Main Description

This pickguard is suitable for the Fender® Thinline® Telecaster®.

The Thinline® was first issued in 1969 and is a semi-hollow guitar. At the time of the guitars’ inception the light ash typically used was becoming hard to get hold of, so heavier alternatives were used, meaning the design had to change to keep the weight down.

Whilst over the years variations on the Thinline® have been made, this pickguard is ideally suited to the 1969 original or similar reissues.

The plate itself follows the curve of the guitar, and is designed to accommodate one tone and one volume knob, as well as a three way switch. You also have a single pickup route in the neck and space for the bridge to sit against the plate. True to its original design the pickguard has a twelve hole mounting pattern.

Fender®, Squier®, Telecaster® and Tele® are registered trademarks of Fender Musical Instruments Corporation and Axesrus® has no affiliation with FMIC

Other Part Compatibility

For some unfathomable reason, the humble Tele® has seen more "factory" modifications then any other guitar i can think of - from the glaringly obvious, like dual humbuckers fitted with locking tremolos, to the frustratingly subtle (different size control plates or bridge routes!) - so, just as a little bit of re-assurance, its probably worth listing a few of the common parts that interact with the pickguard here, that'll commonly turn up on the same guitars

Tortoise Shell Explained

You’ve probably noticed with the pickguards, we do A LOT of different variations in tortoise shells – and even then, we barely scratch the surface when it comes to completing the line-up.

Basically, Tortoise shell, originally, way back when, when it first started (long before the electric guitar was a thing) was just that – pieces of a tortoises shell, fixed together into a shape, and polished until semi-transparent (some of the early acoustic pickguards were actually made this way)

Now, obviously, none of us want to see a return to those practises, but seemingly, everyone liked “the look” – so with the advent of plastic in the early part of the 20th century, science found a cheaper way (it wasn’t until the seventies when trade in hawksbill turtle (the main source of Tortoise shell) shells became illegal!)

The first “plastic” Tortoise Shells were made from Nitrate plastics, usually Celluloid – and, frankly, it’s pretty gorgeous! Its semi-transparent, it’s got a sort of leopard skin look to it, and it soon worked its way onto guitars (again, most acoustics)

The problem is – Celluloid plastics are astonishingly flammable – they have a low point of combustion, and once they’re burning, they don’t go out until the fuels gone, or they flame is deprived of oxygen. As you can imagine, no one really liked working with Celluloid. It was risky to use (cutting = friction = heat) it was dangerous to store, and it wasn’t really suitable for the job at hand ( it changed colour when exposed to sunlight, it warped, it shrank, it was generally, pretty badly behaved!)
Never the less, it did eventually find its way onto electric guitars by the late 50s and early 60s, but was soon replaced for something more suitable and much safer.

Nowadays, you see Tortoise shells in either Polyoxymethylene (more stable as a material, but still very flammable) or PVC (which is fairly bomb proof, but does give off toxic fumes if burnt)

Now, getting to the modern day – Tortoise shell comes in 5 “variants” for us (ignoring the Celluloid offerings, they’re still out there, and great for historical accuracy, but just be VERY careful with them – not only in buying them/storing your guitar once its fitted, but also in actually sourcing the stuff, we’ve yet to find a factory who will even consider making a plate with it (too big a fire risk) and even when we do, its very cost prohibitive (more expensive to buy the things then we could ever dream of selling them for!) – there are guys out there making them though – but as a rough guide, expect to pay upwards of £150+)

Pearls Explained

Pearloid plates are similar to the tortoise shells, but theres a little less subtly between them, and they dont really have anything overly interesting in their history - as far as i can tell, they're always been PVC, and the variations in colour and pattern are pretty easy to follow.

So lets take a closer look.

"Whites & Creams" Explained

Ok, even i'll conceed that this isn't the most thrilling of toics at this point, but there is actually plenty of confusion when it comes to the "off white" pickguard colours, so seeing as we're ticking off pearls and tortoise shell varients, we might as well address the parchments, mints and creams too.

So lets get stuck in