Forgot how much I love Teles, AKA Tele Appreciation Thread

[Chippertheripper]

Last week I got frisky with a router and dremel and dropped a Lollar firebird into the neck of my lil thinline partscaster. I took and paired it with a j-street bridge and it balances outputs pretty splendidly. Custom cut and hack beveled a fresh warmoth pg too.
I have a 24.75 neck coming someday for this to replace the musicraft…just as so it’s a little less stiff, as I’ve been playing quite a bit of 335&p90 sg opposite this.
It’s a ripper, for sure.

[Surfysonic]

Nice job! Looks great!

[Embenny]

bloody love this. how do you find the fluence pickups? I've seen a few videos of them and they sound great (but Greg Koch makes everything sound good).

The short answer is that I love them. They're really bright, but I've never had passive pickups in this Tele (and never will) so I don't know how much is inherent to the guitar vs the pickups. It's a really bright guitar acoustically, much more so than my only other guitar that had Tele pickups, so any A/B I did had the pickups and the guitar itself rolled into one.

Plus, I find it way easier to tame brightness than to make up for a lack thereof. And with noiseless single coils, usually the issue is not being bright or single-coily enough.

Notably, this Tele is my quietest guitar by a wide margin. It's quieter than some of my shielded guitars with humbuckers. It really rejects every type of noise, which is fantastic.

I'm a huge fan of Kinman pickups, and if I was shopping for Tele pickups I'd have a hard time deciding between Kinmans and the Fishman set.

[Surfysonic]

Since it's a non-offset and a Tele, here's my refinished in Krylon Blue Shimmer Glitter Blast rattle can parts build Tele. As usual, far from perfect, but I'm learning as I go (with mistakes aplenty, heh). If it's better moved to the Mods & Project section, thanks in advance.

Body started it's life as a Classic Series Black 60'S Tele before I went all mad-scientist (e.g., modder/tinkerer) on it. It was the guitar I did my first heat-gun stripping effort (black poly finish). It's last refinish was General Finishes Water-Based Milk Paint (Halcyon Blue). It was my first go round with a full Milk Paint refinish job, and it was kind of meh. I did a better job on my TV Jones T90s-installed Cabronita build with General Finishes Water-Based Milk Paint (Blue Moon). Anyhoo, I thought this would be a fun sparkle refin project.

Neck is an All Parts uber chunky C (e.g., baseball bat). I've done some foolish things to it in the past (tried the brown stain trick to give the dots that clay look... Because the stain leaked all over the neck, I ended up sanding the back. For this current effort, I decided to try some Birchwood Casey Truoil Gun Stock Finish on it to give it a smoother feel and slightly darker look. I'm happy with the result.

Not sure where I came across the chromey switch tip, but it works for this build.

After applying the several coats of paint, then a few coats of clear and waiting about a month, I wet sanded the body. Unfortunately, I went a bit too hard on the sanding. If I ever do another sparkle finish, I'll definitley take it slower and lighter with the wet sanding. The back looks worse than the front. Anyhoo, I wiped the body down with alcohol but I guess I half-assed it in the body routes, so I'm afraid there was some glitter dust in them.

Pickups were supposed to be my Fender CS '51 Nocaster set. After putting it all back together, something went wrong with the neck pickup. Either I disengaged a connection somewhere or I encountered a whole new problem. I checked the switch, swapping pickups, etc. but the switch was fine. The other potential problem that caused the pickup failure is it's a strong possibility that some of the dust from the sparkle paint got into the Nocaster neck pickup and killed it (or something).

In my defense (weak as it is) - this stuff gets EVERYWHERE.

After looking everywhere on the CS '51 Nocaster neck pickup, I've decided to set it aside for now and I'm using one of my spare neck pickups from one of my old Squier Paranormal Offset Teles (both now gone). It's actually a very nice neck pickup (disliked the bridge pickup, though). Still using the CS '51 Nocaster bridge pickup, which is pretty powerful compared to the Paranormal Offset Tele neck pickup, but it's alright for now.

Update: Bought another set of the CS '51 Nocaster pickups and swapped out the Squier Paranormal neck (was weaker than the Nocaster bridge pickup anyway). Now experiencing full '51 Nocaster glory. Wonderful pickups. I'll use the new spare '51 Nocaster bridge pickup for another Tele or Offset Tele project in the future.

I decided to move the string tree as I think I got it wrong the first time. I thought I was accurate on my 2nd attempt but was juuust outside, so now i have a new extra hole to fill. 3rd time I got it pretty much right.

It's a fun, solid old partsbuild Tele and it's a keeper for me. No matter how much abuse I've heaped on it.

With flash - special appearance by Winnie, our 13-year old Chow/Corgi with laser beam eyes.







Without flash (sorry for slightly out of focus photos)

[Jtkman]

This is one of my two Tele-style guitars. I bought it years ago thru Craigslist from the gentleman that built it. It's an awesome guitar!

Note: I've never posted a picture here before, so I hope the photo comes out!

[JSett]

I'm a huge fan of Kinman pickups, and if I was shopping for Tele pickups I'd have a hard time deciding between Kinmans and the Fishman set.

i've actually ordered a Kinman AVn-60b for my AO60s Tele. I found a shop selling old stock here in the UK for £89 and grabbed the last one.

[garyptaszek]

Last week I got frisky with a router and dremel and dropped a Lollar firebird into the neck of my lil thinline partscaster. I took and paired it with a j-street bridge and it balances outputs pretty splendidly. Custom cut and hack beveled a fresh warmoth pg too.
I have a 24.75 neck coming someday for this to replace the musicraft…just as so it’s a little less stiff, as I’ve been playing quite a bit of 335&p90 sg opposite this.
It’s a ripper, for sure.

huge fan of this. classy, very classy

[garyptaszek]

Here’s my two. Been playing these both a lot recently.

[JSett]

Here’s my two. Been playing these both a lot recently.

Nice strap

[Chippertheripper]

Last week I got frisky with a router and dremel and dropped a Lollar firebird into the neck of my lil thinline partscaster. I took and paired it with a j-street bridge and it balances outputs pretty splendidly. Custom cut and hack beveled a fresh warmoth pg too.
I have a 24.75 neck coming someday for this to replace the musicraft…just as so it’s a little less stiff, as I’ve been playing quite a bit of 335&p90 sg opposite this.
It’s a ripper, for sure.

huge fan of this. classy, very classy

You might be disappointed to know that I’ve always sorta hate the relic job on this body, so it’s apart, stripped, and turning greener as we go. I’ve tried 2 greens and failed so far, to find the color I want, so the quest goes on. That neck is in, and it is rad. The reddish hue of the ‘hog is gonna pair really nice with the right green once I find it, and the mint pg that’s already been cut and filed to drop on.
Cheers

[garyptaszek]

Here’s my two. Been playing these both a lot recently.

Nice strap

thanks, my bf bought me both these straps

[JSett]

thanks, my bf bought me both these straps

What a wonderful human

[Jtkman]

This is my first Tele-style guitar. It's a 'Tradition' brand that I found at a local music store. It's one of my favorites!

[JSett]

I'm a huge fan of Kinman pickups, and if I was shopping for Tele pickups I'd have a hard time deciding between Kinmans and the Fishman set.

i've actually ordered a Kinman AVn-60b for my AO60s Tele. I found a shop selling old stock here in the UK for £89 and grabbed the last one.

Aaaaannnnd they cancelled my order. Couldn't find it in the warehouse. Bummer.

[Kyon]

Here's my almost a Tele build with a G&L MFD that I've been enjoying