Prince madcat tribute sort of..

jimboflojo

I bought a harley benton prince copy a while back and being quite impressed with it as it was, it ended up becoming a bit of a project.

Compared to the one I had about a year ago, this one was a lot lighter and the neck felt quite a bit slimmer.

Actually, I ended up using the neck on another tele after dressing frets and getting rid of the sticky feeling fake tan finish as 2 things I wasn't keen on with the prince copy was how the horrible tortoise shell pickguard looked and how it sounded plugged in. It played really nicely though.

So this now has a neck from an old squier 51. I polished up the satin finished neck which has made it more glossy, put a graph tech nut on and some vintage style tuners. I've changed the saddles for some steel ones. 

Bought a used loaded fender control plate off ebay which turned out everything on it was more or less faulty. (Lesson in there somewhere) So salvaged the plate and control knobs and had to solder a new harness in there. Used alpha pots in the end and a 4 way switch. 

Got some 57/62 pickups off @funkfingers on here which was really pleased with but could only use the neck pickup as wires were too short to fit the tele. My fault there something I didn't consider. So had to use the original bridge pickup - something I might change in the future.

So for the pickguard I was going to try and cut some perspex sheets to the shape of originals but ended up just painting over them with black enamel paint, then dabbing a bit of gold and silver paint over the top  - more inspired by the celluloid tort shell one than looking anything like it.Quite pleased with how it all turned out though!

Funkfingers

jimboflojo said:

Got some 57/62 pickups off @funkfingers on here which was really pleased with but could only use the neck pickup as wires were too short to fit the tele.

So, for the bridge position, either use the 57/62 middle pickup or extend the conductors on the bridge position unit.

Alternatively, find out whether this is still available.

jimboflojo

Funkfingers said:

jimboflojo said:

Got some 57/62 pickups off @funkfingers on here which was really pleased with but could only use the neck pickup as wires were too short to fit the tele.

So, for the bridge position, either use the 57/62 middle pickup or extend the conductors on the bridge position unit.

Alternatively, find out whether this is still available.

I didn't realise you could extend the conductors - how do you go about it? A connector block and black tape? Both the middle and bridge are too short for the tele unfortunately !

Funkfingers

METHOD 1 - Solder sufficient additional insulated wire to the end of each conductor. Insulate the joints.

METHOD 2 - Carefully desolder the original output conductors from one pickup at the metal eyelets on the fibreboard baseplate. Solder in new insulated wires of sufficient length. (Only attempt this if you are confident about your soldering skills.)

I said either Fender pickup because all three 57/62 units are nominally of the same specification. 

jimboflojo

Thanks a lot! I might give method 1 a try. U the man