Chender, Part Two: Merleoid?

In the previous installment I took you through the ordering and delivery portions of my Chender project - my pioneer foray into the black market of counterfeit guitars. I bought a Chinese-made fake of the $6800 Fender Custom Shop Merle Haggard signature Tuff Dog Tele for the paltry sum of $237, shipping included. 

The first thing I wanted to find out was how GOOD are these bootlegs, really? How exact is this counterfeit?  Would it fool an expert?  An enthusiast?  or is it so lame that the joke is 100 percent on me?

Here in Part Two I’ll play the prosecutor, the assessor, the museum curator.  I’ll dwell on the negatives and show anything I could find that guitar falls short of the expensive “real” one - the stuff you can see easily.  Somewhere along the line I will also get under the hood.  Part Three will focus on the guitar’s strengths, and pull all this info together and tackle the question of what changes, if any, are needed to bring this axe into battle.

The guitar gave a very good visual first impression but to be honest, not a jaw-dropping, eye-popping one.  You’ll hear this again, it may even be a fair Cliff Notes summary of the whole experience.  Even if I could blot the $6800-vs-$250 issue from my mind, when I looked at this guitar I’d go “Nice!”  but not “Ho-LEE-shit...”

The first shortcoming I found was that the neck and fingerboard are of rather plain maple instead of the highly figured birdseye that Hagg specified.

Compared to photos I’ve found the Fender logo seems too far from the nut.  I suspect that even Fender may show minor production variations in this placement if you could examine enough stock, but I don’t think they would get this far North.  The string tee has been omitted, and there is also something wrong with the shape itself - it is a bit clunky, not graceful and slender like a Tele should be. Compare the space between the B tuner and the inward curve of the headstock. Chender not so slender. The string tee on the Fender mounts just under the dog's ear, but if I put a string tee on Chender it will go over his head. Also the E strings do not pull straight along the nut slots - they splay out slightly on their path to the tuners in a Gibson-esque way.

Chender: 

The real deal:

The gold tuners on Chender have matching gold knobs, rather than the pearloid specified by The Hagg himself.  Merle wanted pearl. Mearloid?

A closer look at the Headstock shows the dog to be less colorful than in photos of the Fender.  The Chender uses muted browns and tans, while the Fender seems to provide more dazzle.

While at the headstock I discovered the first thing that will need to be fixed before the guitar leaves the house.  Although the Fender logo, the dog, and Custom Shop logo are all nicely underneath the perfect glassy poly finish  the Merle Haggard signature is not. I can feel it on top of the finish with my fingertip and one quick (and foolishly misplaced) swipe with my thumbnail reveals it can easily be scraped off.  Reluctantly I’m going to have to shoot a coat or 2 of poly on top of it.

Another discrepancy is the bridge saddles.  Rather than the Fender’s six-way “P” shaped cast items,  Chender has a 6-way unit with thin barrel shaped saddles. 

It is obvious as soon as you pick up the guitar that it is not semi-hollow! Although sporting the correct set neck/center core construction the Chender doesn't have chambered wings.  They are clearly solid, per the weight of the guitar and a tap-test on the body.  It is a bit heavy, but not more so than an ash-bodied Tele.

Speaking of the neck joint - $237 bought me a guitar with a perfectly set neck and smooth joint - with big blotchy finish flaw.

Oddly, the body core itself seems to be off-center within the overall shape.  The asymmetry can be seen here by comparing the gap on either side of the string ferrules.

As opposed to the genuine article which appears centered.

It is also noticeable when looking at the strap button - or is the strap button off center? Both?

The asymmetry bugs the OCD person in me but it doesn’t seem to be a functional problem

Pulling the control cover I found exactly what I expected - dime sized pots and a cheap PC switch.

The final 2 misses come together. One is functional, the other only cosmetic.   A real Hag-o-caster comes with a 4-way switch and a Strat style knob.  Chender came with a 3-way and a tophat.

So there I’ve nitpicked. I have examined it with a stern skeptical eye only concerned about fake-value. But ....

How does she play?

How does she feel?

How does she sound??

How about the frets/neck/setup/tuners/pickups/fiddly-bits?

Got she de mojo??

Chender Part Three will be published in the next couple of days - as soon as I can gather my thoughts and command my words.

Chender, Part One

We’ve all heard about counterfeit guitars from China.  The phenomenon certainly isn’t new but the internet has given it wings.  Illicit imports are now so common they have pet names, such as  “Chibson”  for a Chinese made fake Gibson.  

The instruments are illegal to sell in the USA due to violations of copyright law but of course the internet transcends political boundaries so they remain a bit of an ‘open secret’.  Many players seem to be tight-lipped, only reluctantly admitting to knowing anything at all. If tasked to reveal a source website they speak in furtive whispers - as if telling a guy where he can buy a Chibson is equivalent to obtaining alcohol for minors (even though there are often banner ads in plain sight online).

