How to help a thin-sounding Tele/Esquire?

[Alvin Lee Fan]

Yup, it's thin-sounding all right. Even with a Rio Muy Grande in the bridge, it doesn't have a lot of beef. I got to do a comparo with my friend's Duncan Quarter Pounder equipped Tele last night. No comparison, his is way more beefy and loud than mine. I thought the Muy Grande was about equivalent to the QP. I like twang in a Tele, but I also like a certain authoritative sound, too. Mine just sounds wimpy.

The guitar is a custom made Tele that I've converted to an Esquire. It has a 1 1/2" thick swamp ash body and a Warmoth neck with a rosewood fretboard, but very thin profile. It's supposed to be a std thin Warmoth profile, but it measures out between that and their Wizard profile. It's also got a Barden bridge ass'y with the three-barrel bridge. The guitar only weighs a tick over 6 pounds.

My first though is to put a more substantial neck on the guitar, which I will do for personal preference and comfort.

However, on the pickup side I feel that improvements could be made. I'm thinking maybe swapping to a pickup that has an A2 magnet, like a JD Tele bridge or a 5/2.

Any other ideas out there?

Here's the guitar in question.

 

[the guy who invented fire]

Re: How to help a thin-sounding Tele/Esquire?

I know this is not what you want to hear but the thinner than normal body and the thin neck are helping that guitar sound a tad on the thin side...The new neck (if a good bit larger) will help more than you could imagine. The JD is a nice beefy bridge Tele pickup so maybe that you help as well...good luck!

 

[Curly]

Re: How to help a thin-sounding Tele/Esquire?

the JD is probably a pretty good choice

I'd also check the cap value ... I'd recommend a good .05 cap.

 

[Alvin Lee Fan]

Re: How to help a thin-sounding Tele/Esquire?

I'm planning on getting a neck that is substantially larger than the current one. Something along the lines of the neck I have on my JV Strat.

This one measures just .815 at the first fret and .835 at the 12th fret.

I think the combo of neck and pickup should help a lot. I'm liking the JD the more I read about. Sounds like it's the choice here, too.

 

[flank]

Re: How to help a thin-sounding Tele/Esquire?

JD is an awesome pickup. I use it for everything

 

[Artie]

Re: How to help a thin-sounding Tele/Esquire?

First of all . . . thats a gorgeous Tele. I love simple, clean configurations like that.

I second the motion for the JD, although an Antiquity is nice also. Since either one of those doesn't have any real switch options, I'd expand on Curly's suggestion and use it, (the 3-way), to select between different tone caps. Say, none, .05uf, and .022uf. Or .05, .022, or .001uf. Something like that.