Custom Gilmour Black Strat® Inspired Pickguard, Bracket and Switch Kit

Featuring Our Custom Fabricated 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic Pickguard With The Rounded and Polished Edge

The Included Recessed Mini-Toggle Switch Mounting Bracket and SPDT Mini-Toggle Switch.

Close-up detail of recessed mini-toggle switch as mounted in pickguard. Knobs, switch, switch tip and screws are NOT included in this kit, shown for illustration purposes only of how the mini-toggle switch appears in a completed assembly. Optional green lettered and numbered knob sets available here.

Our Custom Gilmour Style Black Strat® Pickguard, Bracket and Switch Kit Includes The Following

• Pickguard - Your choice of one of the following five custom manufactured 1 ply 0.120" Acrylic pickguards with the rounded and polished edge. Pickup and selector switch mounting holes are not countersunk and require round head mounting screws. Copper foil shielding in the control region only.
  • Black 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic, Standard 11 Hole
  • Black 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic, '57 Vintage 8 Hole
  • Black 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic, Standard 11 Hole - Reverse Angle Bridge Pickup (Limited Edition)
  • White 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic, Standard 11 Hole
  • White 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic, '57 Vintage 8 Hole
• Custom manufactured stainless steel recessed mini-toggle switch mounting bracket.
• SPDT mini toggle switch (for neck/bridge pickup selection).
• Black Strat® wiring diagram. Will be emailed to you once your order is invoiced.

Each of our 1 ply 0.120” Acrylic pickguards with the rounded and polished edge are custom hand manufactured in our shop specifically for each customer. They start off being cut out of a sheet of Acrylic with a CNC laser which creates the basic pickguard shape with all holes and cutouts. We then create the pickguards round-over edge effect by hand with a table router where the pickguard is affixed to a routing template where we trim the pickguard to it’s final size and create the rounded perimeter edge. From there the pickguards rounded edge is hand sanded with a fine sandpaper to remove any tooling marks left behind by the router bit.  The smoothly sanded rounded edge can then be polished with a special buffing wheel and a polishing compound used exclusively for Acrylic which creates the highly polished and glossy rounded edge.  The pickguards mounting holes are then countersunk, copper foil shielding tape is applied to the control region and a final polishing of the entire pickguard is completed.  It’s a fairly long process of 1 hour to create one of these unique pickguards, but we feel that final product is one that stands above the typical Strat® pickguard that have been produced the same way for over 50 years.  This unique rounded and polished pickguard edge is only available on our Black or White 1 Ply 0.120" Acrylic pickguards. Pickup and 5-way switch mounting holes are not countersunk and require round head mounting screws.

A significant feature of this kit is the recessed mini toggle switch.  It's a unique feature that is synonymous with Gilmour's Black Strat. We manufacture our switch mounting bracket from a sturdy piece of custom formed stainless steel that is strong and easily mountable underneath the volume and tone potentiometers.  It is not a permanent piece of the pickguard, but when installed becomes an integral part of it.  The function of this recessed mini-toggle switch is to provide you with two additional pickup selection positions by adding in the neck pickup to the current selection of the 5-way selector switch. This includes the bridge and neck pickups selected together in parallel with one another which is similar in tone as a Telecaster and the second additional pickup selection is to have all three pickups selected together in parallel.

The pickup and selector switch mounting screw holes accept Phillips round head screws.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Our Acrylic pickguards are 0.120" thick (+/- a few thousands of an inch) so keep this pickguard thickness in mind when installing a 0.120" thick Acrylic pickguard on a Strat® with a 22 fret neck, make sure you measure the total amount of clearance you have underneath your 22'nd fret overhang and the surface of your body to ensure that there is enough room to accommodate the 0.120" thick Acrylic pickguard with at least a few thousands of an inch of extra clearance for breathing room between the top surface of the Acrylic pickguard and the underside of the 22'nd fret overhang. The vast majority of 22 fret necks and body combinations will work fine with our 0.120" thick Acrylic pickguards but we have seen a rare few that won't and will need some sort of adjustment for correct fitment. You DO NOT want to tighten down any neck where its 22'nd fret overhang makes contact with the surface of the pickguard, you could very well lift the fingerboard away from the neck by the leveraging forces of tightening down the neck.

