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I've read so many positive reviews of these guitars and I wanted to complete (?) my guitar collection with a tele, so I got one!
After a few hours with it I can only agree with the praise. A very nice guitar in all respects. I only plan to change to a heavier gauge of strings instead of the 09's it came with. Gonna let it settle in for a few days first though.
Fit and finish seems flawless. You see more of the grain underneath the finish than is apparent from most pictures online. Looks nice! This particular guitar seems fairly light-weight and gives good sustain. An open chord really lets the strings ring out for a long time. The pots are comparatively hard to turn (which in the olden days apparently was a sign of quality, I don't know). Anyway they are scratch-free, so is the switch. Pickups are Alnico III and sound good and balanced in all positions to me. Not overly bright for a tele I think and have heard from other users. Fretwork is good, no sharp fret-ends and the action was good with no sign of buzz from unleveled frets. The neck is comfortable, it is probably the chunkiest neck in my guitar collection (consisting of guitars with necks ranging from super thin to thin), but it's probably just a medium C profile. I was worried about the rather narrow nut width which is 1.625" (41.3 mm). Didn't reflect on it once yesterday. Just comfortable to play with the 9.5" radius.
I played it with headphones with a Zoom G3 and it delivers jazz sounds that I like from the neck pickup as well as all the rock, funk and fusion you need from all three!
Definitely check one of these out if you're in the market for a tele and don't mind saving a buck.
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09-12-2013 05:13 AM
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Agreed. Fantastic guitars for the price, and can be great for jazz.
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I think they are a great guitar for the price, but the necks are just to thin for me. Wish I could get one with a bigger neck in a v shape. I love my Baja for that reaon. Glad you got one you like though.
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Great. If I didn't already have a Tele, I'd be hunting one of these down.
Tele's are just great gigging guitars. Comfortable, and easy to "swing" with. ( I played a buddy's chambered Les Paul last wknd. briefly, and the weight of it just became an annoyance, plus a few other things made me want my Tele ).
Tele Tone : excellent.
For strings, I would recommend D'Addario XL 110 set but switch out the 1st string for an .011. If you go with a heavier set, again increase the guage (mass) of the 1st string for more tone and stability.
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About strings. The guitar comes with 9's nickel plated round wounds. The guitar just sounds great with those but they feel too slinky for me. So I put on pure nickel round wound 11's, but feel that something is lost in the sound and feel. The wound strings loses attitude and volume. I'm going to set of 10's nickel plated next to see if that is a good compromise.
The suggestion about a thicker high e is a good one.
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Welcome to the Clan of the Telecaster, where life just feels right with a Tele in hand.
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The great thing about the classic vibe series is some of them had beautiful wood and finishes. They make for a great project... anything that doesn't suit you, simply change. Telecasters are all the guitar you want them to be :-)
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Anyway, I put some Ernie Ball Regular Slinkys (10's) on and I think the guitar and I like these better. These vintage style tuners make re-stringing a breeze btw. Why aren't they on more guitars?
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I have one and upgraded the p'ups, wiring/pots and got a fender bridge and its amazing. Worked best for me with 10's on.. Although it took everything from 8s to 11's for a while there.
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Hey Kruger
Just got me a Squier 60's Tele in sunburst on the eBay for a good price! ($342/£215/€256)
The sunburst ones are hard to come by now, Squier are making all black and all white R/W Tele's now which I do not like.
I also don't like maple f/b.
Anyhoo, it needs a fret level, nut work, shimming (I loves me some shimming!), and the inevitable jazzbow tweaks.
Played it through the Ampeg with clean sound and the pickups and pots are really top class
What with tele and ampeg G.A.S we must be on the same road!
Hah......
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how is the neck on that CV60s ?
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Cool! I haven't had the chance to play my tele through the Ampeg yet. Thomann is fixing the fx loop hum under warranty service at the moment.
Originally Posted by jazzbow
What kind of tweaks do you plan? Apart from a couple of string changes (I've found that I love vintage tuners!) I have no plans to mod the guitar. I will perhaps lower the action just a tad, but my guitar came pretty well setup from the factory fortunately.
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Hey PPJ. Originally Posted by papaj77
Its narrower at the nut than my hollow bodied Tanglewood and the Squier J Mascis jazzmaster.
