Hi I'm thinking about buying this http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... TQ:GB:1123 but I notice it doesn't have the black line running down the neck. I don't know much about Fenders, what does the black line mean?

Hello and welcome!

The Black Line or Skunk Stripe you mention is usualy a walnut insert to cover where the truss rod was installed on one piece maple necks. The Strat your thinking of buying does'nt have one because the Truss rod would have been installed under the rosewood fretboard.

That said there are necks that have a seperate fretboard and have a skunk stripe though I can only think that this is a cosmetic touch or if the fretboard was not thick enough cap the truss rod cavity. If someone can confirm this that would be great!

If you are seriously considering buying the Strat off Ebay, i'd ask the seller to show some detailed pics of the frets to see if how worn they are and if poss, get them to confirm that when tapped the neck does not rattle, as this would indicate a potentilally broken or faulty truss rod.

Hope this helps

Andy

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Hm thanks, so do some of the USA Fenders not have the line down the neck?

It looks like a nice clean guitar.

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I believe so. Some do, some don't. It all depends on how the truss rod was installed. Otherwise its just a cosmetic feature. If its the "look" your after you can buy Skunk Stripe transfers but I've never tried them (its not my thing).

Hope this helps

Andy

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'Zactly.

It is sometimes surprising how much misunderstanding there is about what skunk stripes are there for, so in case it is useful to anyone here's a couple of photos.

Here is a neck blank (an uncarved lump of wood, that means) with a trussrod channel routed into it, the rod (blue) dropped into place, and a shaped piece of darker wood ready to insert into the channel to fill it up:


And a different angle might help. Here's the rod in the channel, and if you look at the far end you can see that the adjuster nut is disappearing into a hole. The headstock will be carved out from the wood beyond that, giving access to the rod's nut from the other end. You can see the darker wood insert on the left, waiting to drop in and become the skunk stripe:


You'll notice that the routed channel is semicircular at either end and the fillet that will become the skunk stripe has to be shaped to exactly fit that cavity. That's the tricky bit.

There was a gentleman here a while ago who thought trussrods were inserted by drilling a hole from one end of the neck to the other. It's a cute idea and I'd love to see it done! Above is how it happens in reality.

BTW: to the best of my knowledge Fender's skunk stripes are never merely cosmetic. They started inserting trussrods from beneath the seperate fingerboard in the '60s, as most other manufacturers do. However, people missed their one piece necks and skunk stripes, so they went back to inserting rods from the rear, regardless whether the fingerboard was glued on or not.

So when you see a skunk stripe on a neck with a rosewood fingerboard the rod genuinely was inserted from the back. A stripeless neck is therefore essentially a '60s Reissue design.

Cheers - C

That's very interesting many thanks. Do you think that this guitar will have a weaker neck then, are there any real disadvantages for not having the stripe?

Nope. That iron rod running down the middle is hard enough to compensate for anything.

On the one hand, some small builders like to make necks from laminated sandwiches of different woods to address perceived strength and stability issues. You often see that in "neck-through" designs. On the other hand, most mainstream guitar builders don't use laminations or even skunk stripes, and we don't hear about Gibson, Martin or PRS necks bending any more or less than Fender ones.

There's many other issues about neck structure, but that ain't one of them, out in the real world.

Interesting point on the laminated neck thing. One fairly mainstream maker who sometimes does do sandwich neck construction is Hofner. From memory I believe their Club model semi-acoustic has a neck built from maple and beech laminations. Beech is a very unusual timber to find in guitar construction...

Here's a picture, though I can't find any mention of neck construction on this site. Pretty guitar:

http://www.hofner.com/gab/en/phpshop/43 ... ory_id,24/

Cheers - C

Thanks Ceri!

I've always wondered about that. Of course, I'd never question Fenders neck build quality (in fear of loosing some well earned loyalty points!) but I have come across "fake" skunk stripes on cheapy necks simply to maintain the look you mention above.

Andy

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Hi Andy: mind you, as always I stand to be corrected. If someone knows of Fender using skunk stripes purely cosmetically then I'd be fascinated to hear about it. I guess Mike Eldred (on his Forum on this site) would be the man to say conclusively.

I'd also be interested to see a fake stripe on a cheapo neck. And you seemed to be saying there's skunk stripe decals out there too? Care to point me at those? I'm highly entertained by that idea. Man, that'll just look so silly when it starts to wear off!!

When we were small kids we sometimes wore tattoo transfers on our arms, playing at being grown ups. A skunk stripe decal falls into much the same category, I'd feel. How charming!

Cheers man - C

Hello Ceri!

I've just had a quick look and I'm damm sure there was someone on eaby offering Skunk stripe transfers, but i could only find these

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Vintage-Guitar-Ne ... 3a4fc1bf20

Awfull things (IMO). Its bad enough to stick a transfer on the back of the neck, god only knows why anyone would want one on the front!

I've never seen them on a Fender Neck (as before I have no doubt that Fender Necks are built to the highest standard) and to amend my quote I've only ever come across a neck transfer (personally) once.

I bought a used cheapy korean made Greg Bennet neck for my first guitar build. It had a fake skunk stripe that I only noitced when I spotted the stripe had a small "V" missing and revealed the maple below. It was placed over the neck finish and needless to say, didn't take much to remove. This neck also had some hidious vine- like transfer on the headstock which had caused the varnish to craze. I presume the previous owner had tried to varnish the headstock transfer afterwards, creating some kind of chemical reaction. This had to be sanded down to remove. Unfortunatly I don't have any pics of the neck before it was treated. Really wish I'd documented my first build with more pics as the process was a most enjoyable expeirence and would have been nice to re-live it though the pics (I supose i could always take it apart and put it back together again!). It turned out really well.


Enjoy

Andy

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