I have one at home and yes you definitely can

The non fine's got more range upwards and downwards, while the 510 much more like a strat bridge with a fr functionality but with less range

Very welcome!

Thank you!

Yeah, it's a remarkable line.

Christian, thank you so much. I believe they are using the same Duncan pickups in the USA DK models, correct? I'm surprised. I leaned towards Duncan pickups for most of my life, yet I really don't dig these particular ones either. I actually found the single coils were quite lifeless. They lacked the spank I like in single coils specifically. I sold off my DK24s and replaced them with Tom Andersons. Haha. And I am in love with he Anderson pickups. That IS after all what Tom was known for originally back in his Schecter days. I now have 4 Andersons and am so pleased with the entire range. And they're so helpful in helping you pick the right pickups. You can call and speak to Roy or Tom and get all the advice necessary. But having said that, I bought the MIJ Rick Graham Charvel DK24 last spring and I love it. His signature Bareknuckle pickups in it are great. They are powerful but dynamic and articulate. They aren't on the Bareknuckle website, but I bet if you reached out to Bareknuckle, Tim (Mills, the man behind Bareknuckle), could fill you in on whether they could be made available or if he has a similar set in the lineup. My favorite HSS configuration in my own arsenal is my Anderson set: H3 humbucker with 2 VA7.2 single coils. They are voiced like their vintage single coil with more output to balance against the humbucker in the bridge.

@@RandyWillcox Randy, thank you very much. I remember back in the days friends of mine had several Tom Anderson pickups installed in their Schecter or even Tom Anderson Strats. I forgot all about them. Thanks for directing me to them. I‘ll do some more research into Tom Anderson Pickups. I am not familiar with Barenuckle pickups though. I really can’t understand why Charvel are using such bad Seymour Duncan pickups. Best, Christian

@@CC-vf1yl you're very welcome! Yes, definitely check out the Tom Andersons. I don't know why those Duncans are the choice for those models either. I have spoken to several people who feel as we do about them.

Thank you so much!

Yes, I put those on my Charvel Rick Graham and two of my Andersons. (They didn't exist yet when this video was made, either). They are the next best thing to the Charvel bridge. The feel is close too. But I use my trem a lot and even being sure not to overtighten the lock screws on the Wilkinson saddles, the physics of it just causes more frequent string breakage. It's not excessive, but with heavy use, the bridges on the Guthries don't wear at the saddle contact point as quickly.

@@RandyWillcox That’s good to know!

I do like Suhr guitars, but I don't particularly care for the Modern shape. I disagree about the Guthrie models though. I much prefer the Charvels. The necks are glorious to me and I love the MFB pickups. But that stuff is subjective. My main guitars are my Tom Anderson Angels, but the Guthries never disappoint. However, I do find the dk24s, although excellent platforms for modding, definitely require replacing those pickups. I can't believe they're Duncans, let alone that they were chosen to be the stock pickups. I had the opposite issue with my HSS. The neck single coil sounded like someone threw a blanket over the speaker. Woofy and muddy. No sparkle at all. I have the Rick Graham MIJ model and the Bareknuckle pickups in that sound spectacular! I love the spank of the single coils in it. But I had to ditch these dk24s. For the price, they're great for someone who wants to mod them. But with the Guthries, I never picked them up. But if someone pops good pickups in...and has a luthier install stainless steel frets...they'd be monsters. Yeah, I really thought by now those pickups would have been changed. I can't believe they still use them stock.

Yeah, the Mexican plant is making incredible stuff. When I had these, I'd considered keeping them and just refretting with stainless steel frets and swapping out the pickups. As I didn't like the stock Duncans. But because I have the Guthries, I never played them, so it didn't seem viable to invest that much into them. But if these had stainless frets, nobody would need to even try out an Ibanez AZ. When those came out, I was so excited, then I played them at NAMM. I've played them at NAMM every year and they still do nothing for me. They're "fine". "Well-made", even. But the prestige models don't feel like $2000+ guitars. And the premium feel like entry level guitars. The Mexican made Charvel dk models feel way better to me. A couple months ago I got the Rick Graham MIJ model. I love it. It's what I'd have wanted to do to the dk: stainless steel frets and the Bareknuckle pickups in it are stellar.