But it has been some 15 years since I owned a Tele and I'm really enjoying the vibe!
(Sorry to hijack your thread Kru).
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Thanks Jazzbow
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I picked up a Vintage Vibe with a JazzMaster neck and pup 6 months ago and after a setup and some TI Benson 12 flats I am pretty amazed at what a $200 guitar can sound like. It's all I can play since surgery but even when OK'ed for archtops again it will get a lot of use. It makes me wonder what all those American Standard teles at my LGS sound like...
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Originally Posted by krueger
I tell ya the Ampeg speaker has broken in well, it's not so farty now, but the JM Jazzmaster is tweaked for bassy sound. I can make the light shade in my makeshift music room vibrate on the 7.5watt setting playing a low G#! Nice.
I was getting a metallic resonance on C# notes but it appears it is a speaker fixture issue as I put the amp through a 2X10 cab and there was no resonant sound. So I guess I'll remove and refit the speaker after trueing the baffle.
At the moment I'm putting an old Marshall compressor as a gain boost on the FX channel with loads of amplifier bass mids, gain and 10 o'clock on the treble, a really nice O/Drive sound, vary the clean to O/D with volume control an the guitar.....woo hoo!! (Oops....unjazz,)
As for the Tele, the tweaks are....
- Vintage Vibe H/Bucker sized Charlie Christian pickup with AlNiCo 2 magnet
- Bill Lawrence 5 way switch mod
- 2 throw switch for a choice between conventional capacitor and a Q filter (Acoustic type sound)
- Copper shielding
- (optional) Dummy coil (depending on available space in guitar)
The basic changes that all my guitars get are...
- Fret level and dress
- Nut action
- Shim the neck up (so that saddle height grub screws disappear into the saddles)
The shim might be problematic as the intonation screws might point up too much, I'll see where that lays.
The guitar came with 10's and not enough wrap on the string posts, just barely one 360' turn. The open G string has an overtone. The optimal string pitch behind a guitar nut should be around 17 degrees so F***er guitars use a string tree to apply this, the CV60 Tele only has one for the B & E strings but that plain G string with one full wind on the post has a pitch that is practically flat! This gives a 'wooly' type of overtone to the plain open G. I could put one of those 'hair scrunchie' over the strings but it looks crap.
So factor in some 11's, pure nickel r'wounds or maybe flats, I dunno yet.
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Here is that 5 way switch mod and link to Bill's web site. A genius of guitar development!
Home Page
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Love me them Teles. I put D'Addario Pure Nickel roundwounds on mine, 11's. The Nickels are definitely mellower than regular chromes. If you already have an archtop with flats, this provides a nice contrast that's still good for jazz.
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I would like to get one of the vibe 50's but I'm use to the rosewood neck...I'll guess I go with classic vibe custom....about in the same price range....I'm assuming they sound the same...
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The classic vibe is my first maple fretboard guitar. I've always "disliked" those based purely on looks. Now that I have one I can say that I like it just fine. Living in a very low humidity environment I think that a glossy maple fretboard is a good low-maintenance choice. Originally Posted by artcore
I think that the custom might have more in common with the butterscotch blonde 50's, due to similar pickups (alnico v). All of them get good reviews anyhow.
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Wow, do you do all of this yourself? Originally Posted by jazzbow
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Yes sir! Originally Posted by krueger
A bit on the side.
Used to work for the Fenix brand guitar importer here in the UK back in the day.....
Here's a link on the Squier J Mascis work I did. Unfortunately the pictures have disappeared.
https://www.jazzguitar.be/forum/guita...ts-set-up.html
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Too bad about the pictures in that post, but the text alone was worth the read!
I managed to change a broken volume pot in one guitar at one point. It only took me a couple of days and three replacement pots.
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Better late than never, here's a shot of the guitar. Yes, it's that glossy!
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Oo, pots. Heat sinks, pre solder wire and solder suckers. Originally Posted by krueger
Too bad about the pictures in that post, but the text alone was worth the read!
I managed to change a broken volume pot in one guitar at one point. It only took me a couple of days and three replacement pots.
And yes, uber glossy.
Squier humbucker ready rout but piss poor line up of string holes to saddle to bridge p/u polepieces. Grrr!
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Flatwound strings preference
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