Fender Custom Shop Texas Special Pickups

I have read a lot of articles about these pickups, but the only way to test them out properly is to get hold of a set. They are a bit pricey in the shops but a quick visit to ebay can get you a set for around £100 (we are talking UK prices here).

Project Texas Special
I started this project by getting hold of a scratch plate  to install the pickup's into, the first thing you notice is that the screws supplied are too big and don't actually fit the holes, I didn't have anything to tap the holes out with, but luckily had some screws from another project which did fit. The wiring diagram is quite handy, but does show the blue and red dots on the wrong side.

The rest of the electronics were apparently taken out of a 2007 USA Strat (still wired together so saved a bit of time). It seems that people are now buying up guitars, taking them to bits and selling all the parts independently, this way they can make more money than selling the guitar as a whole. That's probably why 100% original guitars are now quite sought after.

A little bit of soldering later and it's now ready to fit into a guitar.

I recently picked up a '97 Korean Squire guitar which I decided to use for this project. The first thing I did was completely dismantle the guitar so I could decide what to renew and what to keep.

The next job was to put some shielding into the body cavities, the easiest way of doing that was to use self adhesive copper tape.

The tuners on the original guitar were quite bad so I decided to replace these with some locking tuners from Axetec.

The new tuners required a 10mm hole but the original one's were 8mm. I used a tapered reamer to open out the holes from the back, the front side didn't need to be as much as 10mm so the taper worked quite well. Once the holes were 10mm on the back, I could then use a drill to square up the holes a little more. I found a couple of better quality string trees so fitted those as well.

I also decided to change the bridge saddles as I prefer the modern style flat saddles. The bridge was not quite straight originally, so I filled the original holes and refitted it. The tremolo unit was going to be locked down rather than floating, so I added 5 tension springs.

Next job was to re-attach the neck. Originally the low E string was too close to the edge of the neck, so when I refitted then neck I pulled it in the opposite direction before tightening. This, together with moving the bridge slightly, seems to have sorted out the problem. I also fitted a shim so the action could be adjusted properly.

I then soldered the wires from the jack socket and the earth wire to the volume pot in the scratch plate and fitted that on.

With everything now in place, I put on some strings and started to set up the guitar.

Once in tune, I did the intonation and adjusted the action, the neck was nice and straight so didn't require any truss rod adjustment.

I could now plug the guitar in and give it a try, I was pleased to find that everything was working as it should do.  I will do some sound tests in the next few weeks and report back. I have only heard the pickups at bedroom volume so far, but it's sounding very promising. It cost me just over £300 to do this project, but that's not a lot for what is now a very good guitar.

Update: I have been able to give these pickups a good test now and I must say I am impressed. The higher output, tonal variation and responsiveness they give you definitely gives them the edge over standard US Strat pickups.

The question people ask the most about Texas Specials is : "If I install these pickup's into my guitar, will I instantly sound like Stevie Ray Vaughn?" and the simple answer is no! but they may point you in the right direction.