surfpup Posted October 28, 2014 Posted October 28, 2014 This is my Telecaster. It's a 1986 62 Reissue made in Japan. I've had it for at lest 15 years now, and while it is a great playing guitar, I have never bonded with the neck pickup. This is the second one I've tried, having replaced the original set with a GFS 62 reissue set a few years ago. At one point I even added a Strat single coil in between and a 5 way switch Nashville style. And while that sounded pretty good, I switched it back because,well I have a few Strats. already. So my plan is to put a mini-humbucker in the neck position this time. (Thus my routing tool questions in the other thread) Currently it looks like this... The plan is for it to look more like this...
brc Posted October 28, 2014 Posted October 28, 2014 I read your post about not having a router for your pick up mod. Do you have a Dremel? I used my Dremel with a router bit. Its not quite as fast as a router, but it really worked good.
surfpup Posted October 28, 2014 Author Posted October 28, 2014 I read your post about not having a router for your pick up mod. Do you have a Dremel? I used my Dremel with a router bit. Its not quite as fast as a router, but it really worked good. Yes, I mentioned that in the first post of the other thread as an option. I read up on the router base they sell for the Dremel and a lot of reviews called it cheap and flimsy, so I decided it was high time I had a router anyway.
surfpup Posted October 28, 2014 Author Posted October 28, 2014 Why not put a full hum in the neck and switch it to make it a single or a hum. Certainly considered that - and it is still an option it the mini hum doesn't work out. However I have plenty of guitars with humbuckers in the neck and plenty with single coils in the neck, but I have nothing with a mini.
NHTom Posted October 28, 2014 Posted October 28, 2014 I'll be watching this surfpup........ I've got Tele GAS really bad, for me......I actually want the "JA90" model.....but in a solid body. Since that doesn't exist, I've been thinking about doing a regular tele and dropping in a P90 Keep us posted!!!! NHTom
surfpup Posted October 29, 2014 Author Posted October 29, 2014 Parts... Got this GFS pup for my birthday a couple weeks ago. My brother-in-law ordered the bridge one instead of the neck but it should be cool. It's 8.6k instead of the 7.6k for the neck, but my Tele bridge pup is wound to 9.6k anyway. I won't be using the metal Firebird trim ring, and I will probably have to age that shiny cover sice the other hardware on the guitar is not shiny at all.
Californiaman Posted October 29, 2014 Posted October 29, 2014 Have you decided on what type of mini humbucker yet? There is that new Johnny Winter signature pickup from MojoTone that I posted about a couple of weeks ago. That one sounded great.
Californiaman Posted October 29, 2014 Posted October 29, 2014 Woopsie Doopsie. That really makes me look stupid. Not the first time and it won't be the last. So I guess you were posting your new pickup while I was posting my question as to what you were going to use. Carry on.
surfpup Posted October 29, 2014 Author Posted October 29, 2014 There is that new Johnny Winter signature pickup from MojoTone that I posted about a couple of weeks ago. That one sounded great. Yeah, I dug that one a lot. This one is about a fourth of the price.
surfpup Posted October 29, 2014 Author Posted October 29, 2014 Router came yesterday... And the bit and pickguard came today...
saturn Posted October 29, 2014 Posted October 29, 2014 I generally don't take too much interest in mods. But this one of yours seems pretty interesting. I'm anxious to see how it turns out and how you like that GFS Mini. Good luck with it.
kidblast Posted October 29, 2014 Posted October 29, 2014 humbucker in a tele,, sheesh,, --- those crazy kids!!
surfpup Posted November 2, 2014 Author Posted November 2, 2014 Today seems like a good day to do some routing, so here we go... Practice hole in a bog hunk of wood I use to run my car up on for oil changes... Now let's try the template... Rookie mistake #1 - routing inside the plastic template was not a good plan
surfpup Posted November 2, 2014 Author Posted November 2, 2014 Looks like I will have to use the template to draw an outline and free hand it. Guess that template's a little big - P90 sized perhaps. Glad you guys convinced me to practice first!
