Lightly aged or brand spankin' new?

jimistone

jimistone

long standing member
I'm going to build a high end 1959 strat clone. It's going to have the correct hardware, pots, wire, block and trem....right down to the pat. Pend. saddles with the correct stamp, tooling marks, and American standard non-metric threads (which I have to get from Europe...ironic huh?). I'm going to do a period correct burst in nitro laquer. Neck and body are going to be high end pieces...but the one area I might stray is I think I'm going with a 10" radius instead of the vintage 7.25 and I'm leaning toward a Wolfgang neck profile.
Will probably install the 57/62 fender pips in it...haven't totally decided yet. It's going to have an actual celluloid guard not one of those gawky fake looking mint green fender guards.

It's going to KICK ASS!!!

I am sure on almost everything on this guitar except this:
Should it be a lightly aged closet classic with oxidized hardware and some light playing wear and a slight bit yellowed....
Or a brand spankin' new '59 strat?

Back when I was giging every weekend it would be a no brainer..:..brand spanking new and naturally wear it. But I don't gig anymore so if I do it brand new that's basically the way it's going to stay from now on out.

What do you guys think?
 
Can you make some YouTube clips of the build process. I love watching people make guitars to learn ideas.

Good luck!
 
DrewPeterson7 said:
Beat it up yourself. I never got "relicing" - doing it the hard way was always so much more fun. :D
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I don't care for relicing either.
I wouldn't do a relic.
That being said if a brand new 59 strat had been stored for the last 50 years....
The hardware would be oxidized a bit the guard would have a green hue and some shrinkage. The red would be faded out of the sunburst.... So on and do forth.
It would be subtle ...a far cry from the tacky belt sanded and screwdriver dinged UN-natural looking monstrosities that haunt eBay.
But then again a lot can be said for brand new and shining like a 2013 penny.
I'm torn but I have to decide before I start getting parts because I'm going to buy them either new or aged.

I bought some repo pat Pend saddles for my '66....the American threaded tool marked high end ones. The finest out there IMO.
I ordered them "aged" and let me tell you...I was blown away!
Not only blown away by the absolute amazing accuracy of the reproductions but also blown away by the "aging" that was done on them. I can't tell them from the real thing and I have studied the real ones very closely.
There is no way I could replicate aged vintage hardware to that level so I will either order it to come on aged or brand new. I have to decide up front.
 
jimistone said:
That being said if a brand new 59 strat had been stored for the last 50 years....
The hardware would be oxidized a bit the guard would have a green hue and some shrinkage. The red would be faded out of the sunburst.... So on and do forth.
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It would, at one point also have been shiny and new.
Which would you prefer to have right now if you could go back in time?
 
I'm confused... you are considering to purposely faux-age the guitar for aesthetics? Did I understand that correctly?? :confused:

If you're building a guitar, make it look beautiful. Keep it beautiful. Let the oils from your fingers and the scratches from your pick age the guitar. It's a testament to your time with the guitar. It's a beautiful thing, man. Don't mess with nature. :D
 
Chili said:
I'm confused... you are considering to purposely faux-age the guitar for aesthetics? Did I understand that correctly?? :confused:

If you're building a guitar, make it look beautiful. Keep it beautiful. Let the oils from your fingers and the scratches from your pick age the guitar. It's a testament to your time with the guitar. It's a beautiful thing, man. Don't mess with nature. :D
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I agree with you. Here's the thing though. This project will cost me over a grand to do right. A lot of that cost is going to be using high end reproduced hardware, pots, and plastics that will be dead ringers for what would be on a '59 strat....and that all boils down to aesthetics dosen't it? I mean I can go with a high quality neck and body and build a killer strat with modern parts and save $400 or so.
For instance I can get a pick guard for 15 bucks instead of dishing out $50 for the right one.
I can get the entire block and trem assembly for $50 instead of dishing out $175 for a high end vintage repo block and trem with pat Pend saddles...if its going to be brand new looking who cares if the saddles say "fender/fender". I have enough black and red wire, pots, and a 5 way switch on my work bench to wire the whole thing up instead of springing for the period correct wire, 3 way switch, and pots. I could save money by going with a neck that had a truss adjustment on the neck instead of the heel.

My point is that I could do a high end strat that would play just as well and sound just as good for $700 to $800 as the one that would cost me $1100 to $1300.
If I'm not going to age it into a believable version of a '59 strat what's the point of spending twice as much?
That's why I'm torn on which way to go and it's caused me to rethink what I really want to accomplish with this project.... A killer strat for a lot less than A new one would cost or a time capsule of a '59 strat
 
people are giving you their answers ...... but you seem to want to convince them it'd be better aged.
So that leads me to think that you kinda want it aged but would like some confirmation on that decision.

