195-111018 Z-Strat – Zachary Handcrafted Guitars | Bass| Pedals | Strings

Inspiration

I always wanted a Black Strat. You know the one like Hendrix played. However, there are too many things about a Fender Stratocaster, which prevents me from playing them. I know that despite their flaws great players did well with them but they would have done even better had they played an updated Strat. This is what I did. As always, I take a traditional guitar design and modify and improve it every way possible while keeping its essential elements; its soul. I kept everything which defines it as a Strat but altered it for the modern high-performance player.

This particular Z-Strat is more akin to those 80s Moded Strats with two humbuckers. This is not a sacrilege because a whole new genre of Strats were created, equipped with Humbucker pickups. What most did not do in the 80s however, is to have the creativity to wire the pickups for coil-split option. By having well designed pickups, one can get a quite convincing traditional Strat single-coil tone from Humbuckers. So, essentially its like two guitars in one. A traditional single coil Strat and a humbucker equipped shredding machine. All in one.

I hand wound these pickups myself, to a certain specification, which allows me to get a pronounced distinction in tone between double-coil and single-coil operation of the same pickup. In essence one can preserve the traditional Strat single coil tones by adding a coil-split switch, as I have done with this guitar.

Add to this the amazing tremolo system, comprising of a great non-locking tremolo unit, Mission Impossible nut and retainer bar, locking tuners, 24 Stainless Steel frets and ZOT (Zachary Optimum Tensions) strings and you have it so good that Stevie Ray Vaughan could have never even imagined it.