Who is modding a Tele? Chime in

[zuzu]

I am. Two, in fact. Both blondes...one is going to look sharp with a vintage tortoiseshell pick guard, with the other I am torn between "aged" white, and black, they both look sweet.

One is an Indonesian made Squier Standard Tele with a really nice neck and surprisingly genuine sounding Tele bridge pickup. The neck pickup is...well...junk. No worries, I have a gold foil pickup from a mid sixties Harmony going in the neck position. A nice playing very stable guitar but it weighs nearly as much as my banjo! Heaviest Tele I've had my hands on.

The other is a Cozart twelve string Tele, or came that way, I've got a maple fretboard Warmouth six string neck I've had laying around for years that fits the pocket quite nicely. All the electronics on that one have to go, "have not the patience to ignore all that."

What flavor of Telecaster are you concocting?

[Andyfreddy]

I may be in your boat soon.

After 23 years playing acoustic guitar, and occasional Bass, I just bought a Squire affinity Telecaster. (Natural color).

I’m getting ready to take a deep dive into setup and refiing: file fret ends, round over fingerboard, set action, install shielding on cavities and pick guard, check all connections and solder as necessar…

After that. I may decide to wire the pickups in series so the middle position bucks some him…I’m not sure yet about pickups, I need to play around more with the ones it has to see what I like and don’t like.

And oh yeah, I need to learn how to play electric guitar…

[GCWaters]

Squier Classic Vibe Custom Tele: New wiring harness, four way switch, compensated brass saddles (still just 3), and Fender Pure Vintage '64 pickups....great guitar!

[rokdog49]

2022 Squier 50’s Custom Vibe.
Cavalier “Holy Grail No-Caster in the bridge and Rumplestiltskin “Strat” in the neck. Boom!

[zuzu]

The above mentioned Squier Standard has a 4 way installed, which I don't care for though I do wire series. After posting above I popped off the control plate and yuup...it is total amateur hour in there. Evidently whoever did that install came from the "bigger the blob the better the job" and "can we fry the pot?" school of soldering. We shall endeavor to persevere.

[MCDEMO1]

I'm modding an older Larrivee Bakersfield Tele-style with a swamp ash body in Shoreline Gold.

It came with a Seymour Duncan JB humbucker at the bridge and the typical Tele neck pickup, but Larrivee routed the neck position to also take a humbucker. The two previous owners had both intended to go the Tele-Gib two humbucker route, but never got around to it. I have put off doing it for a while too.

I bought the guitar from AGF member Blue Wyatt (RIP, Bat) who had the instrument plekked and setup by Glaser in Nashville. Rosewood fingerboard with good sized frets, a 12" to 16" compound radius and 1-3/4" nut - all features I like. The original hardware is Callaham. Thomastik-Infeld jazz flat strings had been installed just before I purchased the guitar. They are expensive, but sound and play great.

It took a while to modify the original bakelite pickguard correctly without cracking it.
Replaced the bridge pickup with a JB Trembucker so that the string positions each line up perfectly with the poles on the pickup. A SD Jazz humbucker is going in the neck position and both pickups will get the SD Triple Shot rings.

Very good looking guitar overall. The only two things I do not care for are the access position for truss rod adjustment and the over-sized "Larrivee" decal on the headstock.

[printer2]

Will have to decide if I want to refinish the body. Did a arm bevel and belly cut but did not have the same finish to put on the bare surfaces.

[Matthew Sarad]

I prefer Rosewood over Maple or Pau Ferro for the neck.
I swapped out Rosewood for two of my Teles.
The MIM came with Noiseless Fender pickups.
Replace with HarmonicDesign Vintage Plus pickups.
https://www.harmonicdesign.net/allpages/teles.html

[amcase]

Started with a classic vibe 50's tele and realized I had replaced every single part except the body.. So I bought a new body and now have two guitars haha.

This is the leftover partscaster with the following upgraded components:
- Bootstrap Palo Duro pickups
- Guitar Fetish XGP Vintage Cream body
- Sam's Guitar Shop (ebay) neck with bone nut
- Fender vintage tuners
- Music City Bridge 3 string tree
- Gotoh compensated brass saddles
- Philadelphia Luthier control plate with volume knob shifted 3/8" away from switch
- Treble Bleed Circuit
- Electrosocket jack

http://imgur.com/Ws4GJTi

[rockabilly69]

Tele Deluxe with Dimarzio PAF in the neck, and Super Distortion in the bridge. I gutted the electronics and replaced with all high quality switchcraft and CTS pots, and the bridge volume pot is push pull for a coil split on the Super Distortion.



Esquire with Fender American Professional neck and locking tuners, body is light-weight poplar from Guitar Fetish, Cavalier Hot Lion pickup, Oak Grigsby 3-way switch, CTS 250K close tolerance pots, Mallory .0047uf cap (cocked wah position), SOZO .022uf cap (normal position), Gavitt push back cloth wire, and a Switchcraft output jack. All hardware and plates are Fender except neck plate which is custom. Pickguard was done by Greasy Groove.




This was a parts Tele that was gift from a friend. It originally came with a black double bound body, but that thing weighed a ton, so I swapped it for a purple light-weight Pauwlonia body. Neck pickup is a Gabojo MR2000 Dearmond style, and bridge pickup is a hot broadcaster from Onamac. This one has a reverse headstock neck (I don't know the brand, but my buddy put RATIO tuners on it which are great). The rest of the parts my buddy sourced so I don't know what they are.





Fiesta Red parts Tele. The neck is a Fender Custom Shop painted headstock model (Fiesta Red) with Kluson style tuners, Wolfetone Tele pickups (Cub neck and B*tch bridge), Halon Tele bridge, CTS Pots, SOZO and Mallory caps, custom neck plate. Body is a Fendera Vintera.

[DanR]

I have what started out as a '73 Telecaster. I paid $350 for it in 1985. Back then, I had the body routed for a mini humbucker and painted it turquoise. The bridge pickup was very microphonic so I replaced it with a Duncan '54 Tele pickup. Soon I needed to replace the neck. After about 25 years, I was tired or the turquoise and stripped it down to bare wood and applied a clearcoat over that. I also replaced the knobs and switch tip.

[Beachrunner]

My 2013 MIM Fender FSR Special Edition Deluxe Ash Tele, Butterscotch Blonde -

Replaced the stock ceramic pickups (which actually weren't that bad) with a Seymour Duncan '59 humbucker in the neck, and a Seymour Duncan Five-Two in the bridge.

[FrankHudson]

I've got a project I've been putting off since earlier in the year. I have a MIJ Fender '50s style Tele with a nice light body and great sound from whatever pickups were put in before I bought it used for a great price more than a decade ago.

The problem is that it came with tiny vintage frets, and years of playing have made them too low. I've got a couple of necks with more modern frets that I'm willing to try, but I need to put tuners on those necks. I even bought a set of modern Fender locking tuners on sale this spring, but I'll need to drill the little locator holes for them. I have a useful StewMac jig for that, stored somewhere around my workbench. I need to dig that out and get to it one of these days.

[Wardo]

I have a 70th Ann Broadcaster. Great guitar, I would not change anything on it.

[GoPappy]

I expected to see Chickee (Frank) post in this thread, and that made me realize that he hasn't been around in a while. Has anybody heard from him? Hope all is ok.