Fender Am Pro II - new finishes

thegummy

@skunkwerx & @stickyfiddle ;

Maybe I haven't had a guitar long enough to get to the point of part of the neck changing its slipperiness and possibly when I do I might change my mind about smooth necks.

Doesn't rubbing it with sand paper or a scourer take the shininess back out though?

Headphones

Still no locking tuners?  What decade is this?  And how much?

Is it April 1st?

skunkwerx

thegummy said:

@skunkwerx & @stickyfiddle ;

Maybe I haven't had a guitar long enough to get to the point of part of the neck changing its slipperiness and possibly when I do I might change my mind about smooth necks.

Doesn't rubbing it with sand paper or a scourer take the shininess back out though?

Dunno! I’ve not tried any kind of abrasive measures. Maybe I will with some 0000 steel wool on me Ibanez. 

I’ve just looked over at me rack and realised 3 of the 5 have satin finishes lol.. 
Well, the tele only has a satin back of the neck.. 

skunkwerx

Just been checking some videos out online on them. 

Forgot they moved from Ash to Alder now for the bodies. 

I think it was 10 months ago now I bought my American Professional tele, and I think I paid around £1300 for it.  Ash I think.

 They never came down since, and I see b stocks still for sale at pretty much near that price. 

£1500 is pushing it a little though.
If I were in the market I’d just spend the extra £200 and get an Ultra I think..

Personally I’d rather they had locking tuners or an anodised scratchplate over the new switching system.. or the Mocha Burst finish. Seems like the gap between the Pro and the Ultra has narrowed, unless the Ultra’s are about to go up in price.. 

Though if you have a Performer and want to upgrade to a Pro, I suppose you get a few more appointments for £500 than you would have.

March

@skunkwerx I got to try an Ultra for the first time yesterday too. One big difference between the two is the necks, the Ultra is quite a bit thinner, you so notice that it gets extra attention though, the sample I played had a nicely rolled fingerboard. I loved the Cobra Blue finish.

BTW - nothing too weird with respect to neck finishes. Whilst I prefer the feel of satin necks, I am reminded that my number on guitar for the past 20 years has a gloss finished maple neck. If it works, it works.

Bigsby

That Miami blue finish would've been enough to tempt me into owning an American Strat again, but Fender have managed to put me off, which is probably for the best. 

Surely these are meant to be the 2020 'standard' for USA Strats? So why the faux aged plastics? Let's be honest, pale green pickguards and yellowish controls do not look good together, especially on a blue guitar. They don't even look particularly authentic in terms of aged plastic either - but I get that some folks like the look on their vintage styled 50s/60s/70s Strats. But this is meant to be a brand new  2020 Strat, at least give it matching plastic parts. This just looks like they need to improve the factory lighting because the workers are having trouble picking the right parts from the parts bin. Obviously the lighting is better in the Mexican factory: The Player range get parchment parts all round, as did the previous Standard.

And as a 2020 'standard', especially one labelled as a 'professional' why no locking tuners? 

No, sorry, £1,600 for a guitar only to replace tuners and the plastic parts with something that doesn't clash, that's no going to happen. 

But it is a nice blue on a Strat. 

LPManic

The Ultra is only a couple of hundred more. Surely it's worth the extra?

shaunk26

LPManic said:

The Ultra is only a couple of hundred more. Surely it's worth the extra?

That will be adjusted when the new variants of them come out no doubt.

Musicman20

I think they should be more bold with colours.

Go for typical old school vintage colours, then maybe modern takes (e.g. non-nitro) versions of things like Sherwood Green, then some sparkle colours like G&L and Musicman come out with. 

Whitecat

Musicman20 said:

I think they should be more bold with colours.

Go for typical old school vintage colours, then maybe modern takes (e.g. non-nitro) versions of things like Sherwood Green, then some sparkle colours like G&L and Musicman come out with. 

Gotta leave some for FSR runs...

stickyfiddle

I don't get the obsession with locking tuners. They add a bunch of cost and barely any utility - if anything they must often just confuse people more as tuning problems invariably come from nuts and poor string changing technique. 

TINMAN82

stickyfiddle said:

I don't get the obsession with locking tuners. They add a bunch of cost and barely any utility - if anything they must often just confuse people more as tuning problems invariably come from nuts and poor string changing technique. 

