A brand new life to my Thinline Custom Telecaster

Here we go guys, I am the happy owner of this guitar since quite some years and She's my number one but I was sad that the finish was peeling off very badly. I spoke to one of my friend which is building / assembling guitars and we decide to go for a full renovation of the body finish. I opt for a three tone sunburst and a nitrocellulose finish. Here are some pics of this process and the final results.

I must say I'm delighted by the result we even change the pots for a nickel flat button which looks very nice together with the pearloid plate

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Looks great! Was there a particular reason the old finish was peeling? Was it nitro too?

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Originally Posted by marnold

Looks great! Was there a particular reason the old finish was peeling? Was it nitro too?

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Hello Marnold,

it looks like some of the late 70's Fender had this type of bad polyurethane finish issues. I don't know whether they changed their way of drying the finish off or whether it was just bad storage but it was really ugly, each time I was playing I was covered with this urethane leprae :mad


Extracted from another Forum here is what I read

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From what I've read Fender was experimenting with some kind of lower environmental impact finish that just didn't hold up. I don't think any other stock colors reacted this way - besides black and wine red the only other color that turned milky and cracked off was that special pearl white they used on the first 500 or so 25th Anniversary Strats. That finish was so bad it was cracking and flaking off by the time they got out to dealers. They pretty quickly changed to the silver finish they used for the rest of them.

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Nice, those guitars sound great too!

Looks really nice. How do you like those pups. They are humbuckers, right? They resemble the old Supro lap steel pups which in the opinion of many were the "baddest" pups around for growling/snarling blues. Became "legendary" as the bridge pup for Ry Cooder's Coodercaster.

I am torn between liking it and not quite understanding why you did it. Your friend did a great job, no question, but I think laquer changes, no matter how bad they are, are part of an instrument's history. Of course you may dislike them visually, but somehow you also deprive the instrument of something, if you know what I mean. All the geeks talking about even that effect - old nitro laquer peels off, etc. However, the guitar still looks awesome. Man, how I love them 78 Thinlines...Those 70's breeds are way underrated.

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Originally Posted by piebaldpython

Looks really nice. How do you like those pups. They are humbuckers, right? They resemble the old Supro lap steel pups which in the opinion of many were the "baddest" pups around for growling/snarling blues. Became "legendary" as the bridge pup for Ry Cooder's Coodercaster.

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These are the original Wide Range Fender humbuckers they also equipped the Telecaster Custom (Keith Richards) They sound more fat than the single coils but they retain some of the Fender "Twang" caracteristics to my hear. On my other Thinline which is a Nash TL-72 I have Lollar Imperial pups and they sound quite close to the original Wide Range.

The Wide Range are easily driving crunch to a tube amplifier Here is a clip of those in live situation.

http://youtu.be/qSnWVuwekI8

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Originally Posted by Jimi75

I am torn between liking it and not quite understanding why you did it. Your friend did a great job, no question, but I think laquer changes, no matter how bad they are, are part of an instrument's history. Of course you may dislike them visually, but somehow you also deprive the instrument of something, if you know what I mean. All the geeks talking about even that effect - old nitro laquer peels off, etc. However, the guitar still looks awesome. Man, how I love them 78 Thinlines...Those 70's breeds are way underrated.

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I perfectly know what you mean Jimi and I'm aware of the possible drawback of upgrading such a vintage instrument but I really don't care it's my Number 1 and I don't intend to sell that one in any ways so I prefer to have the best sounding guitar rather than a collectible but less playable instrument (The neck was anyway refretted 'cause the original Frets were down the neck)

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Originally Posted by Jipes

I perfectly know what you mean Jimi and I'm aware of the possible drawback of upgrading such a vintage instrument but I really don't care it's my Number 1 and I don't intend to sell that one in any ways so I prefer to have the best sounding guitar rather than a collectible but less playable instrument (The neck was anyway refretted 'cause the original Frets were down the neck)

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Plausible explanation my friend.

Looks great!

Question for you, JP: Does your Thinline have the original Seth Lover-designed wide-range humbuckers (WRHB) with the threaded rod CuNiFe magnetic pole pieces? I understand that the '72 Thinline reissues that started coming out of Mexico in the late '90s contain standard humbucker construction (an alnico bar magnet and steel pole pieces) that is just housed in the distinctive WRHB casing. I've heard that these pickups sound quite good, but lack the great combination of single coil clarity with the warmth and power of humbuckers that the originals possess. I was fortunate to obtain a 2002 Thinline '72 RI recently that had pickups that had been upgraded to the threaded magnet pole piece construction, and it sounds fabulous--combines the best tonal features of humbuckers and single coils. I can't put the damn thing down!

That looks beautiful, Jipes! You guys did a pro job. While I understand Jimi's perspective, there is a difference between a worn/aged finish and a defective one. My Tacoma acoustic suffers from the same problem, due to a finish issue (typical unfortunately to Tacoma's), where chunks of the finish bubble up and flake off - it does indeed look like the guitar has leprosy! I will be only too happy to return the beauty of this instrument someday by stripping it down and refinishing it.

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Originally Posted by duhvoodooman

Looks great!

Question for you, JP: Does your Thinline have the original Seth Lover-designed wide-range humbuckers (WRHB) with the threaded rod CuNiFe magnetic pole pieces? I understand that the '72 Thinline reissues that started coming out of Mexico in the late '90s contain standard humbucker construction (an alnico bar magnet and steel pole pieces) that is just housed in the distinctive WRHB casing. I've heard that these pickups sound quite good, but lack the great combination of single coil clarity with the warmth and power of humbuckers that the originals possess. I was fortunate to obtain a 2002 Thinline '72 RI recently that had pickups that had been upgraded to the threaded magnet pole piece construction, and it sounds fabulous--combines the best tonal features of humbuckers and single coils. I can't put the damn thing down!

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Yes it's the original pickups WRHB the guitar is from 1978 and I bought it from the original owner. I never had the opportunity to compare side by side teh mexican pups to mine. I also read that some of teh Japanese model have another version of the pickups which are apparently between the vintage WRHB and the mexican version

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Originally Posted by tjcurtin1

That looks beautiful, Jipes! You guys did a pro job. While I understand Jimi's perspective, there is a difference between a worn/aged finish and a defective one. My Tacoma acoustic suffers from the same problem, due to a finish issue (typical unfortunately to Tacoma's), where chunks of the finish bubble up and flake off - it does indeed look like the guitar has leprosy! I will be only too happy to return the beauty of this instrument someday by stripping it down and refinishing it.

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Thanks a lot TJ, yes it's a bit heartbreaking to have a finish peeling off that much. I hope you'll get the chance to renew your Tacoma one day !

Magnifique! :thumbsup

Thanks TIG coming from a fan of Games of Thrones (I love it I'm reading the 4th compilation) I'm delighted !

Hey! Great singing and playing, by the way! That Tele is sweet sounding.

Also... If I were to sing in French, you sure would know that I wasn't French! Impressive singing in English (I should say 'American')!

That's a great live video by the way. Tight band, cool playing and good singing!

Thanks TJ and Jimi, I guess after 30 years trying hard to sing the blues, I'm getting a little bit closer to my dreams :thumbsup

Great to see and hear you play! Nice job!

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Originally Posted by Robert

Great to see and hear you play! Nice job!

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Thanks a lot Robert !