Youtube user reviews of various Chinese bootlegs have only piqued my curiosity regardless of the reviewer’s intent.  Most of them conclude with something like “This $300 counterfeit of a $5000 Gibson (Martin, PRS, what-have-you) wouldn’t fool an expert but it is a very nice guitar for what I paid.”   I cannot deny that I have been tempted and very curious to get the ol’ Ballpark Franks on a bottom-dollar bootleg and find out for myself.  

... but we all know what curiosity has done for some other species.

My short list of dream guitars would include among other things the Danny Gatton signature Fender Custom Shop Telecaster ($4760 @ MF) and the Merle Haggard signature Fender Custom Shop “Tuff Dog” Tele (MF price $6780).  


A few months ago I nearly pulled the trigger on a counterfiet Danny Gatton Tele for $399 US shipped,  but managed to resist. 

 Last month when I found a counterfeit Merle Haggard Tuff Dog Tele for $237 US shipped I didn’t resist any more.

In this edition of Mr. Weller & The Ballpark Franks I will share the experience from order to receipt.   In Chender Part Two you’ll see what I found upon unpacking and I’ll render my opinion on how good a counterfeit this guitar is, then in Chender Part Three we’ll ignore brand names & legalities to discuss how good a GUITAR it is and whether (or how much) it needs to be upgraded to be stageworthy.

Order and arrival:

This particular dazzling irresistible bargain was found on Alieexpress-dot-com which isn’t a merchant, but a marketplace.  Therefore just like on eBay the buyer must educate themselves to each seller’s policies, particularly the shipping charges.  I saw guitars offered with shipping charges ranging from free to nearly $200 US per unit.  Many things are sold there, not just music gear.  Ordering was straightforward and no problems presented themselves.

One feature that helped alleviate fears was that Alieexpress-dot-com holds payment in escrow until  the customer is satisfied with the merchandise.  The seller must list an estimated delivery date.  The marketplace holds payment in escrow for a period extending a few days past the delivery date.  The customer marks the transaction in one of 3 ways:

• Received and satisfactory
• Received but not satisfactory
• Item has not arrived, please extend escrow

A mark of customer satisfaction releases the payment to the merchant.  Since many satisfied customers will simply ignore this, if there is no response within the escrow period then the transaction is assumed to be satisfactory and payment is released to the seller.

This system provides a safety net to both the seller and the buyer in case the other party is negligent, and it seems quite fair to me.

This seller estimated that the guitar would arrive in 4-6 weeks.  Ten days later it arrived by Express Mail.   It must have cost a good chunk to send a guitar via Express Mail.  

It arrived in ... no box.  No corrugated paper, no hard outer layer, just a big 

styro wedge with a removable lid and an interior contoured for guitar. The chunk of styro was then completely mummified in yellow plastic packing tape.  With no dense outer layer to resist penetration it seemed inadequate to me but in reality the guitar arrived undamaged. The packing provided plenty of proteciton against any kind of blunt impact but very little to thwart penetration by a sharp object.  At any rate, one can always imagine things that didn’t happen and choose to be fearful, but the reality is that this guitar arrived unscathed.

So what about the guitar?  Come back for Chender Part Two, to be published within the next few days.

The Anti-Xavier: NAK review of the Hard Luck Kings Southern Belle

Late in April 2015 I lowballed a Hard Luck Kings Southern Belle on eBay and became the new owner.  The previous owner posted in a Facebook group that the guitar was used only at home and never taken it out of the house.   He also said he was satisfied with the guitar but was selling it only because he was moving.   Inspection of the guitar revealed nothing to cast doubt on his claim.  The seller treated me fairly and I have no complaints about the transaction.

The Hard Luck Kings (hereafter: HLK) Southern Belle sells for $199 plus $29.95 shipping at the company’s web store and is available in matte black, matte green or alpine white gloss, with a left-handers model available in matte black only.

HLK’s website promises that these guitars will come with “21 medium-jumbo frets, all immaculately dressed and polished”.  My example lives up to the promise.  The frets were perfectly level, glassy-shiny and smooth.  

 

HLK advertises the nut to be bone.  Claims like this can be outright false on many imports, but this string nut has the look and feel of real bone and the slots are surprisingly well cut.  String action at the first fret is perfectly slick & and even across all strings and as a nice touch the ends & edges of the nut are beveled and rounded nicely.

 

The neck is listed as a modern ‘C’  shape with an 11” fretboard radius and a width of 42mm at the nut.  The current American Standard Telecaster comes equipped with a 9.5” radius and a 42.8mm nut width.  This fretboard feels flatter and wider than a Tele, but the published specs show the Fender to be wider in fact.  When I pulled the neck (more on that shortly) I found that the neck on the Southern Belle fits very snugly in the pocket.  This guitar could be used as an example of how tightly a neck & pocket should bond.   The neck feels a bit chunky in my hand but not unmanagably so.  

