T-Bucket

The whole idea behind our « T-Bucket » model was to create a design that would be rooted in the tradition & at the same time grounded in the present.

Our first thought was to pay tribute to Leo Fender, the man who has changed the face of music 60 years ago with the timeless designs we all know…

Leo has always been the role model to follow, always moving forward in order to make his electric guitar more comfortable for the working musician and find new solutions to the related problems of his old designs. So we try to follow his steps and design what could be in our mind the « telecaster » for the new century.

”the project should take the direction of the   « neo vintage »”

As car design enthusiast , we start to envision that the project should take the direction of the « neo vintage » car trend, in the same way the « beetle » design was reworked to hit a whole new generation, keeping some unmistakable visuals that’s so close to our heart and taking them to a new dynamic looking level, reworking the ergonomic giving a new playing comfort and a more balanced instrument.

Our desire was also to brought to the game some « Gibson » pedigree for a more polyvalent tone palette that could satisfy both family fans with the choice of a 24 3/4″ neck scale for a less finger stretching action and some real special humbucker pickups that could provide some spanky vintage clean sound & that would deliver the goods with cranked rocking overdrive tones .

Being some hot rodding fanatics we decide to give a final little « Boyd look » to it, in fact the heroes of the hot rodding world always redesigning the image of the classics in a wilder sexier way, are one of the major influence in our designs.

Finally this guitar was build relying heavily on ZZ-TOP music as soundtrack to our work, and that seems to have found his way into it like a rattlesnake venom in our veins.

Neck

One piece european quartersawn maple with selected rosewood fingerboard featuring Tao custom fretting : we start with medium jumbo to the twelfth fret, and finish with smaller ones, giving your fingers more space to play up the neck ; our single bar double action “carbon flex” truss rod ensuring neck stability and superior playing comfort. Body color matched headstock.

Body

Selected american red Alder body. Optional lightweight swamp ash body.

Hardware

Gotoh Vintage 510 H.A.P tuners with custom short brass bushings ; Glendale “half plate” cold rolled steel bridge with customised “cutting edge” saddles.

Electronics

CTS pots, 3 way Switchcraft switch with custom made button, Russian paper in oil caps, polished electro-socket output jack, custom wound Bare Knuckle Pickups featuring our trademark hand made covers. Optional custom wound Stephens Design pickups.

Finish

Automotive DuPont colors with matt lacquer.
As we love searching for visual striking colors, we’d be more than happy to suggest you some ideas.

Fully Handmade

First & foremost, all our instruments are fully handmade one by one by the two of us in our Brussels workshop.

We take every projects as unique, that’s why we don’t make guitars in series, every instrument as his own character, his own body contour or neck shape, custom color & hardware .

Construction

All our necks are quarter-sawn cut, for the maple ones we use European maple, mostly used in violins & other quatuor instruments making. Lighter in weight, whitish in color it as some gorgeous flame appeal and deliver a more open airy sound than his north American counterpart .

They also feature our trademark asymmetrical shape (round on the bass side, a lil’ flatter on the treble side ), super rounded frets & fretboard edges for a cool  » fits like a glove » feel.

We also do our custom fret job, that we start with a regular jumbo wire to the 12th fret & then going on with smaller ones toward the end of the fret board. This help push-pulls when the space between the frets are becoming to narrow.

We’ve also developed our own single bar, double action with spoke wheel truss rods which are machined by a custom race car parts workshop. We call it « the carbon flex » influenced by Steve Klein’s truss rod design, it consist of a multi layered wood/carbon heart for a larger push or pull than normal truss rods.

This prevent necks from twisting & other problems related to standard designs, it also makes the neck curb evenly through all his length, flanked with 2 carbon bars running from the 9th fret to the end of the fretboard, this helps getting rid of this fretboard end bump that gives us a hell with low action settings .

Our neck joints are tight as possible & hand adjusted.

We are doing our own little magic trick to give our bolt on necks the same sustain as their glue-on sisters, this is our trade secret & would not be explained!

Our wood choice for the bodies are :

- red alder

- spanish cedar

- lightweight swamp ash

- Honduran mahogany

- African Limba

Finishing wise we are trying to keep the layers as thin as possible to let the wood sounds and express itself to the max!

Hardware

Concerning the hardware we choose :

GOTOH 510 vintage H.A.P tuners , or « Stealth » (as on our « Pheaton »)

GLENDALE « half plate » bridge with intone « cutting edge » compensated saddles

COMPTON compensated bridge ( as on our « Phaeton »)

CTS pots which are selected with the best tapper, customized for smoother action & polished for a classier appearance

Russian N.O.S capacitors

Electro socket output

We would also make custom hardware parts as our own designed « BUCKET » bridge , pot buttons, control plates or decorative jewel as on our « El Mirage ».

For our pickups we are now enjoying a collaboration with Mr Dave Stephens of SD pickups.

After nine long years of research we think he reached the peak of what could be to our ears

the most touch sensitive & best sounding humbucker known to mankind.

He also make us his own incarnation of our «chicken strut» neck pickup in which he also put his little magic to bring it to a new level of sophistication.

Our custom SD pickups comes with our trademark « front grill » custom made nickel covers.

We always stay open for new project, special features, or crazy ideas in order to make creative and beautiful tone machines.

As we say « play a masterpiece, wear an attitude »

Serge & John