Pulling bushings out of a Deluxe Strat

OK, I did it. I couldn't wait any longer. I pulled those damn bushings out of the body. I had promised my 12 year-old nephew that I wouldn't do anything without him there, cos he's a budding guitar player and wants to watch me build this mahogany strat from the parts I have assembled. I just couldn't wait!
By the way, I looked everywhere for a real bushing puller. No place in the GTA appears to have anything similar. I had some challenges with making one, per this post, so I thought I would shop around, call around, ask around ...nothing. I was describing the device to my 76-year-old dad, that took quite a while, but he kept asking questions. Well, whaddayaknow, he shows up at my house the next day with one that he made in a half our in his garage, based on what I described! He had never seen one before. Here is his.


Holy crap! Wow, I am impressed, Dad! I added the lock nut, but the rest was all his. Look at this one for $35 USD at StewMac. The biggest difference is that my dad used a piece of aluminum railing instead of steel tubing to make the slotted box.

All I did was add a washer around the nut/pivot screw to pull it out. I couldn't wait any longer to see if it would work, so I laid a cloth on the guitar to protect the finish, and a large washer under the bushing puller to distribute the force across a wider area. Bingo, the bushings came right out. But there was a minor accident...

I'm a little embarassed. The guitar finish is far from ruined, but the finish is visibly marred around the top bushing and mildly marked around the lower bushing. Here's what happened: Fender installed the bushings before finishing the guitar, and some stain/clear coat covered the edges of the bushing. I didn't check what was happening before it was too late. I ovviously did the upper bushing first, then I used a sharp knife to scrape away as much of the finish around the lower bushing before pulling it. Oh well...a victim of my own impatience...

So, the next step is to put the Wilkinson bushings in place of the ex-Fender bushings. Easy enough!
Well, yet again, the AllParts claim as a drop-in Wilkinson VS100 is bogus. The AllParts Wilkinson bushings provided are 1mm wider than the Fender bushings, so I have to (ever so slightly) enlarge the holes. I will never purchase AllParts products ever again! I'll put the bushings in and move on to the next step...