 

The meaty neck and the deliciously snug pocket joint together suggest a very resonant guitar.  In reality the Belle's unplugged resonance is pleasing if not stellar, able to hold its own with more costly guitars.  

 

Many players will feel that the joy of the above-average fret work is partially counteracted by the semi-chunky shape.

 

Decor includes matte black paint covering the body, neck and headstock: Gibson-style black knobs with skull-and-crossbones and large proprietary “X” fingerboard inlays.  The fingerboard inlays, like the frets, are smooth and well executed.  The skull & crossbone knobs ooze baby-goth-wannabee cutesy to me, but at least they have numbers on them.  I do miss numbers on traditional Tele chromedome knobs.  The matte black paint covering the neck lends the guitar a very cheap beginner-ish visual vibe IMO.

 

In the only modification of this used guitar the factory b/w/b pickguard has been replaced with a cutout from classic SRV vinyl on the Epic label.  It looks funky-cool now and I dig it, but I expect it would get pretty gnarly in short order if used on stage.

 

HLK claims every guitar ships “professionally set up”.  This was point of contention #1.  OOTB the neck relief was nearly perfect, but although the 6th string saddle in the 3-saddle toploader bridge was smack down on the deck the string action was about 3/8” at the 12th fret!   Supposedly professionally set up, yet it shipped in desperate need of a simple neck shim.  Ths left me with an initial bad impression of the instrument.  

 

The bridge itself was well adjusted.  

 

I got lucky adding a neck shim.  I hate the trial-and-error aspect of shimming a neck but with a handy scrap of medium celluloid pick material my neck alignment was nearly perfectly on the first try!  *knocks on alder*  I usually have to fiddlefart shims at least twice - not this time.

 

After a very minor saddle adjustment the guitar now plays well with very low action on a 10-46 set. The 11” radius and the slick frets make for successful string bending while the sustain is acceptably Tele-ish: more than most Strats and nearly as much as many Les Paul style guitars.

 

The hardware is the weakest point on the Southern Belle. The die-cast tuners feel sloppy and vague.  The pots are dime-sized imports and the PC selector switch feels flimsy.  The switch action is very stiff with indistinct detents.

 

Being fond of string-through hardtails I was unimpressed to find a toploading bridge on the Southern Belle, but in all honesty the guitar’s unplugged sustain and resonance are pleasing.

 

The “HLK high-output alnico 5” pickups are a mixed bag.  The bridge pickup is moderately beefy and not shrill but the neck pickup sounds dull & muted - the vintage (aka: useless) "wooly" Tele neck pickup sound that many of us avoid studiously.  Bone-stock Southern Belle has one useful selector position out of 3.  Neck pickup replacement to follow, and soon.  I have something waiting in my boneyard that will help.

Value? Ehh.  This from HLK’s website: 

 

“After Jason Boland & The Stragglers guitar player Roger Ray played the Southern Belle we asked him what he thought it would sell for and he replied "its got to be somewhere around $600+".

 

Roger must have a lot more money than I do, because I’d feel very ripped off if I paid 600 for this.  Today’s much-improved Taco Teles street @ $499 and are much better overall than the Southern Belle.

 

This being a $200 guitar, however, lets compare it with other $200 guitars.

 

It competes well in the Squier/Xaviere/XS bracket but I wouldn’t venture to declare a clear winner. I’d hesitate to choose between this and a Squier Standard. Even a particularly shining example of a Squier Bullet will sing with this much resonance, but won't have this great fingerboard. HLK's clear advantage in this price range is the quality of the fretwork. 

 

I think of the Southern Belle as the Anti-Xaviere. If you bought a Xaviere IME you probably got a guitar with a very pretty finish and sparkling voice but some nasty frets.  The HLK looks and sounds like it was found in the mud, but the fingerboard itself is a joy.  IME both guitars needed work OOTB, but I’d rather shim a neck than level and dress frets.  

 

From HLK’s website: "GUARANTEE. If you are not totally satisfied with your purchase please return it for any reason."

 

So maybe you have little to lose by trying one.  My advice: don’t rush to buy one - maybe lowball it on eBay.  Even at a lowball price I’m marginally satisfied with the instrument itself.  After I get a decent neck pup in place maybe I’ll feel closer to it.

 

I’m thinking it has the right visual groove to be wearing a hodgepodge of decals, or (this is not a joke) maybe I should take the neck shim back out and have another try at learning slide.

 

Either way - get the burn cream Mama, 'cause Mr. Weller is comin' out to play!