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.