<veer>that's saying something considering the corners Leo cut
I'm going to have to stop you right there.
Leo was thrifty, sure, but he was never cheap. There is a reason that there are lots and lots of old Fenders around, and not very many others. Most of the others fell apart, and/or were thrown away. Leo would save a penny where he could, but he would never sacrifice tone, ruggedness, reliability and serviceability. He knew where it mattered. Take Leo's classic 5E3 narrow panel Deluxe circuit, bottom of the 'Professional series.'
Leo specifies a 0.0005 uF silver mica capacitor for the tone circuit. If he was cheap, he could have easily put in a ceramic disk capacitor there at 1/10 the price. But given the capacitors of the day, the silver mica one sounded better in that position. So he specifically put it in there, even knowing most professionals would be playing Supers. Pros, Twins or Bassmans, and not this step-above-a-student model. But he doesn't put silver mica anywhere else. Because he didn't detect a difference, and wasting money where it didn't belong didn't provide any benefit, and kept him from providing value to his customers. That's also why he used Jensen speakers, and Triad and Schumacher transfomers. They weren't the cheapest, but they were the most reliable and sounded the best.
</veer>