FINISHED: Plywood Telecaster rebuild. First guitar.

Asomodai

Hello gents. 



(My bedroom circa 2002 with the Vintage Black tele top right)







My first guitar bought for me nearly 20 years ago is a JHS VIntage Telecaster with a "Composite" body, which was of course Plywood but with a glue substance covering the top layer. 

This used to be gloss black, I put a SD Hot Rails into it with a split coil and was essentially my "Metal tele". Vain me also wire wooled out the Vintage Decal. 

The body is not quite full thickness, it is drilled for toploading only. 

A few years later an ill-fated attempt at refinishing it Green made me ditch it in the loft for sometime, the hardware went on a walkabout somewhere. 

I stripped off the green paint, with a hot air gun, which actually stripped the top layer of glue from the ply so I am left with this pure ply body you see here. Some burn marks, but I can probably sand those out if I decide to do a wood finish.



I need to get some fret files/crowning tools to sort out some death grip lower fret rash on the D and B strings 







So what should I do next? Thinking of high level design, I am unsure what will work well with a plywood body. Should I aim for standard Tele sound or go for very characterful pups that do not really care what wood the body is made from? I am not really confident doing any routing or major woodwork. For that reason I may need to stick with the toploader design. I am not really interesting in spending mega money either. So strictly budget name brand stuff (Wilkinson, Warman, Tone rider etc).

Thinking maybe using some wood stain or dye. Otherwise I was thinking spraying it platinum grey and go with black hardware and scratchplate. 

Basically I am looking for some inspiration in terms of finish and sound to aim for considering the cheap ply body. 

What say you?

Winny_Pooh

Use grainfiller, prep nicely and do whatever you like.

I'd personally do a matching colour headstock and a half bridge (https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Wilkinson-WTBS-Bridge-Compensated-Brass-Saddles-to-fit-Telecaster-/142382026634?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l6249&mkrid=710-127635-2958-0)

With your existing SD rails pickup. 

ThePrettyDamned

Alegree old timer pickups look like good value, comparable price to wilkinson - probably very similar in construction but spec is different.

Looks like a fun project! 

Roland

Nice project guitar, and an opportunity to do some fret levelling. I wouldn’t worry about the body being ply. It’s not going to have a significant effect on the sound. Normally I’d go for visible wood grain, but looking at the pictures I think this one would benefit from a paint finish. Maybe silver or gold?

steamabacus

How about a car 'wrap' like this project from a few years ago?

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/33483/hb-modding-challenge-te-30-tele/p1

Funkfingers

Laminate often lends itself to humongous slide guitar tones.

andy_k

IMHO, sentimental value, do a dark burst,or nice solid colour, either hide the ply, or allow it to show- it is what it is.
The neck is what you are used to, make it play well, set it up well, you are never going to get good pickups to sound their best in it, but that is not to say it can't sound good.
Enjoy it for what it has given you, personally, I have ply bodied things that have no value to me, and wouldn't waste money on making them playable, maybe something to put on a wall, but if it was my first guitar that had many hours on it, different story.
It is never going to sound like a light ash bodied tele, but that is not to say it can't make music.
Hide the ply, only you will know, or let it show, it has a story.

Asomodai

Cheers for all of the advice folks. I reckon I am going to do a hot single coil build built for Drop C/C Standard for some aggressive heavy hardcore.

I decided to go with the Half Tele bridge that was suggested by @Winny_Pooh ;;;;;

This is what I have bought so far. 

Grain filler
Cheapo Fret file kit
Wilkinson half tele bridge in Black
Black neck plate and screws
Black Control Plate
Black knobs, switch tip, Jack plate. 
Two black roller string trees. 
Black 3 ply scratchplate.

I think I want to go for a hot Single coil, what is similar but cheaper to an alnico SD quarter pounder? 

Still need machine heads, pickups and pots. 

Still not 100% what I want to do finish wise though I am not interested in the wrap idea. I might just go with a pure black design. Or maybe some sort of grey with black hardware. Any tips on how to use grain filler? Never used the stuff and bought sight unseen! 

prowla

You may find it sounds good - I have an old Audition plywood guitar which is awful to play but does sound nice.

tanihhiavlt

The Ibanez EX-170 I used to have was plywood. It meant the horns could be narrower - Plywood is strong... but heavy. 

