Description

Hoagland Custom, located in sunny Fernandina Beach, Florida, has specialized in custom guitar wiring and pickup building for over 25 years… & we love what we do!

The original two-pickup Esquire wiring is characterized by the absence of a real tone control. Instead, the second pot acted as a blend or pan control between the two pickups, and this was only engaged with the 3-way pickup selector switch in the rear position. In May 1952, Leo modified the circuit to incorporate a true tone control by skipping the blend functionality and discarding any two-pickup combination.

Today, we know that it was not Leo’s idea alone, and this change was mostly made because of Bill Carson’s suggestions. Carson worked as a professional Western swing guitarist and was Leo’s favorite guinea pig for testing his Telecaster and early tweed amp designs. Carson never really liked the blender wiring on his Telecaster and came up with the idea to incorporate a real tone control.

This circuit is often referred to as the “dark circuit” or “Blackguard” wiring and was roughly used from mid-1952 up to late 1967. Within this 15-year period, the circuit stayed mostly untouched, but Fender changed the specs of the two capacitors several times over the years.

HARDWARE:

• chrome control plate, mounting screws (available but NOT included)
• black control plate, nuts, washers, mounting screws (available but NOT included)
• gold control plate, nuts, washers, mounting screws (available but NOT included)
• nickel control plate, nuts, washers, mounting screws (available but NOT included)
• Included hardware – dress nuts & washers, switch mounting screws
• optional “Pure Tone” output jack

AVAILABLE CAPACITORS:

• Sprague “Orange Drop” poly capacitors (2), as standard & no additional cost
• MojoTone Dijon Premium Foil/Film capacitors (2), $6 upgrade (From the manufacturer: “Mojotone Dijon capacitors are high quality foil/film capacitors made to our exact specification. We like to call them musical capacitors because of their good tone and transparency.”)
• Mallory “Mustard” caps (2), $8 upgrade
• Centralab “Royal Blue” mylar-in-oil capacitors (2), $26 upgrade
• Vitamin T “Silver Barrel” paper-in-oil capacitors (2), $28 upgrade

SWITCHING POSITIONS:

• P1 – Bridge pickup alone w/tone control engaged
• P2 – Neck pickup alone w/tone control engaged
• P3 – Neck pickup alone w/a bassy-sounding preset, no tone control

STANDARD INCLUDES:

• 2 CTS or Bourns Pro Series controls, volume & tone, 250k value, both audio taper
• 2 Sprague “Orange Drop” poly capacitors, .047mfd value
• 3-way lever style switch
• Switchcraft mono output jack
• Gavitt vintage style, cloth covered wire
• easy-to-follow wiring diagram
• tech support phone & email