the tele baseplate only affects the tone if it's steel, and only if that steel is in contact with the magnets. like a travis bean pickup. tends to lead to microphonics if they are secured well.

the brass and aluminum plates are more about shielding than any tonal coloration.

Repro Lipstick in the bridge position. :)

"You are making this guitar to eventually sell?"

yep- it's for a sort of paying customer. The instructions were " I want a tele...Just make it sound rad" I think by his standards a mid-output alnico would sound good. I'm gonna put a mini hb in the neck.

I see what i find w/ GFS and a few other places, and see how well the aluminum I have laying around will work. Might have to go to the store for another chunk.

chris jury wrote:"You are making this guitar to eventually sell?"

yep- it's for a sort of paying customer. The instructions were " I want a tele...Just make it sound rad" I think by his standards a mid-output alnico would sound good. I'm gonna put a mini hb in the neck.

I see what i find w/ GFS and a few other places, and see how well the aluminum I have laying around will work. Might have to go to the store for another chunk.

I was going to recommend you have a bobbin rewound or something if it is not something you feel you can do yourself. Strat and Tele bridge pickups aren't the same size. Heavy modding may look a bit funky. If it was for yourself it would be one thing, but a paying customer is another story. Lots of manufacturers will wind to custom specs, I know Seymour Duncan's Custom Shop will do all sorts of crazy things. Their product line is pretty well know to most guitar players.

Yes, the steel will be the only thing that makes a difference. Strat pickups have no plates what so ever much like jazzmasters etc. 52 is the only year I know for sure that used copper plated steel base plates...this is why 52 tele pickups sound like a TB500 as they are basically the same.

The tele bridge does add alot to the sound. I cant back this up other than what Ive heard from things Ive built. I used the same pickups in 2 guitars...one had a Tele bridge and it really favored a Tele in sound, where the other guitar just had that crisp tele sound versus the sort of tele bongy sound. I dont know how to describe the sound better than that. Sorry.

I had thought about rewinding some shitty knock-off pickup, since i have a few laying around. But then that seemed like more stuff to buy, and I don't really have a way of counting the windings, so if i did a good job (or more likely fuck it up), i might not be able to replicate. I think i could build a decent winder out of a spinning reel i have laying around...just can't figure out how to count 7-10 thousand windings, cause lord knows i'll get distracted and lose count.

chris jury wrote:I had thought about rewinding some shitty knock-off pickup, since i have a few laying around. But then that seemed like more stuff to buy, and I don't really have a way of counting the windings, so if i did a good job (or more likely fuck it up), i might not be able to replicate. I think i could build a decent winder out of a spinning reel i have laying around...just can't figure out how to count 7-10 thousand windings, cause lord knows i'll get distracted and lose count.

measure the resistance every so often. much easier than keeping count.

wow- how did i not think of that. I guess i was reading so much about the # of winds, and how those winds were scattered. That would work pretty well.

Is stew-mac the best source for wire?

Does anyone know a good divorce attourney...I have a feeling this hobby is about to overrun our 800 sf home and 200 sf garage.

chris