Why do some Fender guitars have the roswood (I think it's rosewood...) line on the back of the neck while some don't? Is there much of a story here?

I really like the look with the line. If it doesn't have a line, it just looks too plain to me.

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"Speak the truth, and speak it ever,
cost it what it will
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Oooh. Cool, could you elaborate, please?

_________________
"Speak the truth, and speak it ever,
cost it what it will
for he who hides the wrong he did
did the wrong thing still."
-Miss Uel

Older Fenders w/ a rosewood fret board didn't need the "skunk" stripe because the trust rod was put in from the top. I believe that many if not all modern models have the stripe no matter what.

Paris

Hi mac67: would some photos help?

Obviously Fender do this stuff on big machines in a factory, but the process is the same. Here is a neck blank with a channel routed into the back of it and a trussrod (the bit with blue plastic cladding in this case) dropped into place. The adjustment nut runs into a hole at the far end of the channel and will be accessed from the headstock on the other side of the neck:


That channel then needs to be filled with something. Fender use a walnut fillet; these ones are iroko:


That is shaped to fit the channel and glued into place:


Later it can be planed or machined flat to the surface of the blank:


And then you can carry on making the rest of the neck:


During the '60s Fender switched over to installing their trussrods in a channel routed from the front and then covered with a seperate maple or rosewood fingerboard, like most other manufacturers. That meant the "skunk stripe" on the back disappeared for a while. However, a lot of people felt that stripe was kind of a Fender trademark, so they later went back to installing rods the original way regardless whether the neck had a seperate rosewood fingerboard or not.

That means that when you see a Fender neck without a skunk stripe it is usually a reissue model based on the '60s guitars.

Howzat?

Cheers - C

Thanks everyone! (especially Ceri, with the visuals and breakdown. Very informative!)

That's pretty cool, I had no idea. Lol, I'm glad they kept the stripe after the 60's!

_________________
"Speak the truth, and speak it ever,
cost it what it will
for he who hides the wrong he did
did the wrong thing still."
-Miss Uel