Pimp My Tele - I'm all ears...

PonchoGreg

Hey all

Back from a weekend at my parents', where I stumbled upon this:

https://imgur.com/a/rAjGu

The first guitar I ever gigged! 2004 Affinity Tele, which as far as I can remember played and sounded much better than it had any right to do.

It's in a bit of a state obviously as it was stripped of its pickups and left unstringed in a bag for about 8 years. Oh, and in my teenage wisdom I had attacked the gloss finish with rough sandpaper and reliced it... Not proud of that one but it actually doesn't look completely shit. 

Thought it was a shame to leave it there so took it back as a project.

Now as a matter of course I'll clean up the neck, polish the manky frets and do a decent setup. I'll also go over the body again with finer sandpaper to get a more uniform satin finish.

But what to do with the electronics? A few options:

- standard Tele pickups, set up in standard tuning. Could do, but I already have a much nicer blackguard Tele so pretty redundant. Could always sell it afterwards I guess.

- standard Tele pickups but set it up in open G and finally get stuck in Stones stuff and slide.

- Esquire it, with a raunchy P90ish bridge pickup (I think axesrus do one of these) and a new scratch plate. Hmmmm...

- go nuts. At the moment the guitar my arsenal lacks is a rock/metal monster. So go the Esquire route but with a super hot humbucker in Tele bridge format. Again I think axesrus do one of these.

A few constraints: has to be a toploader bridge as the guitar is not drilled for string through, has to be cheap as I really don't want to spend more than £100 on it, especially if end up selling it.

So... What would you do with this??

Cheers guys

Alegree

I'd go nuts with a set of my Hurricane Tele pickups - that'd also hit the raunchy P90 bridge thing.

PonchoGreg

oh yes that does look good - duly noted

professorben

https://imgur.com/gallery/XEfb7


Its an option. 

RMJ

Mojo 4 way switch / harness
Bigsby

digitalkettle

A friend o' mine recently upgraded a mid range tele with Amalfitano pickups and RS Guitarworks controls/wiring...sounds awesome now.

While you're at it, fuck that six saddle bridge off too

digitalkettle

RMJ said:

Mojo 4 way switch / harness
Bigsby

I've got a HSS strat with Mojos...lovely!

DulcetJones

I have that exact guitar, still stock, same color finish and pick  guard,.  It's my main gigging guitar even though I have a Les Paul and a few other guitars that are higher monetary value.  So, I would suggest putting it back into stock condition, top load bridge and all.  As you said, it sounded better than it had a right to,  I bought mine new about 12 years ago.

Funkfingers

PonchoGreg said:

Esquire it

This.

Concentrate on one good pickup for now.

A dual coil T replacement pickup could be wired up to a three-way lever selector switch to offer series/single/parallel interconnection of the coils.

Alternatively, leave the pickup in full output mode. Wire the selector switch for volume only/Vol+Tone/Eldred.

Somebody on this board makes a dual output Broadcaster style single coil pickup. Full/tapped/Eldred

stimpsonslostson

The best thing about modding a Tele is that it's so easy & totally reversible. 

Mine started out much like yours, then...
I stripped the poly & oil finished the body.
Replaced the bridge with a brass saddled ashtray one. 
Upgraded the tuners. 
Cut my own Esquire guard from an LP
Installed an OilCity Esquire harness & alligator 90 pickup. 
Then I set it up & played the hell out of it! 

Esquire: https://imgur.com/a/gXdfg

Total spend was under £150 including the pickup & harness. 

PonchoGreg

Cheers for the ideas guys. Looking at options along all these lines. Anyone has good experiences with t-style humbuckers? Seem to be less common than strat ones, although apparently dimarzio have a few

Funkfingers

Duncan Li'l '59, Hot Rails, Custom Shop Stack, Pearly Gates for Tele. Each good in its own way.

SCMIV

just an idea, but if you're going for a stones tele sound, I'd recommend the guy that makes Cavalier pickups; I had a Nashville Lion (his bridge PU) in a Squier CV that was wonderful, and did that thing down to a tee...

professorben

PonchoGreg said:

Cheers for the ideas guys. Looking at options along all these lines. Anyone has good experiences with t-style humbuckers? Seem to be less common than strat ones, although apparently dimarzio have a few

I can totally recommend the Tone Zone for Tele it's a brilliant pickup in that it stops your guitar sounding like a telecaster in any way, shape or form. 

I liked that.

The series/parallel option on a push pot brings a 'little' snap back, but make no mistake it's a full bucker tone. 

paulnb57

I have an Esquire with a Creamery Tele size P90 at the bridge
Another with a Creamery Red 79 at the bridge and a Tele size P90 at the neck
And another Esquire with a MOJO Lap Steel pickup and Wilkinson half bridge, Eldred wired which is awesome tuned open G
All are great in their own way as a different take on the Tele, they are such wonderfully simple modding platforms

Jack_

professorben

paulnb57 said:

All are great in their own way as a different take on the Tele, they are such woefully equipped  simple modding platforms

Ftfy

paulnb57

professorben said:

paulnb57 said:

All are great in their own way as a different take on the Tele, they are such woefully equipped  simple modding platforms

Ftfy

Have to disagree prof @professorben the Tele is like the Land Rover Defender of the guitar world, sure it has compromises, but is classic and just gets on with the job.....

adamm82

I have a squier tele laying around in bad shape set up wise and the pick up switch is knackered so this thread is great. don't want to spend much on it. any recommendations for cheap pick ups that would be better than the stock ones that came with it?

PonchoGreg

Depends on your definition of cheap, but for £100 and provided you want vintage then the cirrostratus set from Alegree is awesome. If you fancy something less traditional I'm sure he (or Ash from Oil City) can help you out

adamm82

not sure what I want to spend really. I want to get it checked out as I've tried to set it up but not sure if the truss rod is working. was also seeing if i could find a different top loading bridge that would fit it. i tried to set it up but i've made it worse. don't want to put too much into it as i could get a mim tele for cheap