I decided this beauty needed its own thread. I’ve been a fan of gunmetal blues and grays since Fender released them decades ago. I never got the pleasure of owning one tho. I typically like the rosewood + blacked out pick guard look for those fenders. But I felt the itch for a new maple fret guitar and the darker pearloid birds looked incredible with this metallic gray.
I’m very impressed with this guitar for being an SE. I spent time working on the frets to perfect them to my liking. That included some minor sharp ends and some high frets. Relatively minor work but certainly makes a difference feel wise.
Upgrades: functional for the MannMade steel tremolo upgrade kit. This single handedly increased the sustain acoustically. Before I felt it sounded a little dead acoustically which I always believe effects plugged in sounds. Now it’s glorious! I like the sustain, steel bite, and higher end sparkle that I felt this guitar needed over a typical brass block. I installed PRS locking tuners for my convenience. The truss rod cover was cosmetic to match the darker pearloid birds. As was the choice to swap pickguards for pearloid that matched the birds.
This is a beast of a guitar. I feel like I can cover so much ground with this guitar and my McCarty. It’s not quite fender single coil. So that traditional strat neck pickup sound is not there. It’s very much its own thing. But much closer to single coils than a full humbucker. I find it has more useful positions than a traditional 5 way strat where I never used the bridge alone or the middle alone.
I strongly recommend trying it . Some scoff at the notion of a PRS designed import. I say that this guitar can approach USA grade level with some TLC. With time I’m sure the fret board edges will roll.