Mondo fake?

[Stratz]

The string looked wrong to me. Solder joints looked like they had been touched and the tape looked wrong too.
DCR was high for a '68. My guess is that it was a rewind with non original tape and string.

He had the body and neck for sale as well. If it was a fake I doubt the seller was trying to pull anything over on anybody.

[David Schwab]

A quick look on the web says felt tip pens happened in '62, but they had thick felt markers going way back before that.

Do you remember the "Action marker" with the comet on it? We always had those around the house when I was growing up.

I found this just now:



I used to use a blue El Marko to color frets when I was leveling them.

[Stratz]

If i close my eyes I can still smell the El Marko. Very strong benzine like smell.

[Justin Thomas]

In the interest of full disclosure, my bad! My Mustang Bass (11/67) has markered dwtes on it. D'oh! I'll shut up now...

One of many CBS era improvements? How do the added finer carbon granules affect the tone differently from the coarser pencil lead? Does the alcohol solvent take pff any plating and alter it?

Justin

[jason lollar]

"I have seen alot of vintage Tele bridge pickups with fat string like that, you only need to cruise Ebay to see different examples of vintage pickups from different years. Unfortunately there is no reference guide of what happened when. There are counterfeiters in Europe though, you do have to be careful, the lack of good hi-res photos and the marker writing is hmmmmm. The fact that the stagger is so uneven points to it being real. They did have markers back then, one of my interests is cartooning, and felt markers were being used in '68 by syndicate cartoonists. A quick look on the web says felt tip pens happened in '62, but they had thick felt markers going way back before that."

Dave
Maybe the string is correct- its hard to tell from a photo- looks fatter than any I have had in my shop and i have had probably a few hundred but I have seen some string a little thicker but never can be sure its original but aside from the string and the fact that felt pens existed at the time
How often have you seen a vintage fender pickups dated like that and how many have you seen that used something other than masking tape to insulate the magnets from the bottom plate?
All we really can do is guess at this point.

[Telemachos]

The prize it sold is pretty stiff even in Europe. I've seen a lot of gear from spain that I thought was fishy lately. The guy also sold a body which he claimed was 1968 too. The difference between the lighter parts beneith the pick guard area and the tanned areas look to different. Just my thought. maybe I'm paranoid. The body went for gold. Man some people step into things where angels won't.

[Telemachos]

...............Here's my used '74 P bass as it looks today (or as it looked in July 1996 anyway. It's a bit beat up today)


............

You're a bad man, but the bass guitar looks GREAT!! I usually don't like any other than classic orig. design, but this one rocks. A classic at its' own to say so.

[Possum]

Jason, I personally wouldn't buy that pickup, there are what look like laser cut browning on the edges of the bottom flatwork too, but it could be crud from aging. But it could be real, maybe just an oddity, or could it have been rewound a little later? If I was going to buy something like that, I'd want the right to return it for full refund because the photos are crappy and ultimately you can't authenticate something with a photograph. I've been able to age baseplates like that and magnets too, and nope never saw tape like that either, the solder joint looks right, not many think to copy that. I would look at the seller and see what other stuff he is selling, and his feedback. If he's got a bunch of other suspicious looking pickups, I'd say forget it. I've seen some that had really thick string that almost looked not braided, but only in photos. Personally, I think staggered Tele bridges suck, with the high E string pole being way lower than the high poles you never get a really nice bite from that style, so I woudn't want one because of that.

[J M Fahey]

FWIW in 1968 I was finishing High School and a "Rich Daddy" guy brought a box of 6 (count'em) coloured felt pens.
Being a nerdy technocurious kid I immediately borrowed them to test.
And mind you, they were Argentine made, so they must have been available in USA or Europe since at least a few years earlier, until a local maker decided that it was commercially interesting making them here.

[Telemachos]

.....Personally, I think staggered Tele bridges suck, with the high E string pole being way lower than the high poles you never get a really nice bite from that style, so I woudn't want one because of that.

