So...
My first guitar was a 60's MIJ Teisco branded as Conrad, and I bought it decades ago in a pawn shop in Fort Morgan, CO for $35. I'm a lefty and never ran into a lefty guitar by that point, so I decided to try learning on this thing with the strings flipped. The bridge being a straight right-angle to the strings, I figured the intonation couldn't get worse. I did learn on it, but it was a nightmare to play. The neck lacks a truss rod, one tuner is missing its ferrule, and of course the intonation. One night, a drunk knocked it over, cracking the neck and that was the end. I didn't want to repair it, even though it was on a couple of recordings.
Today I decided I would pull those pickups for a transplant, possibly into a Liquid. I haven't decided whether to use all 3 or just 2 (I prefer 2), but might do the 3 because the Liquid in question is routed for 3. Before you ask, nope, they are not the same size or shape as P90s. I'll have to make a pickguard no matter what they go into. These just look like P90s, but they are smaller, and yet deeper. They do sound P90 like though, and they are unusually heavy. I'm not opening them up to see why, but I would guess it's the thick metal covers. When they go into another guitar, they won't be in the same order they came out of the Conrad - the neck pickup is much hotter than the other 2, I'm thinking it wants to be a bridge. Here's how they came out: Neck: 6.58K, Middle: 3.12K, Bridge: 4.24K.
If anyone thinks I'm a monster for parting out an old Teisco, trust me. There are reasons this one was a $35 pawn shop guitar, and I'm doing the pickups a service by mating them with a body and neck worthy of playing. The Teisco made me quit guitar for a very long time. The remainder of the Teisco will hang on the wall as a reminder, and if anyone looks it over in person and offers me too much for the husk, I'll let those parts go. Either way, it's best as a $35 set of pickups instead of a whole unplayable guitar.
Interesting side note. When desoldering the pickups, I noticed a .02 cap wired directly into the bridge hot side. I'm guessing they did that to brighten it (removing lows on the hot side. opposite of how caps are used in tone circuits).
!
