[FrenchD1]

Ok, folks here's what I did:

The first thing I did was look up authorized Fender service repair people in the area. I was surprised to find that there is a place ran by a man named Doug called Dmara guitars that is literally 2-3 minutes from my house...basically right around the corner. So I got in contact with him and he has a shop at home and he is also the repairman at Sam Ash in Springdale so he had me take it down to Sam Ash for the repairs. So I took it down on Monday of this week and then I just picked it up today.

I had him do a standard setup and with this I had him put on thicker strings then what I usually use. Then I had him replace the bridge. The tele originally had the 6-saddle modern style bridge and I had him put on the vintage style bridge with 3 saddles...the bridge and saddles were like 40 bucks.

So initially when I took it out of the gig bag in the store everything looked great, especially the bridge. So I took it home and plugged it in and was amazed. I was not expecting such a HUGE change in sound for the better. I actually had to check the serial number to make sure it was MY guitar...and it was.

Needless to say, I'm very pleased. This guy does great work and is very knowledgable and I highly recommend him. Right now changing the pickups is completely out of my mind...no need to do this at all. I'm just blown away at the difference in sound and playability. I'm very very pleased.

Thanks to everyone for their advice.