Is there such a thing as a bad guitar?

skinfreak

I've been looking at some reviews of new, budget guitars and noticed that it is hard to find a poor rating. It seems that nowadays cheap guitars are made very well in the far east. Not perfect but it doesn't strike me as terrible.

I inherited a Hohner Rockwood LX250G which seems to have good reviews. Although I am not sure how old it it (10-15 years?), the hardware was all flaking when I got it and it needed a new nut. I changed the tuners and am in the process of looking at the pickups. There's a weird thing about the arched top in that it must be only a millimetre thick and has an air gap between it and the actual body wood but that inadvertently makes it acoustically loud for an electric. The neck is a clear issue though with at least 3 different woods being used for the fret board (the high frets alternate in colour) and the "binding" bleeding into the fretboard itself. But I know the guitar is recent.

So has anyone out there ended up buying a guitar recently that turned out to be a stinker? And why? 

crunchman

Most 3/4 style kids guitars are dreadful.

I'm currently trying to make a pink Encore that I picked up second hand playable for my daughters.

I know a young lad whose parents bought him a "Gear 4 Music" for Christams last year one that is absolutely abominable.  The intonation is way off.  It hurst my ears.  I don't know whether it can be adjusted properly or not.

guitars4you

crunchman said:

Most 3/4 style kids guitars are dreadful.

I'm currently trying to make a pink Encore that I picked up second hand playable for my daughters.

I know a young lad whose parents bought him a "Gear 4 Music" for Christams last year one that is absolutely abominable.  The intonation is way off.  It hurst my ears.  I don't know whether it can be adjusted properly or not.

I endorse that, certainly regarding most electric and steel strung models - you can spend hours trying to make something credible, then play a chord and it is still not in tune - spend a bit more they become acceptable - but the very low end tend to be better in toy shops

Overall budget guitars are better today than ever before, but there is a steep cliff at the bottom of the price tag were credible turns into ultra poor

skinfreak

I kind of have to get the Rockwood working as it means a lot to my wife but I do wonder if spending £150 in parts for a £50 guitar is value...?! 

RocknRollDave

Back in the post-war early beginnings of rock n Roll, you couldn't get US guitar brands, either because they weren't available full stop here or you hadn't a chance of affording one, but in this day and age where Epiphone, Squier,  LTD, PRS SE etc offer decent affordable versions of the main guitar shapes, there's no need for the nasty, cheesegrater planks of the 50's/ 60's to exist anymore., 

guitars4you

RocknRollDave said:

Back in the post-war early beginnings of rock n Roll, you couldn't get US guitar brands, either because they weren't available full stop here or you hadn't a chance of affording one, but in this day and age where Epiphone, Squier,  LTD, PRS SE etc offer decent affordable versions of the main guitar shapes, there's no need for the nasty, cheesegrater planks of the 50's/ 60's to exist anymore., 

I sometimes see some early European guitars from the 50's and 60's - granted we get hooked by nostalgia but some are absolutely s*it and unplayable - good action up to the 1st fret then harder to play

TimmyO

When Tokai started their modern, low-cost range there was a shop in Denmark St that had about a dozen identical looking LP copies all lined up on stands. I tried 5 of them - all dogs with basic flaws. Just horrid. 

I've seen some since that were fine though, but those <shudder> 

ICBM

skinfreak said:

I kind of have to get the Rockwood working as it means a lot to my wife but I do wonder if spending £150 in parts for a £50 guitar is value...?! 

There's no way it will need £150 of parts. Only the tuners and the nut may need replacing, the rest will be OK. The problem is the amount of work it may need to make it play properly - if you're not doing it yourself and have to pay someone, it will get expensive fast.

They're worth a bit more than £50 too, if you get one that's properly playable you can easily sell them for over £100. I think I got £129 for the last one I fixed up. (Or it might have been a Jim Deacon, but effectively the same thing.)

I also do quite well fixing up 60s and 70s cheesegraters . Likewise, with some work and a few appropriate parts - usually the trem tailpiece if it has one (replace with fixed), often the nut and sometimes the machineheads - they can be made surprisingly playable and often sound quite good in a 'trashy' kind of way.

Whitecat

I've found that many cheap bolt-on neck electrics can be made ok with some setup and TLC, as long as stuff is actually adjustable (ie, it's got a truss rod) and the wood hasn't warped or done anything silly. Have tweaked super-low-end stuff belonging to friends and relatives into a useable condition. Set necks can be trickier, they aren't as forgiving. You do run into some though that just won't intonate no matter who you punch (that Gear4Music might be a good example), and can't help but wonder if they are even constructed correctly in that case.

Tuners are usually a big problem, because it's a bit of a faff to change them out to better ones if the guitar isn't worth anything in the first place. They need to at least be average quality, but some are downright junk and move when you look at them funny.

Acoustics on the other hand - have played many that I just want to throw straight into a wood chipper when you know that no amount of anything can solve the action you could fly a jet underneath, bowed necks, horrific nuts, terrible tuners, etc.

ICBM

Whitecat said:

Tuners are usually a big problem, because it's a bit of a faff to change them out to better ones if the guitar isn't worth anything in the first place. They need to at least be average quality, but some are downright junk and move when you look at them funny.

I keep a vast quantity of scrap three-on-a-strip and single machineheads for this reason - by mixing and matching parts you can usually get something that fits. The strip ones are great, if the post spacing allows - because they cannot slip no matter how soft the headstock wood.

Whitecat said:

Acoustics on the other hand - have played many that I just want to throw straight into a wood chipper when you know that no amount of anything can solve the action you could fly a jet underneath, bowed necks, horrific nuts, terrible tuners, etc.

