For too long, I've been frustrated by wiring pickguards and having them not set down into a body without fussing with wire clearance. You know - you drop the thing on, and invariably there's a wire or two in the way between the pickguard and the body so it won't sit flush, and you have to poke around to get it out of the way before you run in the pickguard screws. So, I said to myself "Self, there must be a better way!"
This is what I came up with.
Grab an old pickguard that you're less than thrilled with that fits the body you're dealing with, and screw it on. Just a few screws will do - you're only trying to keep it from moving around if you stress it a bit.
Get yourself a 1/2" flush trim router bit...
and chuck it into your favorite router...
Then just follow the inside route of your body's wiring/control cavity. When you're done, you'll have a pickguard that looks like this (assuming you're working with a Strat):
The same thing, on its own...
Now, when it comes time to wire up your new pickguard, you just lay that template on the bottom of the new 'guard, and make sure you don't have wires going anywhere there wouldn't be clearance for them in the body...
It's easy to see where there's clearance for wires. That one's not complete, but lemme tell ya - it works like a charm. When you get done, the thing just drops in place, no hassle.
You wouldn't necessarily have to use pickguard material - especially considering the cost of the stuff - but it is convenient and easy to work with. Since you aren't going to install it on anything, you can buy cheap pickguards from places like
Guitar Fetish for reasonable money. It's a lot easier than cutting out your own, or spending $25+ on something first-rate. That one is obviously made out of a Warmoth 'guard, but I wrecked the face of it screwing around, which converted it to scrap. Word to the wise: never remove the protective covering on a new 'guard until the last minute.
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