Japanese Strats

[Rover]

Hi, Hey Bill you can't expect a budget guitar like the marquee to compare with a 60's Marvin. All I am saying is that the jap strat I had, although looking good had a sack load of problems. The marquee that I replaced it with has proved to be excellent especially for the low price. You tend to stick with what works for you.
Rover

[Stratstroker]

I had a Jap contemporary Strat bought new in 1987. It had a superb bridge and tremolo system with individual micro adjusters.

Wish I had kept it! It produced a better vintage sound than my Mexican 50s Strat fitted with CS54s and heavy strings. Great guitar!

That puts me in the"for" camp!

Al.

[Amanda]

Hi,

I have a CIJ '57 reissue in fiesta red with gold hardware, from MIJ

Excellent guitar no problems!

and also a HBM signature Japanese strat, again no problems.

Amanda

[Apache1]

I once owned a Japanese "Silver Series Squire" what a cracking guitar i wish I still had it. there is a lot to be said about Japanese made instruments
they have the build quality and they sound great
John

[Amanda]

Hi,

Forgot to mention,

my avatar is a picture of the headstock of my CIJ 57 reissue precision bass
also from MIJ!

Amanda

[Bill Bowley]

Rover,

Actually, IMHO the build quality of the Marquees was better than the '64 Marvins (mass produced one-offs!), however design and components used was where it fell down. Access to the truss rod was blocked by the body, but an easy fix was to route an access channel, problem fixed. Why Burns ruined that classic Burns scroll neck by putting a truss rod cover plate on it has me beat, however. Here's some pics of mine which I bought new - oh, and I changed the cheap 'bar magnet' (Indonesian Squire?) pickups that came with it for a set of Kinmans, and the gold 'painted' tuners for a set of real gold locking Sperzels as well, after these pics were taken.

[ernie1958]

I've got one just like that William...only mine's GREENBURST
I've also swapped the cheap stock pups for a REAL set of Rez-O-Matik pups... much better!!
As for the rest, the guitar is also,imo, a very good player as well as being of good quality considering the price you have to pay for it...
Also I find the trem-unit more appealing to me in comparison with the odd trem-unit of a Marvin,but that's just me..

Cheers,
Ernie

[Stratpicker]

I once owned a Japanese "Silver Series Squire" what a cracking guitar i wish I still had it. there is a lot to be said about Japanese made instruments
they have the build quality and they sound great
John

Silver Series Squiers of which the Squier HBM Signature model was one were quite high spec models and very good value for money. I had a 92 HBM upgraded with Kinman C's and a genuine 62 Fender bridge (straight swap out) and it did me fine until my Brason Strat came along.
BTW - if you want a top of the range Squier from the 90's - look for the Squier Pro-Tones - now sold as Fender Mex De-Luxe.
cheers
ian
ps- do not confuse with cheap ProTone brand being sold on Flea BAy and elsewhere.

[Terry B]

Thanks for you comments everyone! Judging by the soundfiles and the pics I've nothing to worry about except getting hold of one!

[bor64]

Terry as you can see on my avatar..there is enough f red for a livetime....but two of those f red strats are of MIJ origin.
The last two on the far right are a MIJ HBM strat and a MIJ Squier HBM strat....both great quality sound and also high standard construction wise.....
I played dozens of MIJ guitars,the first one(in '82) was a strat with the Fender spaghetti logo and a small Squier decal on the headstock....gee I was stupid enough to let it pass ....it gave my original 58 a good run for it's money