Jump to content

NGD: Dean Zelinsky StrettaVita


w00dsy

Recommended Posts

  • Members
my Dean Zelinsky Private Label StrettaVita(that's a mouthful) showed up today. Because my mum died 2 months ago i decided to get her name and birth date on the back of the neck, and because she was a car nut i got it in white with chrome to match her favorite car that she owned.
 
It's very pretty and sounds and feels great. The neck profile is a soft V and is on the thin side. The Z-Glide idea seems to work well but it's odd the first time you run your hand up and down it. You can certainly feel the texture but it's not a bad thing. It's also quite light for this style of guitar, most likely due to being chambered. Pickups are probably medium to high output and give a typical Les Paul style sound. I had a chrome toggle switch here so i put that on straight away.  
 
 
vWQHxuE.jpg
v6oFVQX.jpg
ieZk3Lu.jpg
5klmsmt.jpg
0WVjqLt.jpg?1
qJvFXYe.jpg
 
 
 
 
but, it has a few small issues which i'm trying not to let bug me. The neck pocket isn't a tight fit like on every other bolt on neck i have. It's solid but looks low quality. And the underside gap increases to about 1mm.
 
OEY61SE.jpg?1
IciAnaM.jpg?1
 
 
 
i also noticed some bits of black paint showing around the cavities at the back. So i took the covers off and saw it was a rather sloppy paint job in there. Luckily i was able to lightly scrape it off with a pocket knife. But when i took the toggle switch cover off a bit of wood came away with it. And as you can see from the pics, whoever screwed it on had a couple of goes at getting the holes in the right spot. It's not a deal breaker but it dampens the mood a bit when it looks like whoever put it together isn't overly skilled. I know it's not supposed to be PRS quality but even cheap Squiers seem to have decent workmanship. 
 
IxLLvqk.jpg?1
PSw0mF0.jpg?1
BQtWd3x.jpg?1
 
 
 
 
But overall it's a nice looking and sounding guitar, and it feels good. I had plans to buy one of their Tagliares(Strat style) as well in the future, but these small issues have put me off a bit.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 


halfwhole wrote:

 

 

what's the scale length on that?

 

 

 

any clips would be appreciated, there's like nothing out there on these yet.

 

 

 

Great gesture for your mums!

 

 

scale is 24.75". There was only 1 video i found on youtube, i guess more will pop up over time. I've never been too keen to do video demo's because phone cameras don't do justice to a guitars sound. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

thanks for the kind words chaps. I emailed them when i got the guitar so they could get some honest feedback. They had been brilliant in the dealings i had done with them organising it all so i wanted to help them out and also to let them know i wasn't 100% happy. I figure some customers are much fussier than me and it could give them a bad rep if people send them back. So i sent them this. 

 

hey guys, i got my guitar today and for the most part it's excellent. It's setup beautifully and looks and sounds great. But there are a couple of small things i noticed that may be worth you knowing about to keep an eye on for the future. The top gap where the neck and the body meets is quite a bit bigger than i have on any of my other guitars. It's not quite enough to get a credit card into but it's close. Also the lower gap angles out to become a bigger gap than it should be. 

 
The other thing is the black control cavity paint in both the switch and knob cavities was a bit sloppy and showed around the edge even when the cover was on. I managed to remove most of it by lightly scraping it with a pocket knife. Now it's looks nicer when the covers are on but it's still a bit messy with the covers off.  Also when i took the toggle switch cover off a small chunk of wood broke off and i saw extra holes where someone had had a couple of goes at getting it right. Obviously this isn't a super high end guitar so i'm not too fussed but even low end guitars have good quality workmanship these days so i thought it was maybe a bit sub par compared to other guitars in this price range. 

 

Apart from that it's a great guitar and the z-glide neck is brilliant. I've attached pics to show the issues i mentioned.  

 

Many thanks, Jason

 
 
 
i was expecting a response because of how the customer support has gone so far, but didn't expect this. 
 
 
Hi Jason,
 
Thank you again for your order, I'd be happy to help.
 
We apologize for the issues with your guitar.  I spoke with Dean and he wants you to be 100% happy with your guitar.  Once we have more models in stock, we would like to send you a replacement guitar, free of charge.  This may take 2-3 months as we get those ready.  In the meantime hang onto your guitar, that will be yours to keep.
 
Please feel free to email back if you have any questions or how else I can be of assistance.  Thank you again for supporting Dean's new Signature line of guitars.

 

Regards,
Drew
 
 
 
 
to be honest i think that's a bit extreme but i understand they are trying to build a good reputation and forums such as this can damage them pretty quickly. But i feel guilty for mentioning it now, i don't normally complain about stuff so it's kinda of hard to accept a hand out for what are fairly minor issues. I have sent them another email telling them that i appreciate it but it's not neccesary. I'll see how it goes. But what a cool company, if they get the guitar quality on par with the customer support then they'll sell a lot of gear. 
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...