....it's all a matter of taste. I think staggerd PU are cool. The Fender admins were no fools back then. To me the staggered design makes perfect sense to bring up the inner strings and to soften the ice pick thatb the infamous e-string can cause. Strumming chords on "Broen Sugar" can't get any better w. this staggered design.

[David Schwab]

....it's all a matter of taste. I think staggerd PU are cool. The Fender admins were no fools back then. To me the staggered design makes perfect sense to bring up the inner strings and to soften the ice pick thatb the infamous e-string can cause. Strumming chords on "Broen Sugar" can't get any better w. this staggered design.

The staggered design was made for the strings they used back then, that had wound Gs. When I play a Strat with staggered magnets the string to string balance sounds off. Fender changed their stagger a few times as the types of strings changed. Later on Leo stopped doing it altogether.

[Leo_Gnardo]

it's a small small small small world

I grew up in Orange, on the border of West Orange, down the street from the Edison museum. I had friends that went to school in WO. Wonder if he have any mutual friends from back then? Now I'm on the edge of East Orange and right down the road from my old neighborhood. Kind of funny how that worked out. I can walk down the street and point at buildings and lots and say "used to play in a club here, used to date a girl there..."

Yup there was Tory Corner at one end of Main St, Llewellyn Park up the hill for the mondo rich set, Town Hall & Annie's Clam Bar at the other end of Main St. And just about on the Orange - West Orange town line, Jimmy Buff's for the most satifying greasy sandwiches.

That northern "spike" of East Orange near your present neighborhood, is where my pediatrician's office was.

All that, and who showed up on my doorstep this morning with his latest gadget for me to fix? Marshall Crenshaw.

Small world, innit?

We've sort of semi hijacked this thread but you're the moderator so it must be OK.

Feel free to email me David, & we'll reminisce in detail.

[David Schwab]

Yup there was Tory Corner at one end of Main St, Llewellyn Park up the hill for the mondo rich set, Town Hall & Annie's Clam Bar at the other end of Main St. And just about on the Orange - West Orange town line, Jimmy Buff's for the most satifying greasy sandwiches.

That northern "spike" of East Orange near your present neighborhood, is where my pediatrician's office was.

All that, and who showed up on my doorstep this morning with his latest gadget for me to fix? Marshall Crenshaw.

Small world, innit?

We've sort of semi hijacked this thread but you're the moderator so it must be OK.

Feel free to email me David, & we'll reminisce in detail.

And don't forget Star Tavern pizza. I lived right around the corner and down the street. They are still there.

How long since you've been here? Jimmy Buff's is still open. Town Hall & Ann's Clam Bar are long gone.

[Telemachos]

The staggered design was made for the strings they used back then, that had wound Gs. When I play a Strat with staggered magnets the string to string balance sounds off. Fender changed their stagger a few times as the types of strings changed. Later on Leo stopped doing it altogether.

I kinow, that this was the main reason. I still think that the longer magnets are beneficial with a 7 !/2 " radius neck. It's not perfect, but to me it sounds better than the flat pole design. The low E and A string can be a real problem on older telecasters for instance. There these are way too boomy. With a stagger design I like to lower the PU at the low string side to compensate. At the same time the rest of the strings won't be too far away.

[David Schwab]

The low E and A string can be a real problem on older telecasters for instance.

This is why I like to angle the pickup in the other direction. The angle they use on Teles and Strats is another anachronism. It makes the treble strings too thin and the bass strings too woofy.

I also don't like 7 1/2" radius fretboards.

I did a set of 5 string Jazz bass pickups for someone recently, and he wanted the magnets in a slight arch to match the fretboard, but also wanted less output from the B and E strings, so I made them flush with the flatwork, so they were below the plastic cover, and raised the rest slightly. So doing a stagger that actually makes sense is better than just following tradition IMO.