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Dear all,
a while ago, we had a quite enjoyable thread on teles here:
What telecaster to get?
In the process, I changed my mind 28 times, the final conclusion was to build a Warmoth tele. So, I thought it would be fun to share the various stages of building it.
So, here is the first teaser. I decided to stay a bit on a budget this time and went with screaming deals for a body and neck. They were actually quite close to what I would have chosen anyways.
Warmoth is typically very fast and reliable and a few days the package arrived safely in germany (to say something positive about UPS worldwide saver - fast, reliable, cleared customs for me - really nice and easy):
Last edited by Frank67; 11-25-2016 at 03:47 PM.
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This is an unfinished swamp ash top on swamp ash body. It is really light. As always, it was precisely machined by Warmoth and it makes a really good impression. I went with the most figured of the bodies they had available.
The neck is a maple neck with maple fretboard, 10-16 compound radius, 6150 frets, boatneck shape, gloss finish and black nut (GraphTech TUSQ XL, standard nut)
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A bit of standard hardware from Warmoth. String ferrules, neck screws, copper foil to shield the cavities.
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This is the body before finishing:
All other hardware will come from a major german music seller with the exception of the wiring harness.
(to be continued)
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Very cool! Thanks for sharing the process with us. I'll be watching this thread!
I've got a sonic blue tele body and a mahogany (something different) tele neck that I bought in recent years to assemble a partscaster in slow motion, when deals or spare cash became available. I know I'll learn a lot watching this thread. Like copper foil for shielding. I totally forgot about that...
My own current challenge: how to get a really good neck/pocket fit.
Good luck with your build! It looks like you've got some great wood to start with!
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Nice and enjoy the process. I have built 2 entire guitars from Warmoth parts and have purchased about 4-5 necks and I have been pleased with their in stock and custom work.
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Yes, Warmoth stuff is top notch.
It is my fourth guitar from Warmoth and all turned out to be great (a cool blue strat, a blinged out modern 3 pickup tele and a crazy three humbucker 'chamaeleoncaster with a million sounds). This one I wanted to be down to earth, simple, non-bling, vintage'ish tele (hence no contours or heel shave or three pickups or anything), just a few modern features.
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That's some beautifully book-matched ash!
That's going to be a fine looking instrument. Have fun! 
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Thanks citizenk74!
I was also quite happy with the wood. It is receiving just an oil finish. I wanted to go for the natural wood look here.
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More hardware arrived:
- Fender custom shop Nocaster pickups
- ABM tele bridge with three brass saddles
- Schaller locking mini tuners
- Black Fender telecaster pick guard
- Fender pickguard screws
- Fender neck screws
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I wanted to retain the natural wood look of the body. Hence I first sanded the body with very fine sanding paper (forgot the actual number) and then gently polished it with steel wool. That created a very smooth surface.
After rubbing that surface clean with a soft cloth, I applied about 10 coats of hard mineral oil (the same we used for our wood floor. Each coat was applied with a soft cloth and then followed by careful buffing. Each coat dried for at least 10 hours, hence there were 1-2 coats a day for a bout a week or so.
The final appearance of the body is a bit darker than before with more pronounced figuring. The body feels really nice to the touch. Obviously, this finish nicely seals the wood and has an understated satin look. It will, however, not provide any protection against dings and dongs. Thus, these will likely occur and be part of the natural wood charme of the guitar.
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Very cool, excited to see the finished product.
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Looking good Frank!
Can't wait to see the finished product.
I'm loving my recent Warmoth build.
They do great work.
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Here is one of my least favorite parts. Warmoth did drill the correct holes for Schaller tuners. However, the tuners are secured on the back of the headstock with two small pins:
This means, I need to precision drill the holes for those pins ... precision drilling and me are, unfortunately, rather incompatible (I am really not good with my hands. Fortunately, I have a day job, where I don't have to be). But there is no choice, so I'll do my best. I have marked the pins with a black pen, then pushed the tuners in such that the pen leaves a mark on the back of the headstock. Then I marked the positions of the pin holes with a black pen.
The next step is to drill pilot holes using a very fine drill. The wood was very hard, but it worked.
Next is to put the tuning machines in one by one. For that I did widen the pilot holes with a real drill, being careful to not drill the holes too deep or come out on the other side (fortunately, I did not). I did require a slight amount of hammering. So I put a towel over the tuners and carefully hammered until the tuners sat securely in their drill holes.