@@RandyWillcox Not really true is it? There's a ton of guitar players - many of them some of the best in the world playing AZ guitars - if the necks sucked they wouldn't do that. Even if you think well Ibanez, Charvel etc make an offer Guthrie or Tom Quayle can't refuse they're still not going to play something that's bad. A lot of Suhr owners struggle with the idea that Guthrie plays a Charvel now and have to convince themselves the Suhr was better and Guthrie somehow sold out. Here you're doing the same as them. You're deluding yourself a little bit to suggest a guitar is better when you give a long list of things you have to change to the supposedly better one, like changing frets and pickups on top of the other changes you've already done in the video. All you're really saying is someone with an illness to habitually keep buying variations on exactly the same guitar is going pick up a different guitar brand and the neck will feel different to them. The same would be true if you were obsessively buying Ibanez AZ models. The bottom line is : you know SS frets are better. They are on a plethora of guitars now at price points from £600 upwards (e.g Cort G300, Yamaha Revstar standard) as well as all Ibanez AZ - and that makes these guitars less attractive because there is no saving money buy buying one - in a few cases you're paying more. The only real reason, perhaps, is that Fender haven't got the Mexicans the equipment to use SS. Charvel had an opportunity to make the MIJ SS frets - at least then there'd be a few models at a middle price range you could pick. But they didn't, except, again for Guthrie's sig model (which, like the Rick Graham one are vastly overpriced and not that available anyway) So you're left with a guitar brand that there's a big premium to pay for SS frets. Which seems to have made you convinced that SS frets must be considerably more cost to work with but that's simply not true. What is more typical is that guitar techs that buy cheap tools find they're not up to the job to do SS frets. But why would you use a tech that bought cheap tools? With good tools the job is the same. Bear that in mind before you start getting these guitars fretwork done - if the guy is trying to charge you more or complains that they ruin his tools he's a cheapskate - find a better luthier.

Thank you! What do you mean about still having the "Socialite" performance? I do love the Kotzen in some ways. But shortly after I made this video I converted it to all chrome hardware because my sweat eats gold plating and I didn't want it to get ruined. So I installed a Gotoh 510 2 point trem and locking tuners. Swapped all the other hardware over as well. I bought it because I wanted a strat, but I wanted a flatter radius and bigger frets. This has a 12" radius and jumbo frets. I almost had it refretted with stainless steel, but I never did. In the end, I've swapped it all back over to original and listed it on Reverb. It's great, but I never play it. I have 3 Tom Andersons and 2 Charvel Guthrie Govans from the USA custom shop and recently added a Charvel Rick Graham. All have stainless steel frets and the Anderson neck is unbeatable. The neck on the Kotzen is a monster. It's playable, for sure, but not what I'd ever ask for myself. So I decided to order another Anderson that will give me the "Strat" thing I'm looking for but have all the amenities I'm used to that the Kotzen doesn't have. In fact, last week I was in California for NAMM and went to Anderson Guitars the day after they assembled the new guitar and got to play it. I'm stoked. I'll have it in 3-4 weeks. So I've accepted that I don't live in a tax bracket where I can keep the Kotzen simply to satisfy my fanboy sensibility. Haha. I imagine people who love actual fender strats and meaty necks would LOVE the Kotzen. But for me, it became an ornament. Someone else will buy it and give it the love it deserves.

Absolutely. I didn't find them "stratty" enough.

Thank you! If you're referring to the orange guitar I used for the solo and half of the distorted rhythm parts, it's my Tom Anderson Guitarworks Angel.

Thanks.. 🙂

Thank you so much!

Agreed!

😂😂😂

Congrats! Change strings like any other guitar. Since it has locking tuners, I go one at a time. The technique is painfully obvious: loosen the screw that locks the string in the saddle then tighten it when you've replaced the string. If I have to remove all the strings, I use a cloth folded up to wedge under the back of the bridge to keep it from sinking into the body. This is helpful when restringing so you don't have too much string wrapping around the posts of the tuners. That defeats the purpose of locking tuners. Use a lubricant like Big Bends Nut Sauce on the nut slots and STRETCH YOUR STRINGS WELL! Everyone swears they do this, but 99% don't. Then they complain about tuning problems and blame the bridge, or the nut, or the tuners, or the cosmos. As for the tremol-no, it should be set when you get it. If you change string Guage, you have to adjust it like any standard spring claw to get the bridge level. Just MAKE SURE the claw remains perfectly parallel to the trem block. If it isn't, the guide rod will be crooked and create friction. You'll hear it rubbing when you use the bridge. This will make returning to zero impossible and you won't stay in tune. Out of curiosity, what fender did you have with stainless steel frets? To my knowledge, it wasn't until the Luxe strat last year that they FINALLY put stainless steel frets on a production guitar.

@@RandyWillcox thank you very much mate! This will be very helpful and thank you again for having the care to answer me. By the way you play fantastic! Very enjoyable and subbed. 💯❤️

@@RandyWillcox I had a Fender American series Telecaster from 2003. They were called American Series from 2001 Until 2004 if I correctly recall then the name American Standard came. Bought it from a friend that played in a blues band thought perhaps he had it for a fret job. Honestly I though it was a feature… 😅 from American series and he never told. I will do some research to see if I can find anything but I am sure they were stainless steel.

