I am pretty sure the Hot Rails one I was looking at is routed properly. But pretty sure is not sure. I have put in a question at the Strat Talk forum for Hot Rails owners there.
Also, I am getting tempted to put a nice 22 fret neck on this. Not that I have ever played up there much, if at all.
I was looking at necks from the Fender Blacktop HH strats, and they are really nice 22 fret RW, just what I want. But they cost more than used Squier Standards and Hot Rails guitars. I guess the advantage of starting with a cheap guitar, if in fact it was routed properly (though i am not opposed to some woodwork), is that I could spread out the mods over time and experiment and have fun with that.
But, OTOH, I have seen Blacktop strats used for mid to high $300 range, and I know that they are nice, have decent electronics to mod from, decent tuners, a good neck, and are routed properly. Gets me out of the real cheap project range though.
Steve Thompson
Sun Valley, Idaho
Guitars: Fender 60th Anniversary Std. Strat, Squier CVC Tele Hagstrom Viking Semi-hollow, Joshua beach guitar, Martin SPD-16TR Dreadnought
Amphs: Peavey Classic 30, '61 Fender Concert
Effects and such: Boss: DS-1, CE-5, NS-2 and RC20XL looper, Digitech Bad Monkey, Korg AX1G Multi-effects, Berhinger: TU100 tuner, PB100 Clean Boost, Line 6 Toneport UX2, Electro Harmonix Little Big Muff Pi, DuhVoodooMan's Rabid Rodent Rat Clone, Zonkin Yellow Screamer Mk. II, MXR Carbon Copy Delay
love is the answer, at least for most of the questions in my heart. . .
- j. johnson