Found a design fault in the Telecaster!!

crunchman

prowla said:

ICBM said:

Those silent plugs are a pain. Just get a decent normal plug and put the amp on standby/turn volume down/pull the amp end of the cable halfway out before you unplug at the guitar end.

My tuner pedal goes silent when you switch to tune...

Either approach works, but the silent plug is just a moving part waiting to break.

That reminds me that I have nice lead with a dodgy one of those on.  I need to get a normal jack to replace it.

stickyfiddle

I do 2 things to Teles - put a metal Les Paul-style jackplate on them, and fit a custom control plate that moves the volume knobs away from the switch by about 1/4". Both dead simple and make a world of difference.

lysander

FelineGuitars said:

Needs a tummy cat and an arm chamfer, and better top fret access too

And angled headstock > straight

downbytheriver

ICBM said:

Those silent plugs are a pain. Just get a decent normal plug and put the amp on standby/turn volume down/pull the amp end of the cable halfway out before you unplug at the guitar end.

I’ve been using Cleartone cables with silent neutrik plugs for the blues jams we run for several years with absolutely no failures. That’s at least twenty changeovers per jam, three jams a month, for at least five years. Not a pain at all. They are all straight plugs. 

crunchman

downbytheriver said:

ICBM said:

Those silent plugs are a pain. Just get a decent normal plug and put the amp on standby/turn volume down/pull the amp end of the cable halfway out before you unplug at the guitar end.

I’ve been using Cleartone cables with silent neutrik plugs for the blues jams we run for several years with absolutely no failures. That’s at least twenty changeovers per jam, three jams a month, for at least five years. Not a pain at all. They are all straight plugs. 

You have been lucky.  Quit while you are ahead.

MichaelWatts

I can't think of any electric guitar designed mid 20th century that doesn't have its fair share of idiosyncrasies...

Except the flying V. That thing is perfect. 

Roland

A couple of years ago I put together a list of personal Telecaster “design improvements”: forearm and Belly chamfers, individual saddles, reverse the control plate and go vol/tone/switch, 4 or 5 way switch, tapped bridge pickup, non-Tele neck pickup, string block rather than ferrules, zero fret, curve sided neck plate, get rid of the scratch plate, extend the upper bout to improve balance ....

Somewhere along the route it ceased to be a Tele

vasselmeyer

Bucket said:

The big flaw for me is that the control plate is too cramped - changing pickups on the fly is hard and I sometimes end up grabbing the tone control instead of the volume.

I love the shape of Telecasters, but sometimes there are problems that I can't get over. One of them is the selector which which is just WRONG. @SteveRobinson built this one for me and he used a John5 control plate and put in a toggle on the upper body, in the same place that it is on a Les Paul. I know, which two P90s, that this isn't actually a true Telecaster, but it works for me and has been gigged pretty hard over the past few years.

UnclePsychosis

@vasselmeyer  ;I'd probably have gone for a different finish but thats pretty much my dream telecaster right there. Nice!!

octatonic

I always put Gibson style jack plates on my Tele's unless they are expensive things that would be devalued by doing so.

My current favourite Tele addresses the control location issues, enough for me:

vasselmeyer

For me, Telecasters have to be blonde with a black scratchplate. Nothing else is right

The finish is a thin nitro, and has aged very nicely. I think Steve built this for me in 2013, so this is seven years of being gigged once a week.

crunchman

I've got bored with blonde Teles.  Give me black or sunburst any day, or Lake Placid Blue with rosewood board.

Voxman

ICBM said:

I prefer them without any body shaping - I actually find them more comfortable without, and they feel more like an acoustic.

The big flaw for me is what Bucket said - the position of the switch and volume control makes it nearly impossible to move the switch from the bridge to either of the other positions quickly and without knocking the volume. I also tend to hit the switch accidentally a lot - but reversing the plate is worse, it doesn’t solve the first problem (in fact it’s worse since it’s now going *to* the bridge quickly which is hard) and it puts the volume control right in the way.

So my favourite Tele is an Esquire with the switch removed. But then I miss the neck pickup...

Of course this was fixed on the 70s custom and deluxe models where a traditional 3 way toggle was fitted. And it fixed the other design fault of the Tele...individual pick up tone and volume controls for better control. I do like the option to roll off the volume on one pick up and then switch that fast with a full throttle cranked tone.

RaymondLin

Question- what tool do I need to tighten the bolt on the jack? 

ICBM

Voxman said:

Of course this was fixed on the 70s custom and deluxe models where a traditional 3 way toggle was fitted. And it fixed the other design fault of the Tele...individual pick up tone and volume controls for better control. I do like the option to roll off the volume on one pick up and then switch that fast with a full throttle cranked tone.

Not for me - I much prefer the simplicity of one volume, one tone. I just roll the volume up full when I want that.

The Tele Thinline has it nearly right, but they somehow missed a golden opportunity - with the much larger cavity below the pickguard - of moving the tone control further down towards the end of the guard, the volume down just a little, and having the switch at a more Strat-like angle, a bit like that Tele plate WezV posted above. Having the switch in line with the volume pot is just... doh!

SteveRobinson

RaymondLin said:

Question- what tool do I need to tighten the bolt on the jack? 

A half inch socket driver, assuming it's not the retainer inside that's loose.

Quite often rotation of the retainer has chewed up the wood meaning it can no longer grip. The solution then is a Les Paul style plate or preferably an Electrosocket.

RaymondLin

SteveRobinson said:

RaymondLin said:

Question- what tool do I need to tighten the bolt on the jack? 

A half inch socket driver, assuming it's not the retainer inside that's loose.

Quite often rotation of the retainer has chewed up the wood meaning it can no longer grip. The solution then is a Les Paul style plate or preferably an Electrosocket.

It's the hexagon bolt here, I cam turn it and mildly tighten it with my nail but not enough for it to stay in place for very long.

ICBM

The answer is always Electrosocket.

The stock Tele jack cup is a bodge that should have been corrected at least fifty years ago. It *can* work properly, if you get the metal piece bent just-right to begin with, it flattens into the wood correctly, and you can hold it all in place without it spinning and chewing up the wood while you tighten up the nut *really tight* with a socket - in short, it works reasonably well once, when done at the factory. It's very hard to make it work properly again when the nut has slipped, the plate has bent, the wood it's supposed to grip is worn, or a combination of any of those...

One of the very few truly *bad* (not just down to personal preference) bits of design on a Fender instrument, and astounding that neither Leo nor anyone else came up with something better in all the time before the Electrosocket was invented.

SteveRobinson

You need the half inch socket driver then.

SteveRobinson

ICBM said:

One of the very few truly *bad* (not just down to personal preference) bits of design on a Fender instrument, and astounding that neither Leo nor anyone else came up with something better in all the time before the Electrosocket was invented.

This was his second attempt too. Up until 53 the cup was a knurled affair which was pressed/hammered into the hole.