Yes, that's certainly true. If you get one where it would need a neck reset to get it even close to playable, it's game over.

Surprisingly this applies to some of the 'desirable' semi-vintage ones too - like a lot of old cheap Yamahas, which seem rated now for reasons I have never been able to understand. I'm working on one just now - even with the bridge shaved as low as feasible it will always have an overly high action, not helped by the S-bend in the neck, and it sounds like a plywood packing crate. But someone will pay for it because it's a Yamaha...

Danji

It seems like the magazines won't slate a guitar due to advertising revenue which would be lost if the guitar in question had a negative review.  This may not be true, I haven't read a mag for ages.

That said, I personally think that all guitars respective of price should be judged by their own merits.  I have a squire tele that is amazingly great to play, and I've played expensive coffee table guitars which felt atrocious.  There are a couple of brands that I don't like at all and wouldn't even consider trying them out.

mikeyrob73

I picked up a squire bullet strat a few weeks ago and I will be honest, since I got it it's been played more than anything else, it's really light and really resonant and it's also not really mine :-p

guitars4you

skinfreak said:

I kind of have to get the Rockwood working as it means a lot to my wife but I do wonder if spending £150 in parts for a £50 guitar is value...?! 

one advantage of the guitar shows I exhibit at - loads of spare used parts and I bet you could find some parts to 'hot rod' accordingly for not much money

I agree with @ICBM - if you can do the work yourself and learn from it then it will keep costs down - How do you think the hot rod car market started post war, when no parts around and 'kids' learnt the skill of customisation' to turn an old chassis into their own unique car - I learnt my initial bit of guitar skill on an old 'Grant' Les Paul from ICBM's neck of the woods - similar to a Columbus , Avon and Eros of the day - it is all I could afford but the skill was to improve it

professorben

guitars4you said:

skinfreak said:

I kind of have to get the Rockwood working as it means a lot to my wife but I do wonder if spending £150 in parts for a £50 guitar is value...?! 

one advantage of the guitar shows I exhibit at - loads of spare used parts and I bet you could find some parts to 'hot rod' accordingly for not much money

I agree with @ICBM - if you can do the work yourself and learn from it then it will keep costs down - How do you think the hot rod car market started post war, when no parts around and 'kids' learnt the skill of customisation' to turn an old chassis into their own unique car - I learnt my initial bit of guitar skill on an old 'Grant' Les Paul from ICBM's neck of the woods - similar to a Columbus , Avon and Eros of the day - it is all I could afford but the skill was to improve it

I used to have that very model, it's sounds bloody brilliant at volume, pop a decent bridge pup in it and it's s great semi-les paul vibe. 

Sassafras

RocknRollDave said:

Back in the post-war early beginnings of rock n Roll, you couldn't get US guitar brands, either because they weren't available full stop here or you hadn't a chance of affording one, but in this day and age where Epiphone, Squier,  LTD, PRS SE etc offer decent affordable versions of the main guitar shapes, there's no need for the nasty, cheesegrater planks of the 50's/ 60's to exist anymore., 

Try telling that to @HarrySeven ;

Corvus

I've just sold off this one - http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/93071/fs-cheap-sh-t-you-dont-want for the grand sum of forty one squid. I did think the body was probably ply, in which case your air gap might be some delaminating going on.

It actually plays pretty well, I did fret-level it but the neck has an inoffensive mostly-harmless profile. The machine heads are a comedy of errors. Thought the pickups were fairly OK, quite bright vs the usual mudbuckers of the cheap seat end of things. Didn't have it's own gravitational pull, sustained pretty well. Think this one was 80s-90s going by binding ageing.

TL:DR - not entirely terrible for a few tenners but I wouldn't pay more than 40-50, but can be made perfectly usable.

On the cheapie front my lad has a Crafter Strat copy, seen them go as little as £15 . When he was 14 he stripped it, painted it, we fret-levelled it together, he put a better trem on and rewired it with lipstick pickups and stratoblaster boost, he's gigged with it. It sounds great and plays fine, feels at least as decent as CV Strats and suchlike. Decent guitar after a bit of a fettle.

http://alleykat.co.uk/images/stuff/misc/N_strat_1.jpg

equalsql

Marlin Sidewinder.
I rest my case m' lord.

Bridgehouse

mikeyrob73 said:

I picked up a squire bullet strat a few weeks ago and I will be honest, since I got it it's been played more than anything else, it's really light and really resonant and it's also not really mine :-p

I've been hankering for a Fender Bullet bass for some time - same thing. Cheap, lightweight and resonant.

Jack_

I think @professorben has an answer.

ArchtopDave

Some years ago, I tried out a cheap archtop guitar. I think the brand was called Adam Black. Didn't buy it because the top E string was running along the edge of the fretboard, and the bottom E string was a long way from the edge. The Bridge had been glued in the wrong place.

ICBM

equalsql said:

Marlin Sidewinder.
I rest my case m' lord.

Objection. There was an excellent one in the shop a couple of months ago.

I don't just mean 'excellent for a Marlin Sidewinder', either - it was a really good guitar. I admit it had needed some work...

ArchtopDave said:

Some years ago, I tried out a cheap archtop guitar. I think the brand was called Adam Black. Didn't buy it because the top E string was running along the edge of the fretboard, and the bottom E string was a long way from the edge. The Bridge had been glued in the wrong place.

If it was an archtop the bridge would probably be movable.

Although I have come across a custom shop Gibson flat-top with that issue... caused by the neck joint being misaligned. For the thick end of four grand.