When I was 14, I played a bit and made this guitar:
It ended up helping me get a summer job at Red's Guitar Warehouse in Mountain View, CA as the repair department. No kidding, my first refret was a customer's D-45. I miss the confidence of youth - I could do anything.
Fast-forward a few moons and this guitar has collected mostly dust since then. I'm toying with the idea of starting to play again, and I need/want to refresh the electronics, polish the brass, etc.
When I designed the body, I loved the look of the Strat, but liked the lack of a pickguard from my friend's Les Paul. So I melded the two into the hybrid pictured above. I don't know what I was thinking putting three humbucker cutouts, but that's what I did. I like the way it showed the two maple stringers running through the front (plus they cary sustain from the neck to the bridge, in theory). The middle pickup now is a blank - piece of acrylic. The bridge pickup is a 1970's Bill Lawrence, the neck was from an old Les Paul. The switches are unused - when I first did it I put all kinds of active electronics in it. Now, one of them kills the output, that's all.
I'm toying with one extreme, putting a full size Strat pickguard and three strat pickups - going a bit more original looking. The other is some variation of pickups in the current humbucker mounts. In the middle is a partial pickguard for just the pickups - maybe one strat and one humbucker. I'd probably blank or fill the three switch holes. I just don't know. I'm open to many/any suggestions.
Sound-wise, I'm partial to Clapton, SRV, Blues. More rich/warm sound.
What would you do in terms of sound/esthetics/electronics?
Thank you!!