Ok now pickups & hardware...

[birddog01]

Help me out here (I know you will)

I've got my body bought. And while I'm undecided now on finish choice, hopefully I can decide that before the Warmoth sale is over.
But I need to start a shopping list for pick ups & hardware.
I've noticed alot of blues guys here at least in the Bad Dog Cafe, & I'm a bluesguy with a bassman.
What pick ups do I want to put in this guitar ?
What about good decent hardware & controls ?
If the budget gets too awful tight is there somethings I can use now and upgrade later or is that a waste of money ?

Just things being tossed around in my head, I'm obsessed, I think this may be an incureable disease....

Wally

[BritishBluesBoy]

Have a look at these:

Hardware:

www.glendaleguitars.com

www.callahamguitars.com

Pickups:

Lindy Fralin, Jason Lollar, Don Mare...

[68thinline]

My tele is definately the go-to guitar for playing blues, especially Texas-style blues. I use a Gibson mini-humbucker in the neck position and I love it. It has such a warm clean tone through any tube amp and almost no overdrive is necessary once the tubes get warm. The bridge pickup I don't use at all.

[Teleglide]

For a blues Tele I'd recommend Don Mare's 0038 'Lap Wrap' Broadcaster pickup for the bridge position and his Strat style neck position pickup - I think it's called a Stelly.

I have a Tele with the Mare 0038 bridge pickup that I use for blues - sounds great!

[kate033]

I have a set of Don Mare's. If it's within your budget and time frame, then I would highly recommend them. I know I'll have my set for life, and I don't say that often! Putting a p-90 in the neck is also a fun combo.

As far as hardware, I'm very pleased with the Wilkinson bridge on mine, so that's another brand worth looking into.

[Jeff_K]

I'm building one, too, and it's on-topic to ask about the pots. I got some 500k full size pots from GFS ordered since I just added them to some other stuff, but I know my other Tele has the smaller pots. Will the full size pots work without having to mod the control cavity?

[Flynman]

I just put a set of Van Zandt pickups in my Tele & Strat and they are the best sounding I have heard so far. They also run about $30 or $40 cheaper than some of the other Boutique guys.

[birddog01]

Thanks for the replies.
Looks like could be using a wilkinson bridge, thats within the budget.
I knew I spend some money & don't want to skimp when it comes to pick ups.
Actually Callahan price on the Fralin set I think is pretty reasonable.
I kind of like his jack plate.

I guess the other question is the control plate, weather to build it or buy it.
I think I wanna do a 4 way switch, my as well.

Hopin I can keep this at 7 bills, so far its blank $61.00, neck $260.00 (but its gorgeous)
Its gonna be tight

Wally

[Ricky D.]

Fender OV's are great pickups if you like the vintage type of sound. OEM on the 52RI tele, much cheaper than the boutique stuff. Got mine used for about $55.

I also have a Don Mare set, bought used for $150. Supersport bridge/Stelly neck. A little fatter that the OV's, and there's something else about them that I just can't put into words. Worth the extra $ this time only.

Next project is an Esquire build, this one will be a Duncan Broadcaster.

I have a Glendale CRS no-cut bridge plate in one. It looks great, but I'm not convinced that it actually sounds much better than the stock Fender plate it replaced.

I had Glendale saddles with the Fender plate for a while before I got the Glendale plate. Worth the money, IMO.

The electrosocket jack is extremely cool IMO.

The control plate is a simple soldering project, you can save some money there.

[Jellyroll]

+1 on the Don Mare pickups. He has a flavor for you, I bet they all are good. I have DonOcasters and Hot Bakelites, can't imagine a better sounding, more versatile pickup set.

[thejerk]

You can get a Fender stamped bridge plate for around $10, and a set of Glendale saddles for about $60 and it'll be awfully hard to beat.

Keystones are a nice pickup choice, made in USA, sound great, and won't set you back more than most Asian import sets. The downside is the current wait time/unpredictability, but it is worth it IMO. You could also go with Toneriders, or the Fender OV (new they were running about $100 a month or two back, but I think they boosted the price or will boost the price soon significantly).

I like the Grover Mini Locking Rotomatic tuners, and I say stay away from the "traditional" tele jack cup/retainer design if you can. Electrosocket or other screw in type would be better.

CTS pots and a Grigsby switch are also hard to beat. I like sprague orange drop caps, neat and get the job done. Wire it so the wire to the tone pot comes from the middle lug of the vol pot, instead of the "left" as it is depicted on most diagrams... you get less treble loss on the vol control, sounds much better. I'd do an audio taper vol, linear taper tone if it was me!

[dadawads]

Depending on how much money you have to spend... On the lower dollar end, I put Guitar Fetish (GFS) fatboy pickups on my one of my tele partscasters. They sound great! The neck pup is uncovered, which looks great to my eyes, and changes the sound a lot. My other tele partcaster has a gfs p90 neck pup with a gfs neovin power rock bridge pup. It sounds great as well, though it doesn't sound like a traditional telecaster. More like a Les Paul, so I call it my Les Paulicaster. I agree with thejerk's recommendation on wiring. Both my guitars are wired that way. I don't like the sound of a treble bleed cap.

[birddog01]

More good stuff, u guys are great.

I'll have to check out the Mare pickups, got time to shop while I get other stuff.
I've heard mixed reviews about GFS stuff, may use a few things of theirs, stuff that can be upgraded later if I get in a pinch, like knobs but no pickups.

About the control plate, GFS ok or should I go a few more bucks for stainless ?
Also can someone point me to a wiring diagram for this with the 4 way.

I have an accout with tubesandmore I'll have to check with them on pots and caps, I need to order some more stuff for a cab project from them anyway.

Thanks, keep the ideas coming

Wally

[52Tele_lover]

what about http://www.lundgren.se/index.asp?folID=20 or even joe bardens.

[the_utp]

If you're looking for a Texas blues sound, you could also consider Rio Grande pickups.

Selecting pickups is always hard -- you never know precisely how they will react to all the other components in your guitar until you slap them in there. As long as you aim in the right direction in terms of output and magnet type, you'll get a good sound if you buy quality sets.

[Stuco]

Check out the tdpri classifieds for used stuff. You can get quality pups etc. for good prices.

[bruce123]

don't forget O.C. Duff pickups.