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1987 Japanese Telecaster overhaul project

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wolsnahwolsnah Frets: 190
edited October 2017 in Making & Modding
Well after much lurking, I thought I'd venture out of my shell and post up some work I did last year as a bit of a project. Inspired somewhat by the modding threads on here, particularly the buy something cheap from Thomann and turn it into something nice, I fancied an old tele to play about with.

As with many things, plans changed along the way, with me first wanting something cheap as chips, bit of a bargain type thing which after many weeks of research and faffing about on what I'd like and what I'd like to do with it, I settled with my heart which loves Japanese things and ended up with a nice workhorse tele from Rob at Whistable Guitars. He had a number of good guitars available, but I wanted something that didn't look pristine so that I would actually be willing to fettle it. The only downside being that it was twice the budget I'd originally planned, hey ho!

This won't be to everyone's tastes, but it sounds good to my ears, I like the look and more importantly I had great fun doing it, bar one slip up, but more on that later. It's a bit pic heavy, but putting them up in case it's of interest or helps anyone wanting to do something similar. I'm far from a luthier although I am OK with DIY and manual type things so I was cautious and steady and all turned out well for the most part.

This sort of started from me looking at the Reverend Reeves Gabrels signature guitar, which I liked the look of, but couldn't get to see or try one at the time due to my location which seems to alienate me from nearly everything without a lot of travelling. So I decide to change tack and get this tele.

It started life as a 1987 Japanese Telecaster in black, with a rosewood fretboard. Sounded fine, but the project was burning in me so off I started...

Here's how it looked, as you'll see, nothing really to complain about!






So, first things first, time to stick a humbucker in the neck position o
Started with creating a routing template out of MDF


Body stripped down


Then getting it setup in my "workshop". Thankfully, I have a very understanding partner. What with guitars, cars and computers, she lets me get away with a lot, and her common response is "well if you like it, get it!".

Cheap Lidl drill press and my drill that my parents bought me about twenty years ago, fitted with a forstner bit


Made a bit of a hole


Ready for router to smooth things out. This is where I had a minor slip up in that I put a little too much force whilst doing one of the ears which ended up moving the template across a couple of mm. These things happen, and fortunately the pick plate will cover it



Routing complete, doesn't look too bad, even with the slightly wider right hand side





So next was to get the existing paint off. I didn't want to use paint stripper and wisdom on the internet indicated that a bit of heat and a palette knife will take it off with ease. Of course it will...

The front and back came off in chips to reveal a not too nice piece of wood underneath. Too say I was disappointed at this stage would be putting it lightly. It was taking an age to get the paint off and what was underneath made me think I can see why it was painted. Chatting to a woodworking friend, he said it looked like a bit of veneer and after more reading I found that it could well be, just to help the paint take. I was doing about five square inches per evening before getting hacked off and leaving it for the following night.



You can see the sides done in this shot. They came off in nice plastic sheets, of how I wish the rest of it had been the same.



All the paint off!



Back in the "workshop" to see if it is indeed a veneer, or at least to try and make it respectable



Thankfully, it was indeed a veneer and I got through to some nice Japanese ash underneath




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Comments

  • wolsnahwolsnah Frets: 190
    edited October 2017

    For the finish I planned to just bring up the natural wood, so started prepping it for treatment. After much internet reading again, I opted to use Tru-Oil, usually used for gunstocks, but is nice for bringing out the grain and should provide a hard wearing finish. I cut down a piece of spare wood to hold the body via the neck pocket and masked up all the recesses.


    Trial drying location courtesy of being between toy cars in the garage, a new garage door having been fitted a month or so previous, and an Ikea coat hanger.


    On with the oil...



    Once dry after a couple of nights, it was attacked with wire wool, more oil, sandpaper of various grit from about 400 up to about 2500. It's not mirror sheen like a pro, but has a nice satin look to it.

    Much more internet reading later, and some helpful advice from @ICBM I went ahead and painted all the cavities with conductive black paint. I know that a lot of people prefer copper foil, some don't do any shielding, but I thought it'd be nice to give it a nice finish and see how it fares with a faraday cage type setup. I was helped with the idea by a work colleague who suggested an alternative way to complete the circuit between cavity and copper lined pick plate. That idea being a spring, with a washer soldered each end, screwed into the base of the cavity and protruding just above the body profile on the pick plate side. You can also see the finish a bit better here.