Agree. They add extra weight to the headstock too.

barnstorm

TINMAN82 said:

stickyfiddle said:

I don't get the obsession with locking tuners. They add a bunch of cost and barely any utility - if anything they must often just confuse people more as tuning problems invariably come from nuts and poor string changing technique. 

Agree. They add extra weight to the headstock too.

The vintage-style locking Gotohs they put on the CP 50s Strat were a good compromise in that regard, but the traditional split-post tuners are my preference, too. It's such a smart, simple design.

Only thing that really strikes me as worthwhile on these IIs is the option of top-loading on the Teles.

Bigsby

stickyfiddle said:

I don't get the obsession with locking tuners. They add a bunch of cost and barely any utility - if anything they must often just confuse people more as tuning problems invariably come from nuts and poor string changing technique. 

Obsession? Not sure about that...

These are instruments named 'Professional', rather than classic, vintage, historic, junior or student. Locking tuners are quick to use: string through the post, turn the thumbwheel, tune up in a turn or two. Perfect for a professional musician who isn't obsessed with historic detailing on an instrument. No chance of a poor restringing technique, and hardly confusing - if you've got a tuning stability issue you've one less cause to consider, so it should be less confusing! 

Cost doesn't seem to be significant - after all Reverend have them across their entire range - and they're not at the luxury end of the market. 

Certain brands are unnecessarily heavy, but even those are unlikely to cause issues with a Strat (different story on an SG!). I've played Strats from Japan, Mexico and the USA, and I've yet to play one with any kind of neck dive issues. Just fitted Ratio locking tuners to my MiM Strat - no balance issues at all.

stickyfiddle

Bigsby said:

stickyfiddle said:

I don't get the obsession with locking tuners. They add a bunch of cost and barely any utility - if anything they must often just confuse people more as tuning problems invariably come from nuts and poor string changing technique. 

Obsession? Not sure about that...

These are instruments named 'Professional', rather than classic, vintage, historic, junior or student. Locking tuners are quick to use: string through the post, turn the thumbwheel, tune up in a turn or two. Perfect for a professional musician who isn't obsessed with historic detailing on an instrument. No chance of a poor restringing technique, and hardly confusing - if you've got a tuning stability issue you've one less cause to consider, so it should be less confusing! 

Cost doesn't seem to be significant - after all Reverend have them across their entire range - and they're not at the luxury end of the market. 

Certain brands are unnecessarily heavy, but even those are unlikely to cause issues with a Strat (different story on an SG!). I've played Strats from Japan, Mexico and the USA, and I've yet to play one with any kind of neck dive issues. Just fitted Ratio locking tuners to my MiM Strat - no balance issues at all.

I think you give people far too much credit. 

I agree they're neat, but I don't believe the extra 20 seconds per string saving is worth the extra weight and cost. And I had a guitar with locking Schallers for years. 

DrJazzTap

That miami blue is lovely, I get confused with the model names now. 

stonevibe

I agree they're neat, but I don't believe the extra 20 seconds per string saving is worth the extra weight and cost. And I had a guitar with locking Schallers for years. 

The basic Fender tuners they have on also weigh a lot, so it isn't really an issue with weight. Nut locking tuners are great when I'm gigging a lot and doing lots of string changes.

thegummy

stickyfiddle said:

I don't get the obsession with locking tuners. They add a bunch of cost and barely any utility - if anything they must often just confuse people more as tuning problems invariably come from nuts and poor string changing technique. 

I really don't get all the negative posts about them, other than the obvious thing of people justifying their own decisions.

They don't cost that much more than normal tuners and very clearly have a benefit.

The argument seems to confuse necessity with functionality - most things we buy in general aren't necessary, they just make our lives easier or better.

It's like being against buying a dishwasher because we can just wash dishes without them.

When you take the number of string changes over the whole lifetime of the tuners, it's quite a small price per change. But it's not zero so it's just another case of whether you want to pay for convenience or are you fine enough doing the chore that you prefer to save the money.

For me the difference between locking and non-locking (not the vintage split, the modern non-locking) is huge, I hate stringing on those but with locking it's a breeze.