NGD - more Tele love!

[duhvoodooman***]

It was actually a couple of weeks back, but I've been on vacation the past couple of weeks, so just getting to posting this....

I had been really missing the Squier Vintage Modified Cabronita with the Bigsby that I sold a while back. I've got the Bigsby covered with the '72 Thinline RI I bought when I sold the Squier Cab, but I liked the sound of the Filtertron-type pickup that was at the neck position. So, long story short, I'd been looking at Cabronitas online for the last couple of months, and came across a nice one at Reverb.com--the Thinline variant, MIM, with a pair of the Fender Fidelitron pickups. Made the seller an offer and it was accepted.

Really enjoying this puppy so far. It sounds like nothing else I own, with a ton of jangle from these Filtertron-type pickups. Great bite and clarity. It arrived perfectly set up--great action and spot-on intonation. I love the lightness--this makes my third semi-hollow Tele, though the Bigsby on my '72 Thinline RI pretty much negates the wood weight reduction. The neck is super-comfortable to play; there's some very slight "fret sprout" on the neck, but not enough to cause any playing discomfort.

The only feature I didn't particularly care for was the vintage Strat-style hardtail bridge, which was a little too wide for the guitar--the two E strings aligned poorly with the outer pickup poles and were pushed out closer to the fretboard edge than I like. So I replaced it with an American Strat hardtail bridge which aligns with the pickup poles much more closely. Of course, that meant resetting the action and intonation with the saddle height and length adjustments, but that was a fairly minor task. I'll probably just stick with the stock Fidelitrons and controls for now, though further upgrades are always possible.

I did make one other change, although a purely aesthetic one--I thought the black pickguard on the white body was a bit plain, so I dressed it up a bit with a faux alligator leather p/g I found on eBay for $18 delivered. See pics below.

As purchased:



Body close-up with the new pickguard:

[marnold***]

Happy NGD! I'm not really that familiar with those pups at all. Sound interesting, tho.

[Katastrophe]

Congrats, man! Your Cab is awesome, made even mores by the mods. Nice!

[Robert****]

That is ubercool. Would not mind one of those, but with humbuckers.

I have one of these now

[tjcurtin1]

Wow! Tele madness! Robert, what do they call that tele with the P-90's? Vood, are the fidelitrons humbuckers? I'd love to hear what these two guitars sound like as they must both have some unique sounds.

[Robert****]

It's the Squier Custom Tele II.

Discontinued.

[tjcurtin1]

Robert, have you posted clips in the past or did you just get it?

[Robert****]

I haven't recorded anything with it, and I've had it for quite some time... this probably means I have too much gear. There are too many things I rarely touch. Oh well.

[Jipes***]

Nice Axe I love the pickguard it suits well with the white lacquer

[tjcurtin1]

Vood, how do you find the limited controls setup on the cabronita's?

[duhvoodooman***]

Vood, how do you find the limited controls setup on the cabronita's?

Its only limitation vs. a standard Tele is the lack of a tone control. The only time I miss it is when playing clean on the bridge pickup, which can get pretty ice picky. But that's not very often, as I much prefer some overdrive with that pickup, which tones down the treble. For the neck and dual pickup settings, I always run them wide open anyway. So it's not a big deal for me.

And if you miss having a tone control, it's easy enough to modify the guitar with one of THESE--no drilling needed.

[duhvoodooman***]

Well, you guys know me--I don't like to recommend anything without trying it, so I went ahead and installed a concentric pot for controlling both volume (lower knob) and tone (upper knob). See photo below. The concentric volume/tone control pot I used is a 500K/500K CTS pot I got from Warmoth. Excellent quality pot! They also sell the concentric knobs to fit it. The total for the three parts was $21. As I mentioned previously, unless you do quite a bit of clean playing through the bridge pickup, the Cabronita does just fine without a tone control. But you guys know me--I like to have control, so I thought I'd go ahead and try out this modification. Works like a charm. For the wiring, I used a diagram I came across on the TDPRI forums, which also incorporates a treble bleed to keep the output from getting muddy when the volume is turned down. Turned out that it had the connections from the toggle switch common lug and the output jack "hot" lead switched on the volume pot, so the tone control didn't work initially, but swapping those two wires fixed that. Corrected wiring diagram attached below.

The photo of the concentric pot knobs also shows the replacement bridge I installed--it's a American Strat hardtail bridge, Fender P/N 003-2909-000. I don't understand why this isn't original equipment on the Thinline Cabronita, as it aligns much better with the Fidelitron pickup pole pieces and gives a more comfortable spacing between the E strings and the edges of the fretboard. One note of caution, though--the width between the two outside mounting holes is about 1/8" narrower than the stock bridge, so when installing it on the body, you need to mount the middle screw first and then angle the two outside screws to fit the holes in the body. Torque the two outside screws down evenly/carefully and you'll have no problem. The string-through hole spacing of the bridge vs. the body is also correspondingly narrower, but there's still enough overlap on the outside holes to get the strings through without a problem.

[sunvalleylaw]

Well, you guys know me--I don't like to recommend anything without trying it, so I went ahead and installed a concentric pot for controlling both volume (lower knob) and tone (upper knob). See photo below. The concentric volume/tone control pot I used is a 500K/500K CTS pot I got from Warmoth. Excellent quality pot! They also sell the concentric knobs to fit it. The total for the three parts was $21. As I mentioned previously, unless you do quite a bit of clean playing through the bridge pickup, the Cabronita does just fine without a tone control. But you guys know me--I like to have control, so I thought I'd go ahead and try out this modification. Works like a charm. For the wiring, I used a diagram I came across on the TDPRI forums, which also incorporates a treble bleed to keep the output from getting muddy when the volume is turned down. Turned out that it had the connections from the toggle switch common lug and the output jack "hot" lead switched on the volume pot, so the tone control didn't work initially, but swapping those two wires fixed that. Corrected wiring diagram attached below.

The photo of the concentric pot knobs also shows the replacement bridge I installed--it's a American Strat hardtail bridge, Fender P/N 003-2909-000. I don't understand why this isn't original equipment on the Thinline Cabronita, as it aligns much better with the Fidelitron pickup pole pieces and gives a more comfortable spacing between the E strings and the edges of the fretboard. One note of caution, though--the width between the two outside mounting holes is about 1/8" narrower than the stock bridge, so when installing it on the body, you need to mount the middle screw first and then angle the two outside screws to fit the holes in the body. Torque the two outside screws down evenly/carefully and you'll have no problem. The string-through hole spacing of the bridge vs. the body is also correspondingly narrower, but there's still enough overlap on the outside holes to get the strings through without a problem.

Very cool! I have always liked the idea of the Cabronita style tele, but thought it should have a tone control. Leave it to DVM!