Tele sound: Bridge or pickup?.

[cephus]

Anyone ever put a tele pickup in a strat? I had heard that it doesn't really give the same twang as a tele without the tele bridge. Something about the way the pickup is surrounded by metal on a tele makes a difference. Does anyone know first-hand if you can get a reasonable approximation just by switching out the pickup?

I have a jaguar pickup in the lead position of my guitar to get a surf sound, which isn't super useful to me. I had a duncan quarter pounder for a while, which is a good pickup, but not very remarkable. Fatter sound, but not so different from a humbucker.

I'd love to get that tele twang thing happening, but it's not worth poking new holes in my pickguard if it isn't going to cut it without the bridge.

 

[Light]

It's both. The biggest thing, though, is the size, placement, and angle of the pickup. If you put a Tele bridge pickup in a Strat at the normal Strat angle (which is a lower angle), it will not sound like a Tele. Same with the bridge, but to a lesser extent. Most important, though, is that angle and the distance from the bridge.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi

 

[cephus]

Thanks, light. I never considered position or angle.

I don't have a tele here to look at (which is why I am exploring this mod). If you take a tele pickup and mount it so the poles line with the strings, shouldn't it be at the proper angle? I mean, if the angle is different, then the spacing of poles should be different and that may be why it didn't sound right stuck in the strat pickup hole.

Roughly speaking, is the tele pickup closer to the bridge or farther away? I built the guitar I am working with, so I have alot of leeway with the position of the pickups. IF I can get a closer approximation by repositioning the pickup, I can give it a shot.