The Telecaster Plus (Club?)

[bargoedboy]

am i the only one that thinks it looks wrong ? sorry , never a fan of lace sensors or a humbucker in bridge position on a tele, so count me out !

[hollowman]

I had a 97, 3 pickup version. Loved the look, the neck, just could never bond with the lace sensors, so I sold it

[Tele Jr]

It doesn't look like a traditional Telecaster because it's not. It's an alternative Tele and imho one of the most versatile ever. I love how mine looks, in person it's quite the specimen to behold...



AJ, I don't blame you for wanting to add one another, these things were very well made for their day and the quality still holds up vs today's best.

[Fret Wilkes]

I set one of these up for a friend about a year ago and was basically unimpressed ... until I plugged it in! I was very surprised how good it sounded to me. It weighed a ton though.

[AjayTele]

As a side note - the Tele pluses are becoming fairly collectable for those that are interested.

The early ones in particular are pulling pretty large prices for late 80s / early 90s guitars and I' sure that as time goes by, the V2 will also become more sought after. There is a good reason of course, they are absolutely beautiful looking, made and playing guitars.

[Tele Jr]

I'm unaware of any other Fender pieces from a similar historical time period that have appreciated in value like the early Tele Plus's have when they have gone for top dollar at auction.

[Vker]

I also have Tele Plus envy but prices are ^^^. I have a 89-90 Start Plus Deluxe in Crimson Frost and it was my main gigging guitar for years and years. My friends used to call it the "Cadillac Strat." It is One-piece swamp ash and heavy. There are some TelePlus beauties posted on this thread. I was wondering if most, or just some of the TelePlus series have the locking tuner feature. I also really dig how the Tele lace sensors are Chrome.

[AjayTele]

And recently I managed to find a V2 Tele Plus (1997) with a Rosewood neck...

[slackkeytyler]

So from what I can see the price of any kind of Tele Plus is going for at least 1,000 if not more, some as high as $2500? That is insane! Does anyone know what these went for originally?

[tiktok]

Originally Posted by 56strat

I guess they never made a "Tele Ultra"? I wonder why not? I love my Strat Ultra. It's an early one - E9 serial number. I've often lusted after the Telecaster Plus and you guys aren't helping the problem.

The Deluxe Plus was as close as they got--all that was really missing was an ebony fretboard.

This guy thinks he has a Tele Ultra, but it's really a Deluxe Plus where he's swapped the bridge pickup:



There was an "Ultra Telecaster" named design in the early Dan Smith years, for a neck-through Tele with an ebony board, snowflake inlays (!), dual humbuckers and a trem. There were two prototypes, one in koa, the other in walnut, but it never came to fruition.

[gatc]

For those who have the 1st version

How does the red-red dually sound like? It's such a high output, can you actually play clean with it? Where can i find sound clips? I like Jonny Greenwood a lot, but apart from him no one else play with a Tele Plus. I like the bridge concept, where you have true single coil or humbucker sound with the flip of a switch.

[Johnny Isaacs]

I have the first type. I think the red dually pickup sounds best as a humbucker. I never use the coil splitter to make it a single coil. IMHO it is pretty bad. Especially when you compare how it sounds as a humbucker and that amazing blue Lace sensor neck pickup.

Johnny Isaacs

[gatc]

Originally Posted by Johnny Isaacs

I have the first type. I think the red dually pickup sounds best as a humbucker. I never use the coil splitter to make it a single coil. IMHO it is pretty bad. Especially when you compare how it sounds as a humbucker and that amazing blue Lace sensor neck pickup.

Johnny Isaacs

Thanks Johnny.
As a humbucker it must be pretty loud and screamy. Can you actually play clean with it?
I have s strat with a red lace sensor on it and even at moderate gain i have problem getting a clean sound

[Tele Jr]

The original design of the Red Lace pups with the soldered wire on the bottom were capable of better cleans imho. A more organic tone with what would pass as a good hot juicy humbucker clean tone.

The later v2 design variant with the metal bottom plate sounded a little less organic and a little crisper on the top end, probably better for crunch tones than cleans, these are the ones that are clean tone challenged.

I don't think the Red Lace's are all that high output, hot tone yes, high output no vs the blues which are higher output. If the red is not right for you you can always go for another flavor of Lace, I like the blues in the bridge spots myself.

Right now I have Hot Gold 6k 12K in my dually spots and with the dually engaged they sound like a good clean PAF humbucker.

I don't know the exact date of the implementation of the new design, but my '91 still had the v1's in there. My other mid-90's Plus had the v2's.

[gatc]

I wasn't aware there were two versions of the red-red dually.

So... i guess what Lace music sells now is a reissue of v2?

[qblue]

I wish I could join this club. But I feel like I'm at least related.

I have a Strat Ultra with blue Lace in the neck, a gold lace in the middle, and a red dually in the bridge. There's a 3-way toggle to switch the dually to single-both-single settings. What I like about the Lace Sensors is that they are noiseless and high output, except for the gold. Love the blue in the neck position. My strat Ultra is in a rare Fire Storm finish and bought in 1991.







I can't even imagine these on a Tele. It would be so exciting! Yeah I know this is a Tele forum, but I couldn't resist.

[Tele Jr]

Originally Posted by gatc

I wasn't aware there were two versions of the red-red dually.

So... i guess what Lace music sells now is a reissue of v2?

It's not so much 2 versions of just the double red dually, it's 2 versions or generations of how all of the individual Lace pups have been made including the reds.

Note the Tele Plus dually is different than other so called dually's sold because it's actually just two single Lace pups installed side by side in the housing which can be individually removed and replaced. Other so called dually's are attached to a single housing like a humbucker in which case you can not mix and match them individually as in the Tele Plus.

For those of you who may be following along at home, here's an auction (not mine) with a photo of the underbelly of a Lace Sensor so called 1st generation or v1 pickup;

http://cgi.ebay.com/FENDER-LACE-SENS...3A1%7C294%3A50

And here's a so called 2nd generation, or v2;

http://cgi.ebay.com/3-Lace-Sensor-Go...3A1%7C294%3A50

You can see the soldered wire vs the metal plate which is how you identify a 1st vs 2nd gen Lace unit.

Note I'm only talking about the design of the Lace Sensor pickups now, this has nothing to do with the so called v1 and v2 versions of the Tele Plus itself. Only the early v1 Tele Plus will have the 1st generation Lace v1 pups...

As a general rule all you can buy now is a gen 2 unit but there have been known to be NOS versions of gen 1's out there still for sale, most notably the so called light blues which are not the current so called v2 light blue but the very early version of the 1st gen regular blue which first came out with the light blue lettering.

[Johnny Isaacs]

Originally Posted by gatc

Thanks Johnny.
As a humbucker it must be pretty loud and screamy. Can you actually play clean with it?
I have s strat with a red lace sensor on it and even at moderate gain i have problem getting a clean sound

Mine is the early version. It's not really all that powerful but it sure sounds great!

Johnny Isaacs

[bendecaster]

I modded my Plus Deluxe with piezo saddles. Quite a plethora of sounds. I just wish I would have gotten one without a trem. I really don't care for it.

[Zillinois]

I've had a couple of the 3 single coil pickup models in the past, but I had to let them go. I kept this H/S one mainly because it simply felt better to me.