Telecaster

Telecaster is a guitar model designed and produced by Fender. The telecaster is a solid-body, dual pickup, electric guitar. The telecaster was a very simple design, but it was powerful. The telecaster set trends in music involving electric guitar, and the Telecaster really sparked the rock'n roll period.

The telecaster has been sold since 1950 (not with the same name) and has not been changed since. Telecaster's are not only sold by Fender anymore, however. The design is used by many guitar manufacturers. Such as Jay Turser.

History
Fender's Telecaster was designed by Leo Fender, a radio repairman. 1932-1949, craftsmen and various companies experimented at solid-body electric guitars, but, none made a significant impact.

Leo had his own radio repairs shop. In that shop, he worked with musicians. Mainly with PA (Public Address) systems. However, he also created amps, and pickups for their semi-acoustic guitars. In 1943, Leo worked with Clayton Orr Kauffman to create a crude, simple solid-body guitar.

From then on, he began to experiment with electric instruments. In 1950, after all of his previous experiments and projects, the Broadcaster was made. Compared to his previous version of the telecaster, the Esquire, with no truss rod and it had only 1 pickup. The broadcaster had 2 pickups, and a truss rod. After 1950, the telecaster grew and its popularity was unmatched. From then onward, electric guitar's and their abilities grew from then on. Shortly after the telecaster came the Stratocaster and the Precision Bass.

The Telecaster has been in production since then, with very little changes. The Telecaster recently celebrated it's 60th anniversary.

Design
The Tele's design is very simple which added to it's overall success. With the ability to easily repair and mass produce this instrument, this made it cost effective. Using sold-body slabs of wood that were bandsawn and routed for the electronics instead of using hand carved bodies, lowered the cost and time of manufacturing significant. Also, instead of using glued-on necks, the telecaster used bolt-on. This made is much easier to take off to repair.

The neck also did not have a separate piece of wood for the finger board. Instead, it was a solid piece of maple, that had slits on the side of the neck for the frets to fit into. Typical guitars of that time featured rosewood or other types of woods that were glued onto the neck. This also reduced the cost to manufacturer.

Typical telecasters feature two pickups. Usually a two single-coils or one single coil, one double coil. If there were two single coils, the guitar would feature a twisted-tele single coil pickup, and a "lipstick" pickup. The telecasters' "control switch" had three selections. First position was the bridge pickup, for a higher, twangier sound. The neck position for the third. This created a bassier tone. And the second position is both the neck and bridge positions.