Bruce Welch Telecaster

[satman10]

I thought I'd tell you a little about the guitar that I owned for two years.
Namely Bruce's blonde Fender Telecaster.
It was a very rare guitar at the time and no one thought it was a Fender because they had not seen one before!
It was wired the same as a Broadcaster Fender Tele , the selector was three way although only one pick-up could be selected at a time.
(1)Bridge pick-up then (2)neck pick-up then (3)the neck pick-up with the tone full on it was very bassey and unuseable .
I think that's the reason Bruce returned it back to the shop ,the Strat had far more tones than this guitar had.
It was wired this way for groups without a bass player is what I was told .
I would have loved it to sound like the modern Teles , of course I could have had it rewired ,but I didn't .

satman10

[cockroach]

Thanks Peter- interesting!

I believe most Telecasters were wired that way until the 1970's- as you say , it was the original Broadcaster wiring/pickup selector setup..Leo designed it that way to enable a guitar player to play bass lines where there was no bass in the band- but if course it meant that you couldn't have both pickups on together.
A mate of mine bought a new Tele in about 1969/70 which was wired that way.

I read somewhere that Leo didn't like the sound of two pickups together, which is why the Strat was also wired that way- only one pickup at a time, although as Leo said, there weren't five way switches around everywhere in those days.

[satman10]

I found your resonse a very interesting read about pick ups on Fender Stratocaster and early Telecasters.
I own a 1979 Strat and found a 'little mod' that got the stratocaster to use two pick ups (bridge & neck) together!
I found swapping the wiring on the five way switch gave the 'Jazzmaster 'and later 'Telecaster' sound.
I swapped the middle and bridge pickup wires around so when you selected the bridge pick up you got the middle pick up,
and when you selected the middle you got the bridge !
But when the five way switch was in the fourth position the bridge & neck were in play giving the Jazzmaster and Telecaster tone.
It takes about half an hour to do and is well worth it just to hear it sound so good .
I know some might say the Strat already plays two pick ups already , but the difference is the spacing of the pick ups .
The five way switch puts two pick ups on next to one another,my 'mod' does'nt .
The diffence is amazing , a conventially wired Strat sounds like 'Mark Knopfler' or' Albert Lee' when in position two and four ,but a modified Strat
sounds like 'The Ventures ' or 'Bert Weeden' tone,and you still get the second switch position because nothing has changed .
I have always found the fourth and second tones are very similar sounding on a conventially wired Strat .
Hope some of you try this 'mod' , after all you have nothing to lose and everything to gain ,and you can always switch the wires back
to their original position if you don't like it!


satman10

[satman10]

Although I did this mod back in the 1970's someone else worked it out on youtube.........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PJ8PLZ3jyk

[cockroach]

Hi Peter,

I also worked that changed Strat pickup combination thing out some years ago- I swapped wires (with re-soldering etc) the first time, but since then, I just swap the pickups around- just unscrew each pickup from the scratchplate and swap positions!

It works great, as you say, and gives the all important and very usable neck + bridge position...I've been using this setup for over 30 years now!

[Clarry]

I've done this mod too. It can give a great Jag/Jazz surf sound.

As I play rhythm a lot, having the middle pick-up in the bridge selector position helps for when I accidentally whack it.

[cockroach]

You do realise chaps that it might not be a good idea to mention this useful guitar modification to your wife, significant other, partner etc...

The instant response will be...'well, in that case, you won't need all those other guitars'...

Seriously, I've been gigging with cheapo Strat type guitars (Squier and obscure Asian copies etc) with that simple mod for nearly 20 years now- I find I can get pretty reasonable Strat, Tele, Jazzmaster and Jaguar tones- and the useful range is even wider by also using different types of strings- flatwounds, heavy gauge, light gauge etc...

This situation must be the opposite of G.A.S. perhaps?

[satman10]

I posted a similar artical on www.tdpri.com with suprising results ,several guitarists had also worked it out .
One guy just swapped the pick ups around on the scratch plate ,namely neck pick up with middle pick up therefore keeping the bridge pick up in it's proper position!
This put the 'new' tone on number two switch position.
The other swapped the middle and bridge instead getting the same result as me without soldering.....
I like the first idea ,what do you think?
Satman10

[cockroach]

I decided against that way, because if you swap the middle and bridge, you get separate tone controls for those pickups, which is more useful IMHO...if you swap middle and neck, you still don't have a tone control for the bridge pickup- which is the normal situation with the traditional Strat wiring.

The middle pickup can do without a tone control really, whereas with a tone control for the bridge pickup, you can tame the very sharp tone which most Strats tend to give.

For me, for playing live (and having to sing whilst playing) the most simple way would be to just have the five position switch with a master volume and master tone - imagine a Tele with a third pickup..but that would require some re-wiring and soldering- at which I'm hopeless! Finding a way to change the pickup selection without soldering etc was my lateral thinking way of just swapping the pickups around...necessity being the mum of invention etc!

[Uncle Fiesta]

Much better to replace one of the pots with a pull/push switch, this can be easily restored to standard if desired and keeps all the standard combinations while adding two more. This is how it's done:

PP Switch.jpg

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With the switch activated you will get:

Position 1 – bridge and neck pickups, no tone control.
Position 2 – all three pickups, bottom tone control.
Position 3 – all three pickups, bottom tone control.
Position 4 – all three pickups, top and bottom tone controls.
Position 5 – bridge and neck pickups, top tone control.

This is useful, because you could set the neck pickup tone control on, say, 5, and switch between that and no tone control, by moving between positions 1 and 5.

Note that all pickup combinations are still in parallel. If you want them to be in series, that’s possible but more complicated. (My favourite sound on the Strat is neck and bridge in series.)