Guitar #059

Kaleidoscope Stereo Tele Electric / Acoustic

Completed Sept 11. 2018

Another newly completed guitar and my third stereo instrument. This one is equipped with a set of Fender - Twisted Tele Pickups, and a Fishman Power Bridge (which has piezo pickup embedded in the saddles). The magnetic pickups are routed to their own volume, while the Piezo is routed to an onboard preamp with it's own Volume. From there the singles goes out via a stereo Y- cable to two amplifiers - a normal electric guitar amp and an acoustic guitar amp. 
The trick is to balance the volumes of the two amps, then use the two guitar volumes to send the signal to the amps in various amounts, thus controlling and blending the tone to a new dimension, in addition to right hand technique, pickup selection, or toys.

The first thing any guitar fans will notice is the mixing of Stratocaster and Telecaster design elements, along with the big departure from the standard "bolt-on" neck joint.
At first glance, this guitar is a Tele when looking at the body. But a Tele has a completely flat body with small radius round-overs on the edges. This guitar has the added Strat like arm-rest, belly cut-out, and greater radius half inch edges. It also has a Strat shaped headstock, and a "Set-neck" neck joint. This type of neck joint feels much better in the hand, and gives greater access to the high frets, along with greater sustain.

The "Kaleidoscope" top of the body is made up of nine different types to woods, with a black dyed wood veneer between each section.
The fret board is an amazing birds eye Maple piece of wood recycled from some shelves over 50 years old.
The head stock is flame maple.

This close up of the head stock shows the flame Maple in the wood, as well as the birds eye Maple in the section of fret board shown.
The inlay materials include white Mother of Pearl (MoP), Pink MoP for the heart, Abalone for the Peace Sign, and Black MoP for the music note.

When an electric solid body guitar (or chambered, like this one) has the top made from different section of wood, it is called a "Drop Top" This drop top is 3/4" thick giving enough depth to be able to carve the arm rest without cutting into the backs wood.
This photo also shows how spectacular the fret board's wood is.

Another view of the drop top and also showing the carved transition from the neck into the body.

The body's wood is another departure form standard, using White Limba in this case. This wood is closely related to Mahogany, and was commonly used on classic Gibson guitars, not showing up on Fenders until much more recently.

Most White Limba just has a straight boring grain, but as I cut into this rough cut, oxidized and dirty board that I had in my stash, this board started to show a very tight flame pattern, and very even color. The flame is very unusual in White Limba. I also had a very nice flame Maple board ready to use for a neck. So this guitar just kept getting better and better.

Flame Maple neck, Flame White Limba body. String-through, set-neck. Fender tuners, and the black thing is the battery box for the Fishman Powerchip.

You wont see this again soon. You are looking at Flame White Limba. A little of the flame figure in the neck's wood is also showing up in this photo.

Flame Hard Maple neck, transitioning to the carved neck joint; no shape edges to bang your hand on as you reach for those high notes.

Specs
Neck	AAA Flame Hard Maple - set into body and carved heel.
Body	Chambered White Limba back, Drop top of Wenge, Black Walnut, Butternut, Cherry, Mahogany, Black Locust, Swamp Ash, Bocote
Fret Board	22 fret Birds Eye Hard Maple
Postion Marks	1/4" Abalone dots on top and 2mm dots on the side.
Pickup	Neck Position:  Fender Custom Shop Twisted Tele,   Bridge Position:  Fender Custom Shop Twisted Tele,  Fishman Powerbridge 6 Pesio sensors - one per saddle.
Tuners	Fender American Standard Tuners
Bridge	Fishman Tele
Nut	Bone
Controls	Chrome Tele knobs dual volumes through onboard preamp (9 volt) to Y cable sending to two amps,  Three ON/OFF rocker pickup/pesio switchs.
Head Inlay	Various natural shells  used in "Heart - Peace - Music" inlay
Truss rod	Dual Rod two way adjustable at the head.
Finish	Murdoch's Uralkyd - 500 Gloss

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