The final result would not put a luthier to shame, but it is kind of ok'ish - definitely by my rather low standards.
(to be continued)
Last edited by Frank67; 11-27-2016 at 08:21 AM.
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The next step (after letting the body dry for another three days or so), is to shield the cavity with copper foil. To this end, I first made templates of the cavity shapes by taking a blank piece of paper and gently brushed with a pencil to reveal the exact contours of the cavities.
Now I can cut these out and glue them onto the back of the copper foil, saving as much space as possible.
Now cut out the pieces from the copper foil and glue them to the cavities. This is not so straightforward as the copper foil tends to curl and stick to itself etc etc. But at the end that worked. The sides of the cavities are not so hard and in the end, I have used small pieces of foil to make sure that there are no cracks or openings in the shielding (other than the ones necessary to get the wires through of course).
The results, I think, looks quite alright:
it is getting close now. Stay tuned :-)
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Looks GR8 Frank.
You didn't say what other 27 things you considered :-)
Warmoth stuff is top notch, you did well... the wood looks good enough to eat!
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For future reference, a tapered reamer is the recommended tool for opening up the tuner holes. Drills can go too deep to fast or chip the wood, and hammering can split the wood (as I found out on my first build). A reamer cuts quick and smooth.
Luthier Tool Tapered Reamer 1/8" to 1/2" | Reverb
There's a how-to video here, check out his trick for a depth stop near the end:
Peghole Reamers | stewmac.com
For installing guitar tuners the regular (cheaper) reamers do fine.
Last edited by MaxTwang; 11-27-2016 at 10:47 PM.
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Max, I bought a taper when I used a drill on a piece of scrap wood before installing Grovers, good advice to everyone!
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Many thanks for chiming in. I did feel that there must be better way to do the tuners than I did it. I was afraid of hammering and drilling for the very reason. This Maple neck looks indestructible though. But in general it could be harmful. I keep that in mind if there is a next time!
Gary, my inner monologue on the subjects in that other thread that I linked above. I wanted a vintage sounding tele, but I did not like vintage frets, the vintage neck radius and vintage tuners. I also hate 'relic'. Last but not least I found the Fender historic teles to be vastly overpriced.
Of the more modern ones, there were many good suggestions in the other thread. I did like the new 2016 elite tele and all demos sounded convincing (but not vintage). I may get one down the road, but I was reluctant given the price at this point.
The third alternative was a cheapo and mod it or a Warmoth build. I remembered linking the Baja tele that I once had except for the thick poly finish. The Baja is mid price, but I would have been ok with it. Modding a cheaper one, like a Squire of some kind, would have probably brought me roughly in the same price regime.
A modded guitar has no resale value. Hence, I figured for that money, I can build a Warmoth guitar that has all the features I like (and also has no resale value). I've been going deliberately easy on the features. There pretty much is the neck radius and the tuners that are more modern. The chambering makes it very light. The electronics will be a bit more versatile than the vintage ones.
So, this is how I ended up here. If I were in the US, all the parts together would have set me back some 700$ or so, which is even less than the Baja. But all parts are top notch quality. Given that I'm in europe it is a bit more due to all the shipping and taxes, but it is still less than a new Baja tele over here.
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So, here we go again.
Screwing in the pickups is a piece of cake (the little rubber washers will allow to adjust the pickup height):
Last edited by Frank67; 11-28-2016 at 03:21 AM.
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Putting the bridge on is trivial giving the precision drilling. The only thing that is definitely beyond me is why ABM only puts three screws in their package when there are clearly four holes. This does not seem to be an accident. I had it with the last bridge too. Fortunately, I did have another screw of the correct size, so it was not an issue:
On the back side, the ABM provided string ferrules are quite nice and went in without any pickup or brute force (so, I would not have needed the Warmoth ones, but I forgot that ABM provides them)
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The next thing drove me nuts. The channel that connects the neck pickup cavity with the control cavity is very narrow and the pickup wires are relatively thick. I just did not manage to push these wires through.
Finally, I remembered that pulling is always better than pushing in such a situation. I manage to fiddle a narrow piece of rope through the channel, attached the wires to the rope with a piece of tape and carefully pulled the wires through.
until finally:
So after that it was easy to put the pickguard on, pilot drill the holes and put the pickguard crews in.
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Almost done. Now screw the neck on. The Warmoth parts fit nicely together and there was no pickup doing that.
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