Just bought a used MIM Tele. She's been well played over the years and looks it (which I like). I'm really excited about both the guitar and the idea of tweaking, modding, etc.. I'll ultimately need to do some work on it, so I have lots of questions:
1) How do you know when the frets are too worn to level and re-crown, and if its not too late, how big of a job is this? Could a novice do it?
*For instance, if you've got a couple of frets that have considerable wear at one or two strings, can you "level to a point" where you may still have some uneven wear on those frets at those strings, but the rest of the frets are uniform (essentially making it "less worn" than beofre but still having some trouble spots)?? i hope this makes sense.
(I'd like to do as much work as I can myself on this guitar...I'll probably make it kind of an ongoing project guitar and use it to learn maintenance, basic repair, mods, upgrades, etc.)
2) If Its too late to level/recrown the frets, is it more practical to just get a new neck rather than do a re-fret of exisitng neck (its maple)?
3) Basic Tele set-up question....
The action is a bit high (maybe due in part to worn frets). How do I tell if the truss-rod needs adjusting, and which way do I turn the nut to adjust for a lower action? Also, Do I want to adjust the truss-rod first, then move on to adjusting the saddle height (its a 6 saddle bridge)? Is that the order for adjusting action?
4) Its a '92 MIM Tele with what I believe are all factory parts. Two single coils, a black one in the bridge with the poles visible, and a smaller one at the neck with a chrome cover. Are these crap? Is this where most people make there fist upgrades to MIM Teles? If I wanted to put a humbucker in the bridge position, would I need to router more room for it in the body?
5) What are some other common mods made to Tele's
6) Anything else I need to know about my new baby?
Thanks!!!!
One of our members Nils has a basic setup page at:
http://home.nycap.rr.com/nils/BasicGuitarSetup.htm
It's a good place to start, I don't have any info on fret dressing but there are lots of sites, do a Google on the subject Probably some close up shots of your fret wear would give the people here in the know a better idea of whether the frets have to be replaced or not. If you only do a few I imagine fret buzz may become a problem but that's just a guess. Someone else will give some better advice.
Sounds like a cool project gutar
Robbie
I'll try to post some closeups of fretboard, but I've had trouble with this. When zoomed in closeup, my digital camera loses focus and picks up a bunch of glare. I cant get anything of any quality that close up.
Two simple Tele mods some find useful:
* Bend the pup selector switch down toward the floor so it is less likely to be in the way while playing.
or
* Remove and re-install the control plate flipping it 180 degrees so the switch is now toward the tail of the guitar to get it out of the way. That is the simpler version. The more useful, complete mod involves removing the switch and spinning it 180 degrees in its mounting slot, and also swapping the positions of the tone and volume controls before re-installing the control plate turned 180 degrees. This puts the volume control where the switch used to be (for convenient pinkie swells), tone in the middle and the pup switch to the rear and in corrected orientation so forward is still forward pup. IIRC, this is a mod favored by Bill Kirchen -- one of the Tele-masters
-=tension & release=-
If you feel that the frets are too worn I would just replace the neck. You definitely can re-fret the neck, but for $110 you can get a mint MIM neck for that guitar.
-=- Steve
"If the moon were made of ribs, would you eat it?"