You won't get it from me ..... I think ANY fake aging is silly and I love my guitars when they're brand new and shiny and if I could keep them that way forever I would except for the inconvenient fact that I gig the hell outta them.

But this is your guitar and it's your money. It's equally silly to let any of us have any input on something you're building for yourself and spending significant money on.
You should do what feels right to you ...... it doesn't matter what any of us think.
However if you're really serious about taking a vote .... so far it's 100% on the side of brand spankin' new.
 
I vote new and shiny too. I'm not impressed by faux patina. Even if I can't tell the difference.
 
I don't think in going to age it. I've also decided that I'm not going to obsess over nailing every little detail of a '59 strat. I'm going to build a killer strat with a vintage vibe but it's not going to be painstakingly specific to a certain year (like a '59 clone). I'm going to take my favorite features from the whole spectrum of vintage strats of various years...with some modern features like a 5 way switch and reverse wound middle pickup.

Actually lt boob is right. I had the jones to do a custom shop style time machine '59 strat down to the smallest minute detail and wanted the "hell yeah that would really be cool!" consensus.

Bottom line is this:
It would be a lot of fun doing the project but in the long run...
Does the end result justify investing twice the money to achieve?
I have about decided it dosen't.
Thanks for the input guys
 
jimistone said:
I'm going to build a killer strat with a vintage vibe but it's not going to be painstakingly specific to a certain year (like a '59 clone). I'm going to take my favorite features from the whole spectrum of vintage strats of various years...with some modern features like a 5 way switch and reverse wound middle pickup.
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that's the way to go ....... IMHO ....... what you're gonna have is something that's better than an actual '59. For example ...... you've already decided not to go with the 7.5" radius and to me those old 7.5" radius necks suck because as soon as you bend a string they fret out. And some of the other things you just mentioned are better features than on the original.
So take the very best of the best features and put them in this guitar and it'll be a killer strat that others will envy and you will love.

I look forward to seeing it!
 
This always seems like a paradoxical question to me, because every time someone brings a new faux-aged strat into the world, the coolness, mojo, and apparent rarity of the original instruments is somewhat reduced and/or cheapened. If you don't care about that, that's fine. To each his own. But, if you don't care about those guitars, why would you want one?
 
I also find it ironic that after Leo's people spent hours and hours trying to find the cheapest possible parts to make these guitars out of, there are now droves of people spending hours and hours trying to pay as much as possible for those same parts.
 
JohnWatkins said:
This always seems like a paradoxical question to me, because every time someone brings a new faux-aged strat into the world, the coolness, mojo, and apparent rarity of the original instruments is somewhat reduced and/or cheapened. If you don't care about that, that's fine. To each his own. But, if you don't care about those guitars, why would you want one?
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I don't agree with you at all. The fact that faux-aged strats are flooding the marketplace just proves that a lot of people think they are cool and rare. That increases demand for originals even more.
Much the same way that Nicholas Cage increases the coolness and desirability of a '68 cobra Shelby gt500 by running the dog shit out of a fake one in "gone in 60 seconds"
 
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jimistone said:
I don't agree with you at all. The fact that faux-aged strats are flooding the marketplace just proves that a lot of people think they are cool and rare. That increases demand for originals even more.
"
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yeah, I don't see fake things making the originals less valuable at all.
And personally, even if it did, why would I give the least little crap about that?
 
bongolation said:
That unless someone's giving you the parts, building is a terrifically uneconomic waste of time and money you'll never get back.
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That's pretty much entirely untrue.
First off building a strat is a pretty simple and easy thing to do.
And for someone that wants a custom git with the exact features he wants it's also not uneconomic. I have a partscaster I built ..... parts cost me around 400 bucks and for the exact git I have buying one prebuilt would be at least twice that
About as cheap to order the parts I want and assemble them .....
As for the amount of time it takes ..... except for the finishing part it's maybe a couple of night's work. Personally I'd get a body already finished but many people enjoy doing finishes on gits.
 
Lt. Bob said:
As for the amount of time it takes ..... except for the finishing part it's maybe a couple of night's work. Personally I'd get a body already finished but many people enjoy doing finishes on gits.
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Eh, Lt Bob beat me to it. :( But yeah, I'm refinishing a bass and the thought of how it's going to look has me so anxious, I bought a bass kit so I can start from scratch.
 
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