December Birthdays 
Hello.
I'm building a surf guitar called the "Surf Master". I'm going to wait until it's complete before I devolge all the details, but I was wondering if anybody could help me with advice.
First off, what kind of pick-ups would you recomend? I was thinking of going with some sort of strat/single-coil style pickup for the bridge position for that classic surf tone (Dick Dale, Miserou), and some sort of Getsch-style pickup at the neck for versatility.
I have to say that personally I think strats have the bridge pick-up angled the wrong direction for surf. I want more "body" on the high strings. And plus, the high-e string in bridge position through a reverb tank becomes earsplitting. If I had my way on my strat I think the low string would be picked up where the bridge pickup is placed, and the high string would be picked up where the mid pickup is placed. Anyways, that's where I stand on that.
I'm on an extreme budget, but I've noticed that on ebay fender pickups can go for really cheap. But I've also noticed that there are many different kinds, and honestly I don't know what the differences really are. What the difference for example between Texas Special, Deluxe SCN Noiseless, Hot, 50s Reissue, and Standard Strat pickups?
I also know that tone also has two other significant factors -- the strings, and the guitar itself (lets pretend your fingers don't really matter). I tend to use 12 or 13 guage flatwounds. As for the wood, on my guitar, it's redwood which I realize is an interesting choice. It's pretty resonant, so I'm thinking once I put strings on it'll actually have some nice big tone. I use a solid state amp for clarity (I find that tube amps turn the trip of my reverb unit into muck).
Does anybody here know anything about building a simple single-coil pickup? I figure that'd give me the most control over design (I could make it really long and place it at a 45 degree angle).
Other than that, does anybody have any advice in regards to:
- fret wire size
- fretboard radius
- are locking tuners worth the extra money? what exactly do they do?
Thanks,
THOR
Monsters From Mars
http://monstersfrommars.com
