Strat body routing and weight affect on tone?

[TKS]

I have an Am. Deluxe strat that I like the sound of, but would like a vintage style bridge and a larger neck so I am going to build a USACG guitar to my specs. I have a question regarding the pickup cavity routing and tone of the body. My strat is 4.1 lbs (alder) and is routed like THIS (http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i148/notam/1.jpg). My question is how much will the routing affect the tone. I would like to know if I were to get an alder body made by USACG would HSH sound different than SSS, and also how does weight affect tone (highs, mids, bass, and sustain)?

Thanks

[testing1two]

This is just my opinion, but there are so many other variables that affect tone that I don't think you could attribute any major (or even perceivable) differences to an HSH route vs. a SSS route.

[Deaf Eddie]

It was explained to me that, once you cut across the grain for ANY rout, any subsequent cuts will have zip influence on the tone. A swimming pool rout sounds the same as a single pickup rout.

[Bob V]

I would be willing to agree with Eddie. I've said it before, but my favorite Strat is a '97 Roadhouse with a swimming pool rout - and nobody's drowned yet. However, there is an intageable value to having your guitar made the same way as your guitar hero's vintage axes were made. Maybe iit's the concern that all things add up and you don't want to take chances with the details, or it happens to be that you can hear the difference in tone, it doesn't matter. It's your preference and that's valid. So, if you would never consider putting a humbucker on a Strat then stay with S-S-S routing. If it's a possibility, then S-S-H. If you're a complete heretic, then H-S-H. If you want room for active electronics and a battery for a light show onboard, then swimming-pool is your bag.

As far as weight is concerned, the variance in weight between two different wood blanks is going to far exceed the difference from the routing patterns. Don't try to quantify it - just note whether the guitars that turn you on happen to be light or heavy, and stick with that.

[brad347]

It was explained to me that, once you cut across the grain for ANY rout, any subsequent cuts will have zip influence on the tone. A swimming pool rout sounds the same as a single pickup rout.

That sounds like a conclusion that comes from thinking and not from listening.

Not saying you're wrong, or right, just that intellectualizing what something 'should' sound like doesn't always give us the right conclusion. :AOK

[ChrisGS]

I had Warmoth lightwieght alder s-s-s route body that I routed-out to a bathtub route after hearing a friend's Strat that had a bathtub route... I thought that my friend's guitar had sort-of a hollow-body tone. When I did mine, it didn't really impress me(but, there was a difference to the sound), so I routed-out all of the wood that I could underneath the area of the pickguard, at that point the guitar sounded like a Banjo.

I figured that I went to far , and tried to fix it by filling up most of the area with Bondo, and at that point it sounded like a Heavy Banjo