1968 new concept development for the Telecaster-4

Circa late 1967 to early 1968 new concept development for the Telecaster. It has two split coil pickups and active electronics. Truly next level stuff at the time.

Tonight I’m going to focus on the technology in his bridge design. While i imagine it would be impractical to execute in production (I wouldn’t want to sign up for this), the amazing thing to me is seeing him explore technical concepts that I understand influenced his bridge designs of the ‘70s and ‘80s.

Note the saddles are barrels with intonation screws approaching from the opposite direction. Already a little weird. Now see how the strings go down metal bars that are not part of the plate itself. I’ll post a look underneath shortly so we can understand Leo’s CLFR future tech of the late ‘60s.