Based on the holes, I'd say that this is now on its 11th bridge. How on earth they finally settled on putting a wrap-around in a seemingly random location, I have no idea. It's bottomed out and still has 1/2" action at the 12th.
It also has holes where there was a thumbrest installed. Because at 22.7" scale length it's understandable to mistake it for a frikin jazz bass.
In fact, there's basically holes everywhere. It must have been through a handful of pickguards, and they settled on one that doesn't fit properly, attached with screws that have heads as big as dimes, and that overlaps with the control plate. The control plate was also masterfully installed to allow free air flow into the control cavity. No longer will I play in fear of my electronics overheating and causing by guitar to reboot unexpectedly...
It's also been sanded down to the primer, and a little beyond in some cases. It was originally black, which I can tell because clearly a belt sander can't reach *everywhere* on a guitar.
No idea what humbucker this guitar got slammed into. Can't really test it because the wires go up to the non-existent pickup selector. Plus, the acoustic strings it came set up with probably won't do the misc humbucker justice.
On the plus side, aside from some light relic'ing, the neck is great. Tuners seem fine.
So, my overall plan is to turn this into a spunky little punk rock machine. But not the "hopped up on crack and heroin" type of vibe it's got going on right now.
I've ordered the proper pickguard (in white) from WD Music. In the mean time I'm grabbing some toothpicks, wood glue and bondo to start filling in the damage.
I haven't had any luck sourcing the original bridge that would have been on these (other than the original '60s ones for $$$). I'm not looking to do a fancy restore, so I'll probably end up just get a simple hardtail like the wilkinson cut tele. I'll see once I've got the pickguard roughed in exactly what kind of space I've got to work with in the bridge cutout.
I'm not sure about the pickups, or even if the single coil is original. I'll do some digging around the local second hand shops here and see what I can find. I'll probably try it S-S at first before I go carving into my brand new pickguard to try to fit a S-H.
I'm still in the air on refinish color, but I'm also still trying to source good paint here in Ottawa/Canada.
Anyhow, it's going to be a fun project, I'll try to keep this thread updated!