LIMITED TIME OFFER - REVERSE ANGLE BRIDGE PICKUP ACRYLIC PICKGUARD

For a limited time we are offering a reverse angle bridge pickup in our Black 1 Ply 0.120’' Acrylic pickguard's with the standard 11 hole mounting pattern.  Typically the bridge pickup on a Strat is rotated at a 10 degree angle in reference to the other two pickups where the treble E string pole piece is closer to the bridge than the bass E string pole piece.  This unique pickguard's reverse angle bridge pickup is rotated the opposite 10 degree angle where the bass E string pole piece is now closer to the bridge and the treble E string pole piece is further away from the bridge.  This would create a bridge pickup tonality the same as what Jimi Hendrix would of have experienced since he played a right handed guitar strung up and played left handed.  This results in a reverse-angled bridge pickup with more high-end bite on the bass strings and a warmer sound on the treble strings. the tone of the middle two strings will essentially go unchanged since there is very little change in their position relative to the bridge.  

NOTE: A very important aspect to consider if selecting this reverse angle bridge pickup pickguard is that you need to have a Humbucker bridge pickup routing in your body or the large “swimming pool” pickup routing to accommodate the reverse angle of the bridge pickup as it sits down into your body cavity.  A typical SSS (3 single coil) routed Strat® body will not accept this reverse angle bridge pickup without customization to your body with a router in the bridge pickup region.  The production run of these reverse angle bridge pickguard's is limited to a quantity of 42 and once they’re gone there won’t be any more.

Select Your Choice Of Pickguard

All names used in this webpage are trademarked by their respective owners that do not endorse and are not associated with OverDrive Custom Guitar Works. Those trademarked names, manufacturers or individuals are used solely to identify the products of those manufacturers or individuals whose tones, sounds and visual similarities were studied during research, design and product creation.

Turn-around time from order placement to shipment is up to 45 days.  Holiday work-loads sometimes may increase turn-around time, but keep in mind, we don't waste any time in getting these prepared, packed and shipped on their way to you.

By purchasing this assembly kit you acknowledge that you are aware that some Strat® bodies are NOT 100% compatible and some pickguard perimeter mounting holes may need adjusting on your body. 

Each pickguard is custom manufactured for each customer and cannot be returned, exchanged or refunded.

This item is an assembly kit where you the customer are required to perform final assembly, wiring, soldering and testing to complete the kit.  In the event you encounter an issue with the completed assembly we do not provide a troubleshooting service to assist you in figuring out what may have gone wrong.  All parts included with any kit have been tested for fit and function prior to packing to ensure that everything will operate normally when the kit is completed correctly.  You are required to have the necessary electrical, wiring and soldering skills/experience along with proper tools required to complete this project per the provided instructions. If you are not experienced with the required assembly, wiring and soldering and testing you will want to consult a trained professional to complete your project.

Occasionally we find very small cosmetic imperfections in the surface of our Acrylic pickguards, typically they are small bubbles or spots and sometimes thin lines. This is not something we consider as defective since they are an effect of the Acrylic casting / handling process.  Unfortunately we cannot determine if any Acrylic pickguard is going to have any of these imperfections until the entire pickguard manufacturing procedures are complete, so there is no way to pick and choose a "perfect" pickguard for a project beforehand. For the most part it's a non-issue and inconsequential and we will never let any pickguard go out that we feel has any undesirable characteristic that is obviously unacceptable.  We've made over a thousand of these pickguards and some have these characteristics and no one has yet felt the need to complain.  With that being said, we just felt it was best to make sure you were aware of these possibilities to avoid any surprises.

Acrylic pickguards and back plates are more fragile than the typical vinyl ones most are familiar with. Always use the utmost of care when installing components into an Acrylic pickguard, never tighten any fastener too tight and never tighten any perimeter mounting screw any tighter than just to the point where the screw barely snugs the pickguard or back plate down to the surface of the body.  Never flex or put undue pressure on any part of the Acrylic pickguard or back plate or you will break it. 

Occasionally you may find the need to clean your Acrylic pickguard and the following are items you will need; an old clean and very soft 100% white cotton terrycloth towel or an old clean and very soft 100% white cotton T-shirt, pressurized air can and an Acrylic cleaner such as Novus #1 "Plastic Clean and Shine" or Kleenmaster Brillianize,  DO NOT use any other cleaning products to clean the Acrylic pickguard or you may damage it.  On occasion you may wish to remove some fine scratches from an Acrylic pickguard or back plate and the Novus #2 "Fine Scratch Remover" is the perfect 1'st step cleaning product choice for this task followed up with Novus #1 or Kleenmaster Brillianize. For world-wide distribution and Acrylic cleaning product availability contact the manufacturers directly at Novus or Brillianize.