop Music:

http://www.metalshopmusic.com/

Although they don't show any loaded pickguards on their web site, they do sell them on eBay.

The SURF pups from Seymour Duncan series called the Antiquity II. Seymour has this to say about them:

Don't let the name fool you: the '60s Surfer™ pickup would be equally comfortable in the smoky clubs of Chicago's West Side as hanging ten at the Malibu Pier. The Antiquity II Surfer is hailed by many members of the Seymour Duncan User Group Forum as the ultimate pickup for vintage Strat® chime and quack. Whether you play Blues, West Side Soul, Surf, or Jangle Pop, the Surfer has the sweet highs and percussive lows to give you and your Strat a Free Ride on the Way Back Machine without sacrificing output or versatility. A Custom Bridge version is available for those players needing more output from the bridge position; and an RW/RP version is available for the middle position.

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/antiquity/stratocaster/1102409_08_10_a/

Here's a couple snaps of my original 96 TexMex pickguard front and back:

The loaded pickguard back:

And the finished look:

If you've been studying the photos of the fronts of both pickguards, take a look at the bridge pickup position. The new one is "different". It's called a Gypsy Flip according to Metal Shop Music, something Hendrix did (couldn't prove by me, not a Hendrix fan).

My thinking was that this might make the bridge pickup slightly less shrill, and the keyword is slightly. Very slight. As in, you might not notice it. At all. YMMV..:-)

The thing that also appealed to me, apart from the pickguard being fully loaded was that Metal Shop added a switch to one of the tone controls. That switch turns on ALL the pickups, or, in bridge position, it turns on neck and bridge. So I now have seven positions to play with. A much better tonal range selection.

Something else is different too. The new setup doesn't have the hum that the original did. Take the old Tex Mex PUPS near my computer monitors and they buzzed like crazy. I checked the grounds in them to make sure nothing was wrong, but they were just noisy.

Hence I was a little apprehensive when the new pickguard didn't even use shielded wire for the output jack. I soldered it in, and was shocked to find it was super quiet. You can see there is no additional shielding on that pickguard so I don't know how Metal Shop does it, but it certainly is nice.

Where the old TexMex pups started to go into "drive" was with a volume of anything over 6. The Seymours seem to have about half of that gain so 10 just starts to drive a little too hard. A setting of 5 is quite quiet so usable range is 6-9 for me.

The tone controls seem quite typical, or not much different than any other Strat. It's not a TBX tone circuit...:-)

I am not only elated with the sound of the new pups, but I like the look of the pickguard a lot more than the old one. I figure I got a decent deal for the $259 I paid.

Mel

Spud
I'm curious about the name though 'Antiquity 11' is it comparable to anything else in say the AVRI range? like say a '62 set up?. Did you have to rout out anymore room in the body to take the different selector switch set up? My old strat had a card type selector like your original one and when I got my new loaded vintage pick guard, the selector switch was an old style that was much chunkier and I had to alter the body a little to fit it, just make it a bit deeper and wider in that area.

The one I recently purchased and installed was a '56 - '58 vintage type and I couldn't be more pleased with the tones that I now get out of my strat. Vastly different from my original setup which was a normal basic strat from the early '80's.

Hi Spud,

I have nothing at this time to compare the pickups against for sound. I know the TexMex pickups I took out were a lot hotter for output than the new SD pickups. Sound wise, these seem to have more bass and mid-range response. The bridge pickup by itself can still shatter glass...:-)

The old pickguard was easy to pop out, but I have to say the new one is SNUG. As in very snug. I didn't have to rout out any of the body to fit it, but I didn't have to worry about it shifting out of position either. It was that snug. The selector switch on the new setup is WAY bigger than the one that came out. It looks like it's shielded too. Maybe that's why it's quieter.

I'm pretty sure my Strat on made on a "free beer" day too. When I removed the screws holding down the pickguard ONE of them was actually in straight. All the rest were off by as much as 10-15 degrees. And the screws either side of the bridge were a different size than all the rest. I have no idea if thats normal either. Maybe it was "screw shortage" day too...:-)

I always found the Tex pickups were too hot for my liking and the B & E (1&2) strings would ring like crazy up around the 12th fret. I mean it was like having a compressor on the guitar for sustain. The new set up is much cleaner up the neck.

It also seems to sound better/cleaner through my 63 RI Reverb Tank. Probably because of the better response to the lower frequencies now.

The guitar is strung with D'addario Chromes 11-50 Jazz lights. No idea what the pickups would sound like with rounds on it. I only played rounds til I tried my first set of flats...:-)

You're right about saving the original pickguard too. My idea was that if this idea tanked, then I could have something to tinker with. As it is, the original is in the closet. And it sounds really good there...:-)

Metal Shop has an eBay store with a LOT of loaded pickguards (now I that found it)...

http://stores.ebay.com/MetalShopMusic-Guitars-Parts-Amps

They have a plain pickguard with the same pickups in mine for $249 (or buy it now for $259). When I priced out the pickups alone, they were up in the $80 range. So better they do all the hard work than me...

Mel