Koocho, I think you knew the answer all along... Hope your new guitar
exudes much mojo for years to come!

I really like my Road Worn 60's sunburst strat. I like that it is beat up and that the guys at the factory did their homework and wore it down based on actual wear on old guitars. That's why the wear looks identical on every single one- it is an assembly line guitar, just like every guitar Fender makes.

I like the way it feels, and love the way it sounds. To me, it's what an old Strat should look/feel/sound like.

I've got a PRS CU22 and THAT is a beauty that will avoid all dings and scratches. Bird inlays, flamed black maple top, locking tuners and machined trem that stays in tune... mmm... oops wrong forum..

Strats and Teles to me are neither beautiful guitars nor marvels of fine engineering. They are workhorses that brought us the sounds we have loved for 50+ years. They don't need to be polished.

I think the Road Worn 60's Strat is the closest thing in its price range to replicating the build and tone of guitars from that era. I like 'em!

Mann..have you seen the picture page !? Some beautiful guitars there..

The thing is, most modern guitars (including Strats) will not age like this (paint wearing off , frets wearing down to the wood, etc). Guitars nowdays are finished with very thick, glossy poly coats which will never age the way a '50s-'60s Fender does. Those were finished with thinner nitrocellulose (sp?) laquer. For the relics, they actually have the nitro finish, which makes them more authentic looking. I played a couple of these at GC a few times. I like the feel and look of them, but they weren't set up well. The action was about a mile high on all of them, which I hate.

+1

Same thing here. I played one out of curiosity and recoiled at the horrible setup. It strikes me as intuitive that guitar shops would sell more guitars if they took half an hour for each and set it up properly!

Well - yes, the finish is different, but the frets wear down just the same. I wear down my frets very easily on all my guitars: Fender, Taylor, Ibanez, etc. Both of my strats have had fret jobs, and I'll probably have to repolish my main strat's frets again in the next few months. There's no problem with frets wearing

Actually I ment to say "fretboard" wearing down to bare wood instead of "frets".

In the '60's, that finish (and the way it prematurely aged) was viewed as a quality defect. Fender then worked hard to put on a finish that would stay on the body.

The way the "white" pickguards turned "green" was also viewed as a quality defect (one that took quite a while for Fender to fix).

It's funny how some of these quality defects have become "Charming" and "Desirable" and how other defects are viewed as garbage.

20 years ago, a beat up vintage Strat was at the very bottom of the collectors list.

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Member #26797
My other guitar is a Strat.

If CBS hadn't instituted the newer paints at the same time as turning a bit of a blind eye on quality control in other aspects i wonder how different it would be. i think a lot of CBS bad rep actually came from the changes their engineers made to the amps, in order to try make them more efficient. the sound changed, and most were returned to 'blackface specs (some never changed, like the deluxes anyway,)after only 8 months. unfortunately stores unable to move the older stock had them sitting on the floor for a long time, and this led to the belief that silverface amps stayed different for a long time. i think this rep led to people being critical of all Fender products, sometimes unfairly.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

Ah. Yes, those do not wear like the old ones. My 94 MIM maple neck has been played a LOT in the last 15 years. I can't even guess how many thousands of hours. Frets? Two fret jobs. Fretboard? Still going strong and probably will be for quite some time

why buy road worn when you can just DIY like my burnt relic.....It's your own creation, nobody else's.

This was just a cheap Squier $150 au that I have modded with cool Vintage pups and CTS pots etc.

I would rather spend a couple of dollars on this which to me sounds and looks awesome, rather than outlay the price of a new road worn, how weird does that sound to say "New Road Worn"

Sorry to the guy's at Fender but I think I'll do my own...

I have developed a fetish for buying cheap Squiers and turning them into Relic's.

I would never do this to my top end USA Fender Strats though.

Sorry for being rude but check out the pic's...

BEFORE



AFTER

Great pics, and nice to see your pride in your work! To be fair to Fender, they are trying to best reproduce the original build of the guitar of certain era, and the wear and tear that would have been accumulated over years of playing.

To "relic" a guitar could mean many things to many people, but I think Fender has done a good job of simulating (key word) a well worn, era specific guitar without going over the top. The trick is to make the wear look natural and not obvious. I think the factory did a pretty good job, though some will disagree.

The lukewarm reception of the Road Worn series will most likely mean it's demise. So if you like em, get one while you can! If you don't like em, then you won't have to see/hear about them anymore!

No doubt BSS! Thats exactly how I feel about the roadworn series. Trouble is a road worn mail box just doesn't have the same mojo as a strat And a passal of willing buyers...

Hey to all, I noticed on all the RW 50's strats, that the wear marks are all in the same place, in the same way, I think it wold have been cooler to make them all diffrent, road worn, but no two alike,

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Quit sittin' around and play!
"This one goes to 11."

The wear marks are similar because these are assembly line production guitars. They will look the same if you line up a bunch of the same model, just like any other production guitar. Unfortunately, the minute you move off the line and into "no two alike" land, you are entering custom territory which = $$$.

Once the guitar is separated from the litter and appreciated in its own existence (i.e. tearing it up during a hot set on stage), it won't matter if it shares wear marks with its siblings. So far, no one has come up to me after a show and pointed out that they saw a guitar with the same wear marks as my 60's RW!

your brilliant thats so true its funny