OT - guitar shopping - best direction?

[ethrbunny]

The guy Im playing for / with at the moment is big into surf and twangy country. As a result Im shopping about for a telecaster with a bigsby (oh darn!). Im v reluctant to buy a guitar without hearing / playing it first but the mail order prices are hard to beat. Has anyone had success / horror stories they can share with me on this? Got a tele with a bigsby - what do you think of it?

Thanks.

[SirPoonga]

Guitar store nearby you can try one?  If they don't have one in stock see if they will get one.  My local store is pretty mice that way.  You request something he'll see what he can do.

[jayp5150]

I have mail-ordered a couple of guitars, and have had a good experience.

One of them I did try out in a store first, though.

The big thing with mail-order is that you will need to get a good setup once you have the guitar.  They ship these things to you right off the shelf, where as a store will usually do a nice neck/action setup first.

If you're a good neck and setup guy, I wouldn't worry (I am not, however...).

Also a lot of places give you a 45 day return policy.

And, you can always trust a Tele (biased statement ).

I think there's a Bigsby Tele down the street from here (Willis), if I get to try it out, I'll let you know.

[Nasse]

Guess the basic sound is ok but imho Bigsby is not quite so easy or "smooth" to control than standard strat vibrato bridge, little different feel and results, but don´t believe me I have never really owned a decent bigsby

[petemoore]

OT?,,,'nah' anyway...
 Dan Erlewines Guitar Repair Method...in depth understanding of what makes guitars 'tick' is mixed in there, but how to do fretwork has been of great value, I do all my own luthiering lately, from fret redressings to whole guitars.
 Doing your own luthiering ... Valuable asset, very valueable.
 On 'very expensive' guitars, at the factory they do e'm like they used to...laying out fret files and measuring devices of various length, setting the neck in a tension jig, eyeing it etc. to make the guitar feel like a pro when you pick it up in the music store....very labor intensive and time consuming tasks...working the nut down [just far enough...too far means start with new nut] redressing the frets...etc.
 All that said here's the advice:
 Choose the wood you want, type of guitar and shape, learn how to rewire and redress it, and you won't have to pay factory pricing for same.
 At your own risk...it's easy...after you've re-read through Dan's book, and with your knowledge of trouble spots on the neck...I feel you can do as well or better...[caveat emptor] experience DOES count for something...I tried it on a 'cheepy' first...excellent results consistantly using Dans method.
 Newer Mfg. techniques and standards allow Mfr.s to simply 'slap the frets on and ship it'. And they do amazingly good lineups, [sometimes] considering no redressing and very little setup work is done...
 With less exp guitars, there is almost certainly going to be room to lower the nut [they leave 'em a lil' high...lil' low and the string will touch a fret instead of the nut]...also, the frets can be made to be a touch or two closer to the same height as adjacent ones...the necks are usually Dern straight [when they're new, old woods don't move so fast like newer guitar necks IME], and a light retouch dressing of the frets should be easy and remove little fret material. So with a little work, a factory neck can be made 'PRO'.
 So...I bought an LP [Epiphone/Gibson], and replaced with Dimarzio pickups, redressed the frets, lowered the bridge and nut CONSIDERably...
that was a couple redressings ago...now I'm on the last bits of fret [new frets before next redressing cause they're low...]. This guitar now plays like that old LP I tried long ago, [ya know...the one that left an impression as the best guitar anyone ever played]...all slinky and EZ feelin'...
 Nothing like playing freshly redressed frets, I say get a factory neck, redress it, set it up the way you want, and save yourself about 1000 buxx.

[ethrbunny]

Ive played tele's before - thats not really an issue. I spoke to a few locals and it looks like it will run me about 200$ to retrofit with a bigsby. I don't know much about different woods for the bits though. Or whether to stick it out for a full US version or to go with Japanese, Mexican or a "California" which is apparently a hodge-podge of bits.

Not sure if Im up to actually doing my own fret dressing!

Ought to be interesting. Thanks for the input.

[nightingale]

ethrbunny,
i own 3 tele's. one is an american standard, the other a 52 RI, and the third is a swamp ash tele made from all warmoth parts. [about $500]

for playablitly, it's a pretty close toss up between the white american standard and the 52 RI. the warmoth is great but i find myself adjusting/intonating it 3 times more frequent than the others.

to be honest, the white 1999 american standard i have has been the most low maintenance guitar i have ever owned.

i have seen the new tele's with the bigsby. they are pretty neat, just for the record bigsby makes a special tremelo just for the tele. it surrounds the bridge p-up.

the neat thing about a bigsby is that you can pull up, and down on it. i have a freind who swears that the xtra length of the strings that his bigsby adds, gives his guitar more sustian. i'm not sure if i'm buying it tho..
hth,

[petemoore]

Ive played tele's before - thats not really an issue. I spoke to a few locals and it looks like it will run me about 200$ to retrofit with a bigsby. I don't know much about different woods for the bits though. Or whether to stick it out for a full US version or to go with Japanese, Mexican or a "California" which is apparently a hodge-podge of bits.

Not sure if Im up to actually doing my own fret dressing!

Ought to be interesting. Thanks for the input.

I think it's easy for me, because I've done it. Dan's book covers pretty much everything I know about electric guitar setups. Alot of it was EZ reading for me because I'd read and mulled it many times before [had GP mag subscriptions].
 Definitely alot going on with all the materials involved in a guitar, setting it up right you have to have solid background 'guitar anatomy' knowledge.
 I should say if you think you could do it, it's definitely worth getting in to.