Thank you so much! 🙌🏻❤️

Thank you. Starting at about 4:30 I run down the comparison.

@@RandyWillcox Wow…so the Blue Guthrie is baked basswood, but the only difference on pink DK to the orange is the neck pickup…yet they sounded vastly different to my ears! Still enjoying them? Did you ever try the Ibanez AZ for comparison? Thank you

Thank you! 🙏🏻

It was the opposite for me, but that's the great thing about them being so good. You aren't necessarily sacrificing anything to prefer the dk24s. 🤘🏻

@@RandyWillcox yeah i agree.. the US charvels are expensive but for many... its worth it.

Thank you, I appreciate that! You're most welcome!

Thank you so much! I appreciate that!

Thank you!

Excellent! That whole Charvel line is fantastic!

Haha. Thanks. It's a flametop Guthrie. I just dyed the top blue to have some color on stage. I wanted to order a custom shop Charvel based on it, but Charvel's custom shop is really just a list of options they make available and you choose them from the list. It's not a real "custom" shop. And right now they're saying at least 2 years for their so-called custom builds.

@@RandyWillcox oh I see! Cool! Amazing playing by the way. Looking forward to more uploads! Thanks!

It's a 1 11/16" (1.6875mm) nut that's 3.21mm wide. The height is negligible because you slot it based on the height of the first fret. A standard graphtech tusq blank that fits that slot would work if you're trying to mimic it.

​@@RandyWillcox you forgot to ask whats the weight..hahhahahahha of the nut.height ?weidth??taste??whqt are you asking bro???what do you want in a guitar???

I no longer have the DK24s. They were amazing, but having the two Guthries, I found I never played them. They would be an excellent substitute if I couldn't have the Guthries, but they proved unnecessary. And although I'd have liked an HSS version, even swapping the pickups, I wouldn't likely have used it enough. So I sold them and ordered a shell pink Tom Anderson Guardian Angel Player for my HSS and got an orange Tom Anderson HSH Angel. Heaven! BUT...to answer your question, yes, they set up beautifully! I play VERY lightly! The harder you play, the higher the action has to be for the sake of physics since how hard you pick determines how wide the oscillation of the string gets. So it allows me to get away with as low an action as the fretwork will allow. That's also why I like flatter radiuses. Smaller radiuses mean higher action to clear the upper frets when bending. All of that said, I got the action on the DK24s as low as my Guthries, which is 1/16" (2/32") at the 12th fret measured on both E strings. I adjust my neck so it's perfectly flat when I press the strings at the first and 13th frets, then add JUST enough relief that when I press the strings at those frets, the strings are JUST lifted off the frets. I other words, I was able to get the action as low on the DK24s as I was on the Guthries. For comparison, the Tom Andersons have a 12-14" compound radius, instead of 12-16" on the Charvels, but the fretwork is so incredible, I actually have them set at 3/64" at the 12th fret, (1/64" lower than the Charvels). Sorry for the super nerdy response, but I hope it helps.

@@RandyWillcox Not nerdy at all bro... I'm going to use your analogy of the DK to my luthier and have it set just like the heights you mentioned, thank you so much! Other thing is the setup you had on the dks good for easy legato like Allan Holdsworth?

@@RandyWillcox Also if I get the same setup you had, exact height and all will it work for a 9-42 string gauge?

@@dreamforfreedom I'm so sorry! RU-vid doesn't send notifications to replies for some reason. I know it's probably too late, but yeah, lower action is far better for legato since you're relying on just your left hand for the sound. And the lighter the better with the strings as heavier strings have more mass and move more when struck with the same force. I personally use 9.5-44 so 9s should be absolutely fine.

@@RandyWillcoxOkay thank you!

Thank you. 🙏🏻

Haha! Thank you so much! I'm always glad when someone picks up the King's X tunes. 🤘🏻

@@RandyWillcox first vid - spotted straight up. Transcribed the solo years ago and Ty was quite interested in it. Most underrated band in history… great video - will check out more… x

🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻

Thank you! I appreciate that!

Thank you so much! I'm writing and recording a project now, but I need to produce more music. If you go to the "About" section of my RU-vid channel, there are links. Soundcloud probably has the most material to listen to. Thank you again!

Thank you! Yeah, I needed some color for stage use. Mrs. Smith said my guitars looked like cheese boards from West Elm. And being such a big Tom Anderson fan, I decided a transparent turquoise would be nice. I had the top sanded back and dyed. The original color ended up being too green, so I did it again myself using Angelus leather dye like Big D guitars on RU-vid does.

It turned out great with the lining on the sides. Nice color man!