[greco]

Looking forward to the pics. Please consider taking quite a few (we love pics), including closeups of the tuners, nut, frets, pickups, controls and inside the control cavity.

Once the pics are posted, someone should be able to help you with information about the model, etc.

The big question: Would it be worth it?

I think it depends on how much you want to spend on the (possibly/probably) needed parts, how much extra time you have to devote to it and your expectations of the final results of restoring it.

I would enjoy doing something like this and have bought some inexpensive guitars from Kijiji and brought them "back to life". I have the luxury of time as I'm retired and have quite a few hand tools, a dedicated bench for guitar electronics, etc. I also have several friends that do this type of thing and can go over my questions with them.

EDIT: This might interest you...
I found a Mansfield Guitar ?!

 

[greco]

Your guitar is in much better condition than I imagined before seeing the pics.
VERY NICE!!

Have you done any kind of work on guitars in the past?

Can you solder?

... yes, it is a "bolt-on neck" !! Bad, right?

Many Teles and Strats have bolt-on necks. They don't seem to be all that bad.
Some people even like them.
(I'm ducking the flames...LOL)

As I said, it would be nice if I could play it, and the fact that the pickups (at least one of them) seem fried at the 3rd and 4th strings ... could well be a shot in the dark.

It is interesting that only 2 strings are not sounding. I'm thinking it might somehow just be the ancient strings and not the pickups that are to blame.

I wonder if I can find some old/original/replacement stuff.

Personally, I wouldn't even try. I would work with what you have for now.

More questions:

How do the tuners look?
Have the plastic knobs on the tuners deteriorated? Do they turn smoothly?
How is the fret wear?...especially on the first 5 frets or so.

@laristotle is a friend of mine that has done a lot of of this type of "restoration" work with a variety of guitars. I'm sure that he (and hopefully many other forum members) will comment and make suggestions.

Sorry about all the questions. As you can tell, I like these projects and the challenges they present.

 

[greco]

Tap on the slugs with a metal object to see if it’s the pickup or the strings.

You beat me to it.

The results of the testing will be interesting as only one pickup is "symptomatic" and this assumedly a bar magnet.

Mysteries are so much fun.

 

[greco]

BTW, I'll have another piece of old (again) equipment that will need a bit of info ... old tube amp (head) from the late 60's!
Not even sure if it works ... haven't yet turned it ON, nor tried to.

@Frenchy99 is the fellow to talk to. He usually buys about one tube amp every week or so.

With any luck, he might live not too far from you as I'm quite certain he is somewhere in Quebec.

 

[greco]

He`s about 6 hrs from me !

Almost everything is at least 6 hours from the North Pole (Gotcha)

 

[greco]

@JacquesP
Did you test the individual pole pieces of the original pickups? How are they?

 

[greco]

This is totally messing with my head..

 

[greco]

Thanks Greco.
Well, what I did was to tap (gently) with a small screwdriver on each pole, one at a time, for each pickup.
There is "sound" coming from each pole, however, it is scratchy and very irregular: sometimes it does produce a sound, sometimes not and this is very chaotic/irregular as I tried it while turning the volume knobs.
Seems also that two poles on one pickup act very strangely ... sometimes it does produce some sound, sometimes not.

Seems like you will be shopping for some pickups.

Please keep us updated regarding the progress with bringing the guitar back to being playable. Thanks