This Tele has my favorite Squier logo. I've replaced the stock 500k pots (Mighty Mite or Alpha I suppose) with CTS 250k pots and the stock Cor-Tek switch with a CRL. I replaced the stock saddles with Gotoh chrome plated brass saddles. I like the stock Mighty Mite AlNiCo pickups.
In addition to (and an easier quick check than) the neck heel/pocket method:
Serial numbers on Protone Teles I have seen start with y or KCyy where y or yy indicates the year. Mine and other '97s I have seen start with KC97. I know I've seen some that started with 6, I haven't seen any starting with 96 or KC96. 1st letter is country of manufacture, second letter is company/plant of manufacture (KC, K for Korea and C for Cort on all I've seen).
This pattern is used on most of the more recent production Squier Teles I've seen. But the CV Teles (at least the first wave of them) had more letters at the beginning, C followed by GS was common. C in general means China, but as used in Squier Tele serial numbers that can mean either Taiwan or Mainland China. CY Affinity Teles are (according to a Chinese poster here) made at the Yako plant in Taiwan, while the CGS CV Teles are made in Mainland China, but I don't know what company(ies)/plant(s) make them.
I edited this to correct my statement on what I had seen on 1996 models.
Last edited by yegbert; 01-15-2010 at 08:38 PM..
Reason: correction re 1996 year Protone serial numbers
It's interesting that on mine - on the back {Heel} of the neck, it has the "Crafted in Korea" and then the S/N as stated above. No Letters or other designations. I am Assuming that according to Rockape that the Thinline Protone Telecasters where made 1996 - 1998?
Sorry guys (my bad!), on the 'butt' of the neck you will find the month and year of the guitar's manufacture....the serial number on the heel will only give you the year.
The Pro Tone range was made between 1996 and 1998.
The body looks as if it is a single solid block of wood. Is it?
No. It has a two piece top which meets between the third and fourth strings, sitting on a two piece bottom which meets between the 5th and 6th strings. The bottom is the thick, main piece of the body and the top is a relatively thin piece. Neither the top nor the bottom are bookmatched, but the two sides of the top have a similar pattern and a good symmetry. On the back, the side with the 6th string has a straighter grain than the other side. You may be able to see this if you look closely at the additional two pictures of mine I've attached here.
I can't imagine how an electric guitar body could be made from a single solid piece of wood, and that block of wood kept essentially intact and only carved out to have hollow parts similar to this design. I think at a minimum, one would have to slice off the top (or back) of a solid piece of wood so the thicker half could be routed to form a cavity, and then the two pieces glued back together.
Fender reportedly made the original Thinline Teles with a thin cap of wood on the back, and with three cavities, as shown in the picture below I scanned from the Tele bible. (That's either a lefty or someone flipped the picture so that it's a mirror image of a righty.)
I don't remember what the cavities are like under the pickgiuard on the Protone, whether they are sized and shaped like the original Fender design. I saw some pictures of a Squier VM Thinline and it was not routed out as much as the original Fender design.
There it is! I took the neck off mine and it's a January 97 Neck and Feb. 97 Body Looks just like the first one shown in this thread - Thanks for the help. Much appreciated. Mine also has a four way switch to allow you to put both the pickups in parallel or series. It's a nice mod - Allows you a bit of Humbucker sound. So now the Big question is keep it or sell it - I'm still trying to get a sound out of a tele that I'm comfortable with. It's hard to change us Strat guys!
Man, that IS beautiful! How do the 250k pots compare to the 500k ones? I didn't have my Protone long enough to find out (even though it was a Strat).
IIRC...
With the 250k as a volume control, the volume decreases quicker (more decrease with less CCW turning). I prefer that to the more gradual dropoff I got with the 500k. And something about the tone change as I turned down the volume didn't seem as natural to me.
With the 250k as a tone control there's less treble headroom on the tone control. The 250k gives me all I need. I most often leave it at 1/4 turn down from max CW. But when I do vary it the range I find useful is now spread from max CW to about 1/4 turn down from max CW. With the 500k, the equivalent of having the 250k at 1/4 down was at a lower point down and it seemed more touchy so it was difficult finding that sweet spot, and my useful range was in a narrower band that was also harder to find.
I don't think 250k pots for single coil Teles compared to 500k pots are universally better (better for everyone and every application). If yours don't seem to provide you the control you want and you're curious, experiment and determine which ones are better for your needs.
I've recently made a couple of changes to the bridge that I didn't cover earlier.
The saddles that come on them are ~ 10.8mm wide. So they are made to provide a string spacing of 10.8mm and a total string spread of 54mm. That's consistent with Fender vintage specs and a comfortable spread for me.
Unfortunately, the string through holes on the bridgeplate are more widely spaced, and they are larger than necessary. The result is that the saddles don't sit snugly together. It looks sloppy to me and my theory is that they work better (contribute to a better sound) when they sit snugly together.
I filled the holes with JB Weld and then redrilled the holes to be slightly smaller with the hole centers spaced 10.8mm apart and slightly farther from the neck.
The reason I place them slightly farther from the neck is that on the 6th string, correct intonation often means the string is pulled backwards, slightly towards the neck to get into the string through hole. Those holes didn't need to be placed quite that far up on the body. My hole centers are still within the space of the original larger holes so I'm not so much moving them down as I am keeping it from getting moved up and making the string any more bent backwards.
And then I installed a set of Gotoh chrome plated brass saddles. I would have used gold plated saddles except that the only source I have for those in a Japan web site and they are more expensive than Stewmac. The Gotoh saddles are 10.8mm wide like the originals, but they are 24mm long whereas the originals were 20mm long.
I think it actually sounds a little better with the saddles fitting snugly and also with the brass saddles. I've swapped back and forth between the Gotoh brass and the originals. And I had compared one Squier Tele with the saddles snugged up by my mod, to another one with the bridge unmodified. The original saddles were not magnetic, based on their light weight I assume they are pot metal but I'm not sure. I also tried some of the formed steel saddles like you can find sold by GFS. And on other Squier Teles I've drilled this type of bridgeplate and fitted it with 3 saddles instead of 6.
(I like experimenting with Tele bridges!)
I'll take some closeup pictures of the bridge to show the modded holes and the new saddles.
And for comparison, here's my 03 Squier Standard with its bridge still in its original form with the large and widely spaced holes and the original saddles. Other than the different color plating, this is the equivalent of my original Protone bridge.
Wow! That is a nice looking Tele. I've owned four different Protone Strats and they've all been great. Especially the one I let my son have. Flamed maple neck..nice guitar. I'm going to sell the white Potone Strat I have now to raise some needed cash. Probably around $300 plus shipping. Vintage whilte with a matching headstock and a red tortuous guard.
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Protone Thinline