    Just poking above.


    Here's the finished electrics, all new bits, some which I distressed over a heated pan of water/vinegar. I'd used 250k pots, and the concensus seems to be 500k pots would have been better, but I prefer my sounds on the darker side. I may swap them out at some point if I ever fancy a bit more brightness. And yes, the dining room table was a mess!


    The finished article




    For the purists amongst you, apologies. There's a DiMarzio DP384-BK Chopper T in the bridge, Railhammer Chisel in the neck which I'd originally wanted black, but could only get silver. I've wired the switch with a 4-way setup with either pickup individually or both together in/out of phase. The switch between the volume and tone is a kill switch.

    Thanks for reading, as a well seasoned lurker, I took a lot of inspiration and admiration from both the amateur and professional luthiers on here. I'm not sure I'd want the pressure or develop the patience to do it full time, hats off to those of you that do. Thanks also to @Bridgehouse for pulling me out of my lurking.

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  • wolsnahwolsnah Frets: 190
    Hopefully the images come out ok for people :) It looks more orange in the bottom picture than in real life, I really need to get to grips with lighting for photographs.
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  • BridgehouseBridgehouse Frets: 24581
    What an epic thread.

    You've done a cracking job there, and I really enjoyed scrolling through there thinking "oh oh, what's he going to do with this??"

    However, the end result is brill. Welcome to the forum - you'll fit in perfectly ;)
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  • paulnb57paulnb57 Frets: 3055
    Great job, turned out really well in a less than ideal "workshop" (No way I could do that!) Thanks for sharing!...
    Stranger from another planet welcome to our hole - Just strap on your guitar and we'll play some rock 'n' roll

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  • Adam_MDAdam_MD Frets: 3420
    Lucky escape with the veneer I thought you were going to have to go with a solid finish for a while. 

    Looks good and that neck pickup looks massive! 
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  • randellarandella Frets: 4221
    edited October 2017
    Interestingly I've a Japanese Strat of roughly the same vintage which has a sunburst and, given you can see the join lines through the finish, there's no veneer.  Unless they've gone to the trouble of using a multi-piece veneer which I would have thought defeats the point entirely.  Why they've used one on your guitar is odd then, as there looks to be some perfectly decent wood underneath *and* it had a solid finish.

    Anyway, looks very nice what you've done.  It's come up a treat.  For my money the humbucker looks better in chrome/nickel too, win-win
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  • SeshSesh Frets: 1847
    Very nice.
    Can't sing, can't dance, can handle a guitar a little.
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  • wolsnahwolsnah Frets: 190
    Thanks all. @randella I've no idea why mine had a veneer. Examples I'd seen online didn't have the veneer either so I'm not sure what was going on with mine. I did find mentioned somewhere that it was done for allowing the pain to take better, but I don't understand why a few seem to have them, but most don't.

    This'll definitely be one of those keepers, something with a bit of me in it, simple understate looks (apart from the massive humbucker at the neck, and a pleasure to play to boot. Strangely, it's no bigger than most humbuckers, maybe it's just down to people being used to seeing the usual thin neck pickup in its place.
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  • DannyPDannyP Frets: 1682
    Nice work! I like the spring-as-ground-connection idea.
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  • BigMonkaBigMonka Frets: 1782
    @wolsnah what an epic thread! The finished guitar looks great :-)
    I've not seen a neck pickup like that before, what does it sound like?
    Always be yourself! Unless you can be Batman, in which case always be Batman.
    My boss told me "dress for the job you want, not the job you have"... now I'm sat in a disciplinary meeting dressed as Batman.
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  • wolsnahwolsnah Frets: 190
    edited October 2017
    @BigMonka I'm probably not the best person to describe how it sounds really. It's full sounding to my ears, but with clarity and a nice even sound. There's a full sort of warmth to them clean, and a crispness distorted but nowhere near as harsh as say an EMG81. For a passive pickup it has a nice strong signal too. It's wired in a four conductor config too, so there are options for how it can be wired up. I did consider having a push pull pot for giving it a split coil option, but the wiring suddenly got very complicated and I decided to keep it simple(r).
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