Fighting my Strat

Hello everyone,
Well I just got my 1st strat afew days ago,I bought it off a co-worker who's son lost intrest and moved on,it is a 60th ann mex strat,silver with a maple neck and tex-mex pickups,I liked the neck on this one because it seemed fatter than others i have played.
I'am trying to set her up,I screwed the bridge down flat to the body,there's five springs on the back also, strung her with 11's and set the neck relief and action the way I like it and started to intonate. I can get the harmonic 12th fret and fretted 12th fret to match on my tuner but when I check other notes around the fretboard there flat, example is the harmonic low e and the fretted low e on the 12 fret are right on ,but if i fret the low e at the 5th fret the A note is flat, I have been fighting with it all night long,does anyone know what I'am doing wrong ,I have read that there is no way you can get perfect intonation on the guitar ,but mine is way out of wack.
Another issue is the pickups are down flush with the pickguard and the D&G strings are louder than the others and I think it is because of the staggerd pole's on the tex-mex pickups,how do you adjust that? I have read some have took a file to the middle poles I realy dont want to do that if I dont have to.
Anyway if I can sole these two problems I think I will have a pretty good strat. so if any of you guys or gals who have alot more experience in this than me give me some advice or things to look at or try.
Thanks
Eno

If you are tuned and the action is not too high or low and the neck relief is appropriate, then if the 12th fret and the 12th fret harmonic are OK, that is as good as it gets. If the frets from the nut to the 5th fret are way off (sharp), you need to have the nut adjusted. Otherwise, if the rest of the neck is plus or minus within a handful of cents, that is the way the physics of the instrument work out.

Do not file the pole pieces. You will never get the filings out of the pickup.

it's a fight between the saddle height, intonation screws, bridge angle, and string size.:mrgreen: this might help (http://www.fender.com/support/stratocaster.php) other wise seek a luthier, or wait till someone that knows more than me, comes through.:mrgreen: oh and i hate the way my mim sounds with the bridge flat.:oops:

First of all, does the guitar sound like it's in tune when you play it?

Do you have the guitar lying on a table with a neck rest holding the neck up?

If so, there's a good possibility that the pressure applied to fret the note is bending the neck slightly and causing the note to go flat.

Another possibility is, DR Strings. Are you using DR's? They're great strings but I have had several intonation issues with them lately where my guitars just wouldn't tune right. Changed the strings to a different brand and see if that helps.

Lastly, if those two options don't work, it's possible that your nut is too close to the first fret. If you shave it back a little, you may find that the tuning issues are cured.

I find 'vintage staggered' strat pickups annoying. That stagger was for guitars with a 7.25" radius neck and a wound G string.
Modern pickups need staggering to suit modern guitars. My Dimarzio Area '61s are staggered correctly.


Sometimes you can just press the magnets down to adjust the staggering. I've done it a number of times successfully...but you can damage or even kill a pickup doing it so I'm not recommending that you do it.
If you aren't fussed by the pickups as they are now (I didn't think much of the TexMex set) you can get a different set and try to sell the TexMex's, or you can have a go and hope it works. But you could wreck them and then have to buy new pickups so I'm not recommending you do it.

(Just covering my butt in case you decide to try it and bollox your pickups :rolleyes:)