Personally I'd plane 6mm off the back and chamber it. Humbucker in the neck, then create a backplate from wood. 

Funkfingers

Asomodai said:

I want to go for a hot Single coil, what is similar but cheaper to an alnico SD quarter pound?

DiMarzio Chopper T. Raunchy in series mode. Twangy enough in partial (AKA tuned) coil split mode.

Asomodai said:

Still not 100% what I want to do finish wise

Might be less work just to buy a solid wood body from BooBoo Guitars. They offer several variants including Deluxe, Custom, Cabronita, HH and offset Telemaster. 

Coupla coats of gun stock oil. Job done.

Asomodai

Funkfingers said:

Asomodai said:

I want to go for a hot Single coil, what is similar but cheaper to an alnico SD quarter pound?

DiMarzio Chopper T. Raunchy in series mode. Twangy enough in partial (AKA tuned) coil split mode.

Asomodai said:

Still not 100% what I want to do finish wise

Might be less work just to buy a solid wood body from BooBoo Guitars. They offer several variants including Deluxe, Custom, Cabronita, HH and offset Telemaster. 

Coupla coats of gun stock oil. Job done.

Hoping for something much cheaper then the Dimarzio. 

Id rather stick the original body. It's my first guitar so I want to make it work! 

Asomodai

So I did some fine sanding, sadly the Plywood is super cheap and starts flaking off as soon as it gets a bit thin, which means a decent smooth finish is impossible to do an oil or dye finish. 






So had to get some grain filler (Never used the stuff before), mixed in with some white spirit to fill in some of the gaps. 






Just done the top and sides. It is getting there. I will do another careful fine sand after, but as I mentioned. The plywood is incredibly brittle so achieving a super smooth finish just isn't in the realms of possibility. 

steamabacus

How about a textured paint finish like on the Musicman SUB basses? Should cover all manner of defects in the ply.

Asomodai

steamabacus said:

How about a textured paint finish like on the Musicman SUB basses? Should cover all manner of defects in the ply.

Not a fan of textured finishes. Maybe something with some subtle sparkle to take away from the potential roughness? Something like British Racing Green with sparkle. 

Asomodai

Just grabbed some spray stuff. Will need to have another go with the grain filler due to shrinkage.

Standard Primer
Crackle finish spray paint in Green Patina
Acrylic Spray finish. 

Asomodai

So I had to do another round of grain filler, sadly it seems removing the glue substance has started the thin plywood top layer to crack on the back and front so had to tidy that up and hope it won't continue to crack after refinishing.

The first 4 coats of Primer have gone on. I ordered some Black Noir spray paint to use and then spray the crackle on. Some of the hardware I have ordered has come through as well. Sadly the black pickguard is so "On-spec" It has no chance of fitting on my "Off-Spec" tele body as it physically overlaps the bottom cut of the body. But have decided to just respray the existing guard instead. 





I need to drill a hole below the new bridge for the earth wire. 

Just did my first ever full fret level and dress to remove the beginners death grip fretwear on the B and G strings. Even with Masking tape and all the precautions I managed to mark the fingerboard a fair bit, but I don't mind so much! Polished off with some fine steel wool. Pretty chuffed with the job actually. Hope it all works out when strung up!

Asomodai

Managed to get a coat of primer on the headstock and Scratchplate before it started tipping it down. It's a nightmare to paint anything in this weather! At least each coat gets nice and dry. 

Asomodai

Here's the progress with the Noir Black. Finished all the coats. You can see how bad the Plywood is still! It is also cracking in more places. Shame I didn't think to recoat with PVA glue before I started the primer. Now on the 4th or 5th coat. 

Asomodai

So the crackle has been applied and a number of things have happened that didn't come up during my cardboard test. 

Lesson 1: Don't use white primer if the base colour is black, the crackle effect bores right down through to the primer so my crackle is pretty much white and a little bit of black. 

Lesson 2: The headstock came out better then the body with bigger crackle because the base coat is much thicker. The body looks more reliced then anything due to the thinner coats

So much to learn for next time but I reckon I can do this quite well on another project!





Still drying, I started spraying the black guard with Acrylic finish. 

Asomodai

Dried a bit better now.