tmessenger
Junior Member
There are a few acoustic telecaster-ish builds that have shown up on youtube that more or less mimic the Fender Acoustasonic. My build started in the left field and then progressed over into the right field (and no I'm not being political).
For some reason that even I don't understand I had a thought to build an acoustic tele with nylon strings and a piezo pickup under the top. Let's just say the tone was less than inspiring, nylon strings really need a big airbox to bring out their beauty, lesson learned.
So next up was a set of Ernie Ball Super Slinky 8-39 steel strings, this really woke up the tone, not loud or heavy on the bass side but very pleasing and fine for acoustic-only practicing. The Ernie's have the same string tension as normal nylon strings so they worked great with my lightly braced Sitka spruce top. (see top photo). The piezo was the next to go when I installed a scatter wound Alnico II humbucker. Oddly with the humbucker installed and most of the soundhole blocked the tone improved and the acoustic volume did not decrease, go figure!
I used a Paulownia wood body blank and a Guitar Fetish XGP maple/rosewood 21 fret neck with Kluson vintage style copy tuners. The neck is nice with good fret-work but it came with a very cheap plastic nut so I made up a nice bone nut for it. The finish is 5 coats of blond shellac, the guitar now plays great and is very light for an electric at 4 lbs 2 oz.
You know the old saying, "everything is cheap when you eliminate your own labor from the equation", all in I have about $240 for the parts. My wife bought me a Spark modeling amp as a pre-birthday present so now I'm ready to rock.
Tim
For some reason that even I don't understand I had a thought to build an acoustic tele with nylon strings and a piezo pickup under the top. Let's just say the tone was less than inspiring, nylon strings really need a big airbox to bring out their beauty, lesson learned.
So next up was a set of Ernie Ball Super Slinky 8-39 steel strings, this really woke up the tone, not loud or heavy on the bass side but very pleasing and fine for acoustic-only practicing. The Ernie's have the same string tension as normal nylon strings so they worked great with my lightly braced Sitka spruce top. (see top photo). The piezo was the next to go when I installed a scatter wound Alnico II humbucker. Oddly with the humbucker installed and most of the soundhole blocked the tone improved and the acoustic volume did not decrease, go figure!
I used a Paulownia wood body blank and a Guitar Fetish XGP maple/rosewood 21 fret neck with Kluson vintage style copy tuners. The neck is nice with good fret-work but it came with a very cheap plastic nut so I made up a nice bone nut for it. The finish is 5 coats of blond shellac, the guitar now plays great and is very light for an electric at 4 lbs 2 oz.
You know the old saying, "everything is cheap when you eliminate your own labor from the equation", all in I have about $240 for the parts. My wife bought me a Spark modeling amp as a pre-birthday present so now I'm ready to rock.
Tim
