TeleAx-2

This one is for a friend of mine. It is a pre-painted Mighty Mite Telecaster body.

This one will look pretty much like a standard Tele until you look at the back. It's a

Variax sleeper!!  I wanted to try the Variax conversion on a pre-painted body

to see if I can do it without scratching the paint. This makes things MUCH easier.

No paint involved. Just rout the rear cavity, output jack, bridge pocket

and drill the bridge cable access hole and your ready to go. This body is ash, so

we'll see if the models sound different on this one versus TeleAx-1

which is alder. Here are some pics of the latest one.

I start out by drawing a line from the center of the 2nd string ferrule.

Now I measure out about 13/32" and draw a line to mark where the edge of

my template needs to be. This is important because this is where the bridge cable

 will pass through. If you rout too close to the string ferrules, the bridge

mounting screws will come through into the cavity, so be careful.

Since this is a pre-painted body, I taped up everything real well so the finish

 didn't get scratched from the router and flying wood. It gets messy quick!

Here I have the template taped on and ready to go. I am not routing this

 body for the battery cavity. I line the template up so the bridge cable

section is center (or somewhere near center) with the the 2nd string ferrule

and is out the 13/32" that I marked earlier. Keep in mind if you're using a body

with pre-drilled string ferrules, the string spacing can't be too much over 2-1/16".

This Mighty Mite body has a string spacing of 2-3/16". I can make that work

with the Variax bridge. 2-1/8" string through spacing will work as well.

The cavity rout is now completed. My template is for the outside edge

of the cavity only. I rout the circuit board stand-offs free hand (no template).

I just draw the stand offs in with a pencil once I rout down to where they

need to start. The stand offs start at around 9/16" down in the cavity.

Here I have completed the cover rout.

Try the cover out....

Circuit board in fits.

Here's what she'll look like from the front.

The Variax 5-way switch, volume and tone knobs will go on the chrome plate.

I'll put a dual concentric volume/tone for the passive pickups on there too. I'll

just need to place the model knob in a location that doesn't look too crazy. I'll

also add a couple mini-toggles. One for passive pickup switching and one for passive

or Variax selection. I have figured out which wire leads to the tip of the Variax

output jack. I'll be testing the passive pickups in the mix of things this week.
 

I have just completed the live tests of the Variax components mounted this guitar

and it works as well. I'm starting to get the hang of doing all of the routs now. This

one only took me two evenings to rout and put together. Since it was pre-painted,

that made things really easy to deal with. I'll be installing the passive pickups this

week and I'll let you know how it works. I have my game plan together on the pickups now.

 

Here's some more pictures of TeleAx 2. I put in a set of Fender Noiseless

pickups. The mini toggle under the 5-way is to switch between the passive pickups.

 Down is bridge, middle is bridge & neck and up is neck only. The other mini toggle

 is an A/B switch to go between the passive pickups and the Variax sounds. The dual

pot is volume/tone for the passive. Tonight I took that out and replaced it with a plain

 250K pot with no tone at all. The 5-way is the Variax 5-way switch. The other two

 knobs on the chrome plate are the Variax volume & tone. Last but not least is the Variax model knob.