I finally got around to taking a couple of pics of my modded 50's Tele. Here's the lowdown on exactly what I did to it. It's a 2001 model 50's Classic
Telecaster in white blonde. I replaced the bridge with a Joe Barden vintage-style assembly with compensated brass saddles. The stock bridge pickup was exchanged for a Seymour Duncan
APTL-3JD (Jerry Donahue model). The body was given a universal rout to accommodate a Gibson mini-humbucker for the neck position and a Fender Texas Special Strat neck pickup (black
cover) for the middle position. I ordered a custom pickguard from Warmoth. It is 1/8" thick gloss black with 5 holes. The route for
the pickguard was designed for the installation of the middle Strat pickup and the mini-humbucker for the neck. I disconnected the mini-humbucker's cream plastic ring in order to
have a direct mount to the pickguard. I like the cleaner look of the mini-humbucker directly mounted to the pickguard without the ring. I got this idea from seeing fellow TeleModder, Ray Chung as well as Scotty Anderson's Tele. I left the stock pots and 3-way pickup selector switch installed. I did drill a hole in the control plate directly in between the volume and tone pots for an on/off
mini-toggle switch. The 3-way switch operates as a standard Tele switch. The mini-toggle switch activates/deactivates the middle pickup. The volume/tone controls operate as standard Tele master
volume/tone. The middle pickup, when activated can only be used in tandem with the bridge or neck pickups. It cannot function individually. The pickup switching is as follows:
- Pos. 1/mini-switch down - Neck pickup
- Pos. 2/mini-switch down - Neck/Bridge pickups (parallel)
- Pos. 3/mini-switch down - Bridge pickup
- Pos.1/mini-switch up - Neck/Middle pickups
- Pos. 2/mini-switch up - Neck/Middle/Bridge pickups (I never use this one)
- Pos.3/mini-switch up - Middle/Bridge pickups
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