Gear Hunter

Fender SRS HSS US Strat

Description

2005 Fender American SRS Stratcaster with HSS pickup configuration and S1 switching.

Apart from a couple very minor blemishes, this guitar is in excellent condition with factory hang tags still in the case.

What does an S-1 switch do on Fender instruments equipped with it?

The short answer is that it gives you more tonal options by offering extra pickup-wiring configurations. Further, S-1 switching does this without significantly altering the appearance of an instrument, because it’s a “push” switch built into a single volume or tone control knob. Consequently, instruments with S-1 switching don’t look notably different than instruments without it.

The tricky thing about explaining S-1 switching is that it does different things on different instruments. That’s sensible enough, since different instruments have different pickups, different pickup configurations and different wiring schemes. S-1 switching on a Telecaster, for example, must be different from S-1 switching on a Stratocaster.

Not only that, but S-1 switching can vary from model to model within the same instrument type. S-1 switching on an American Elite Telecaster, for example, differs sharply from S-1 switching on a Classic Player Baja Telecaster. More on all this shortly.

And not only does S-1 switching do different things on different instruments, but it has done different things at different times. That is, it doesn’t necessarily do the same things today that it did several years ago. S-1 switching has been around quite a while, after all—it first appeared in summer 2003 and was offered on several Fender instruments throughout that decade; even on some Precision Bass and Jazz Bass models.