Elusive rattling

[pmcqueen]

So my baby Tele has developed an odd rattling that I can't for the life of me seem to source. Of course, I am no expert and it could be nothing, but I am a bit concerned by it.
It seems to be coming from the neck, though I can't be sure of it.

The only things I've checked are the tuners and I've also gone through the entire control cavity to make sure there's nothing loose in there. Still can't figure it out. It doesn't seem to have any bearing on how the guitar plays, but it is NOT a cheapo guitar and I just get the feeling that something ain't right.

It is a Boogie Bodies custom Tele, regular 4-bolt Tele neck. The rattling appeared to happen randomly, though I do restring the guitar once a month so something may have happened when I was restringing it? I'm really hoping it isn't related to the truss rod. I handle the guitar like it is my baby, it has never been dropped or abused.

Any thoughts/suggestions on where to look next would be very much appreciated.

[frankencat]

Truss rod. Slap or knock on the the back of the neck with your fingers and see if you can hear it. It may also manifest itself as a weird overtone on certain notes. You can usually fix it by turning the truss rod slightly in either direction to take up the slack and stop the rattling.

[pmcqueen]

Yep, you hit the nail on the head. I tapped up and down the neck a couple of days ago and the rattling was pretty obvious.

What a pain! Any ideas what may have caused it? I mean I have had the strings off for lengthened periods of time twice since I got the guitar (once when I installed the Glendale bridge, once when I replaced the pickups - maybe ~2 hrs each time), and have changed the string gauge a couple of times to try and find what feels best, but other than that it has been all put together and stored in its hardcase when not being played for its whole life.

Looks like I'll be changing the strings again tonight. :)

Thx for your help.

[pmcqueen]

So it turns out this was a blessing in disguise.
The action on this Tele has always been extremely high, almost acoustic style. While I usually don't care about high action, the fact that this guitar has such a fat neck in conjunction with the high action made it a bit of a pest to play.

I flattened the truss rod a bit last night and let it sit for a few hours, the rattling was still there so I decided to just restring the guitar and hope for the best. Well, after letting it sit for another two hours or so with the new strings, and another thirty minutes or so adjusting intonation and action, I was pleasantly surprised to find that not only had the rattling gone away, but the action was significantly lower than it was before. No buzzing anywhere on the fretboard, no fretting out, string height is now much more comfortable with the fat neck. Woohoo.

It's the little things that make me smile.