Rabs Posted November 2, 2014 Posted November 2, 2014 You can make your own template..... What you have to do for the router bit to work properly is get deep enough so that the bearing on the router bit runs along the side of the template or as you saw it will just cut through it... What you can do is use your pickguard to give you the right shape... Get a bit of MDF or some kind of panel of wood so its not too thick.. Then take as much of the middle of the hole you want to make out as you can freehand and then file the rest down by hand until you hit the lines and use the pickup to see if it fits..... its a bit of a boring process but you will get a good template out of it. I think I did much the same as you when I first tried to use a template... go to 2:30
NHTom Posted November 2, 2014 Posted November 2, 2014 I don't know much about routers..............especially how to use them well. I think there are some bits that have a collar on the upper side that you can get very accurate with the depth and the collar rides inside the template so that it doesn't get chewed up like yours did. That said, I don't know if its a special router or special bit, so in the end I'm pretty useless....... Definitely part of the reason I'm scared to rout anything of mine...... NHTom
surfpup Posted November 2, 2014 Author Posted November 2, 2014 That makes sense as it would let you use the bearing on the bit. On my practice runs I only got deep enough to use the roller bearing on the last few passes.
surfpup Posted November 2, 2014 Author Posted November 2, 2014 The patient ( or victim perhaps) getting prepped... Neck off. I've actually never removed this neck in 15 years of owning the guitar. Maybe I should put a new neck on while I'm at it as the frets are looking a bit worn. Pickguard off and neck pickup removed. I forgot I shielded this sucker so well. I will have to remove that copper foil to rout. BTW, that hole for the middle single coil I did with a drill press about 10 years ago. Decided to just use the pickguard and scratch out a line to attempt to follow... Ready to rout!
L5Larry Posted November 2, 2014 Posted November 2, 2014 Rookie mistake #1 - routing inside the plastic template was not a good plan You missed one part of the router setup, the follow-collar. It's a collar that mounts to the router base, and then the bits goes down through it. The "fixed" collar then "follows" the edge of the template as the bits spins and cuts inside it. This is also why the template is oversized, which allows for the difference between the diameter of the collar and the diameter of the cutting bit. Since the collar is mounted to the router base, and in a fixed position, you can adjust the depth of your cut and your collar stays the same. In a pinch, you can just use a straight-edge (or rectangular template) clamped to the work that you can run the OUTSIDE of your router base along. To do this you have to do a lot of math (measurement of the edge of the bit to the edge of the router base, plus the size of the hole you want, etc)). Trying to freehand plunge route this to full depth is not recommended, not only for intended results, but also for SAFETY reasons.
L8_4thesh0w Posted November 2, 2014 Posted November 2, 2014 The collar on the bit should work just fine. Just don't go too deep at first. That pine is gonna be softer than your Tele too. Another thing you could do is make a template to fit the base of the router instead of the bit and use a couple of clamps, but you'd have to cover the baseplate with something. I definitely wouldn't try it freehand myself. Patience is key and a mask wouldn't hurt either. If you have a vacuum and someone or something to hold it, it makes things much easier. Σß
surfpup Posted November 2, 2014 Author Posted November 2, 2014 Decided to mask the other electronics off with tape instead of removing them... Also found it hard to see the line in my practice routs, so I broke out the old backpacking headlamp... The first cut is the deepest... baby I know....
Rabs Posted November 2, 2014 Posted November 2, 2014 Yeah I guess since its going to be under the pickguard anyway its not mega important that the hole is perfectly straight...
surfpup Posted November 2, 2014 Author Posted November 2, 2014 Yeah I guess since its going to be under the pickguard anyway its not mega important that the hole is perfectly straight... Good thing!
surfpup Posted November 3, 2014 Author Posted November 3, 2014 Went ahead and finished up. The knicks on top are from pulling the router out while it was still spinning. One more lesson learned. You can see I started a "dog ear" for the pickup bracket, but didn't end up needing it. All in all pretty ugly job, but it will work. I hate woodworking!
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