Hi,

Well, I've been gasin' for a strat for awhile now (well, years actually). I was saving my coin for a Custom Shop, but realized it would take me another couple of years at the current rate to afford what I wanted. That being said, I splurged on an Eric Johnson sig with a bound RW fretboard and Lucerne Aqua Firemist body color. I love it, except it has excessive relief on the bass side of the neck, and no relief (if not slight back-bow) on the treble side. There is also a 'hump' on the bass side above the 15 or 17th fret to the end of the board at 21.

I took it to Mike Lull Custom Guitars to have them assess it and give me a quote for a setup. Mike confirmed my worries about the differential relief. He said their PLEK machine could compensate for the issue (I believe it needs to be defretted, plained, and refretted for a proper fix), however, being a new guitar, Mike said I should send it back for 'repair' or exchange. I agree with his advice.

My question is, is this the sort of thing that can be corrected with clamps and humidity? Or does this guitar need a new neck? It just sucks to buy something (mail order) like this and have issues with it. I partially blame Fender for letting it leave the factory, and the company that sold it for accepting it and then selling it to me.

I believe that this is the very kind of thing that the Fender warranty covers.

I think I'd 1st go through whoever you got it from directly for an outright exchange for a new one. They in turn can worry about the Fender warranty end of it.

As for placing blame, perhaps you should reserve some for yourself for buying sight unseen.

Yeah, I hear ya RRR.

I really like this color and the RW. Up until I saw this one, I wasn't a RW strat guy. The other LAFM colored one they have has a terrible looking RW fingerboard. That's why I'm leaning toward having them perform the Fender warranty fix on this guitar. I don't know...the whole thing just kinda sucked the excitement out of it for me. I should have waited and bought one local...one I could touch first. I'm pretty picky about quality. I used to think the American Standards were awesome---2008 and older. I pick them up now and am not impressed. Either my expectations have increased, quality control has decreased, or a combination of the two.... That's why I was considering a CS before this. But I bought into the "CS features at the production level" touted by the Eric Johnson reviews.

Don't get me wrong, this is a sweet sounding and playing guitar (in general), I just happened to get one with a lemon for a neck.

Well at the top of the page, go to support, choose product warranty. See what they can do for ya.