Manny Tele Build #1 - The Pine and Oak Tele

Manfred-Klose

ok, #1 means this is my first tele build and i will be building alot more over the next few months(for myself and for some friends)

no i am going a bit wild and building the dream guitars that always wanted in my mind, but that doesnt exist.

#1 is my first test run to see if everything works out and that my math side is correct.

Conclusion: it was a big success and i played a gig with this guitar on friday and it killed!!!!

i kept track of my time, i did all of this under 24 hours. the neck and body i cnc'd. the neck took 9min and the body took 15min. for fret slotting and fre pressing i went to Brian fanners workshop and he let me use his fret slot cutter and press.

Specs:
SA Pine body, 4 piece
Oak neck, 2 piece(sprayed with nitro cell)
Wilkinson compensated bridge
Wilkinson EZ lok tuners
all the hardwar i got from Terry D
Alpha pots
some chises pickups that i am yet to swop out for some toneriders

Why did i go with pine and oak ? why not ?
everyone told me oak would be a dab choice for a neck, it turns out to be an excellent neck
SA Pine ? apparently its bad choice for body wood and that oregan pine is the one to go for, it sounds good, just not as strong, but it works.

PS: the oak neck use to be an old desk top in a place i cant really mention on the internet, and the pine i found lying on a farm in the middle of nowhere.

the colors on the guitar, i love it !!!!!

sure i could have probably gone with a better finish.
each plank is stained a different color with danish oil on top(thanks for neon gecko and Wizard helpng me decide on the funky colors )

and i get get over how good the guitar sounds acoustically

ok enough about my wining here is the pics:

few coats of sanding sealer

Manfred-Klose

clamping the neck

Manfred-Klose

adding my favourite embuia stain i will sand out again just to show the grain

checking if my template works

waiting for oil to dry

and the scrathplate i am yet to finish, i want to stain it white or something:

makepeace

Nice 1! Super cool that you're doing the necks too! Going to have to get some tips from you at some stage..

Oh and BTW I think there's a reason why that guitar doesn't exist.. Whats up with that colour scheme?!

Manfred-Klose

lol the colorscheme, well i always wanted a hapy looking guitar that has an african look to it, so that is why went with a kind of a rough look. some people prefer the nice expensive looks, i something that looks like it has character.

i could not decide on what color i want the body so i got the idea to stain each plank a different color, kind of a last minute.

Gearhead

I don't understand why you don't put a radius along the length of the truss rod cavity?

nicovlogg

Really cool! Where did you get it CNC'ed?

BTW.. there are some really nice tele pickups for sale in the classifieds.. at negotiable prices ?

Manfred-Klose

I don't understand why you don't put a radius along the length of the truss rod cavity?

dont have to. the straight works just fine with the type of truss rod i use.

Really cool! Where did you get it CNC'ed?

BTW.. there are some really nice tele pickups for sale in the classifieds.. at negotiable prices

i made friends with a guy a few blocks from my house, with a multicam CNC, so i would go spend some time there over the weekends and we play around a bit.

yes i saw those pickups, i am keeping them in mind

Danele

where did you get the templates from? or are they self made? looking for a place that can 'print' me a couple, gonna start looking around for a router soon, already got the table itll go into.

Manfred-Klose

hi danele is 3 ways to get templates.

1.buy them online
2.learn how to use autocad, draw it up, take it to a cnc or laser cutter, and cut it out, very cheap to do, thick perspex or supawood should be fine
3. there is alot of jpegs on the internet of guitar plans, just size them up on the computer to the right size print it out stick it to the material of choice and cut it out with a band saw or whatever, but its easy to make a mistake with this one, thenyoud have to start over again.

something i want to add to number 2, you can also buy drawings on the internet thats already drawn up as well.

Danele

Manfred Klose wrote: 1.buy them online
2.learn how to use autocad, draw it up, take it to a cnc or laser cutter, and cut it out, very cheap to do, thick perspex or supawood should be fine
3. there is alot of jpegs on the internet of guitar plans, just size them up on the computer to the right size print it out stick it to the material of choice and cut it out with a band saw or whatever, but its easy to make a mistake with this one, thenyoud have to start over again.
something i want to add to number 2, you can also buy drawings on the internet thats already drawn up as well.

thanks for the reply.

yeah i thought of the autocad route.. i have a few plans for Fenders (Mustang, Jag and Jazzmaster), but theyre all in PDF form. think the laser cutting might be the best.

bandsaw and sanding is sloppy, as the router will follow any imperfections that is made in the template.

Manfred-Klose

depending on the cad program you can import PDF's as well

Attila

Friken hell Manny - you guys are talented .... nice work-horse you have there

Manfred-Klose

Thanks attila.

i played two songs with it at my last gig at Die Boer in durbanville, stayed perfectly in tune all night and really cutted nice into the mix, i am really falling in love with my ugly telecaster ?

Wizard

Manfred Klose wrote: i played two songs with it at my last gig at Die Boer in durbanville, stayed perfectly in tune all night and really cutted nice into the mix, i am really falling in love with my ugly telecaster ?

It's not ugly!
It's the Rainbow Tele ...

Attila

Wizard wrote: It's not ugly!
It's the Rainbow Tele ...

Ditto !!!

Neon-Gecko

Manfred Klose wrote: Thanks attila.

i played two songs with it at my last gig at Die Boer in durbanville, stayed perfectly in tune all night and really cutted nice into the mix, i am really falling in love with my ugly telecaster ?

Just one problem with that pic Manny, where's the 'guitar mouth'? ?

Manfred-Klose

this was a pretty chilled song ?

Styles

That Tele's got some character to it ?

singemonkey

Important necropost:

Folks, EZ and I went and saw Manfred's band, The Stone Jets, last night. Do yourselves a favour. This is an incredibly well-rehearsed band playing GREAT songs. Sort of a live '80s pop feel of the funkier kind. I felt at the show that if I heard them 3 times, I'd have those songs imbedded in my head. Their singer, Given, is fantastic. He's got a Tracy Chapman meets Michael Jackson thing going on. Go see them and you will be entertained.

But I'm posting here because I want to talk about this Telecaster. We heard the band before The Stone Jets with a Tele through a modern Marshall 100Watt. It might have been any guitar. Dull, lifeless. The moment Manfred strummed this Telecaster through a Peavy combo it sounded like an absolutely classic Telecaster. It chimed. Cut through the mix like butter while still sounding warm. It looks fantastic on the stage with no pickguard too.

After the show, he came and showed us the instrument. I think he thought we were maybe being kind for the sake of it. But in fact I have literally never played a Telecaster with such a resonant neck in my life. And I've played many. I've played a 1958 Telecaster. The neck vibrates so strongly you almost expect to see it blur. I can confidently say that it's the best Telecaster I've ever played. Oak is clearly a very viable neck wood. The neck is also wide and fat. Very comfortable.

Manfred knows how to make a Tele folks.