Squier ?

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

Anybody like the squire, do they feel cheap, stay in tune, how's the hardware, etc.

I know it's a beginner guitar but I saw one in a pawn shop for 80 and 5hought about putting P90s in but not sure if it's worth it. Opinions please and have you ever modded

one.

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

Thought about. Hate this phone

[Bucksstudent]

Squiers are not as high quality as Mexican Fenders, IMO. I even owned a Mexican Squier, and it was below par. I had a Classic Vibe Tele, and it was good, but still not there. The closest was the Jagstang. Great body, the neck felt awesome, and it stayed in tune. The Duncan Design pickups sucked.

 

But Squiers are solid modding platforms. If you can get a maple neck, even better. The rosewood necks never feel right to me on Squiers.

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

Thanks BS appreciate your input. Neck and pickups noted. I think it would be a cool little project for the cash. I would put more into it than the 80 bucks the guitar cost.

[Bucksstudent]

Gardo should pitch in since he has an Affinity Tele that he modded and loves.

[hellion_213]

I'll second Bucksstudent in regard to a great modding platform, and I'll second him again in regard to Squier rosewood boards. They just don't feel right to me either. Newer Squiers have an almost cult-like following, with some folks buying them For the Squier sound.

As far as quality, it really depends on whether or not it's a Vintage Modified. The Vintage Modified Squiers rival MIMs, and honestly, sound and play better IMO. Outside of that series, the standard bridge is pretty much the run of the mill cheapo 6 screw, pot metal block, meaning string ends Will get stuck. Cheap pot metal bar, and typical low end tuning machines that will go out of tune overnight. At least most I've owned anyway. But again, a great modding platform, especially if you plan on using GFS, Mightymite, or AxeTech for a lot of your parts.

[Les Paul Lover]

I've had 3 vintage modified telecasters, and have been really impressed by them all.

I've had 3 Mexican strat too, none of them impressed me much - the best of the bunch had "upgraded" cheapo iron gear pick ups.

 

However....... Just to throw a spanner in your works....

You might want to save yourself the upgrade and look for a 2nd hand G&L Tribute guitar. They're pretty cheap, and the hardware is already really good.

 

You can throw some money at a squier - when you get bored, you'll lose that when selling the guitar.

 

The G&L Tribute will already have good tuners, bridge and pick ups. You won't really need to mod it, and if you get bored, you should get about the same you got it for.

 

Just a thought......

[Chordite]

They are variable but that means you can get a good one. No substitute for taking it off the wall, tweaking the tuners and seeing how the neck feels. You will know straight away by how it feels in your hands to take it or pass.

[Axisplayer]

I have played decent and bad Squires. I prefer the maple necks. My biggest issue with them has always been fit and finish type stuff. I hate the little things, like sharp fret ends that get you as you slide around the neck. It seems that if you choose to spend the time to sort out the issues, the backbone is OK. But as LP Lover points out (and I agree,) once you have spent the time and effort to sort it out you will have more into it than the value of the guitar, which of course only matters if you choose to sell it. Spending the equivalent of what you would invest + purchase cost on a better guitar seems more prudent. Then again, sometimes doing the upgrades are the fun of having it. If the Squire is decent as is, you just decide do want a player, or is the fun fixing it? I seem to get amps or cabinets I don't need just to clean them, recover them, fix the hardware up, and then either keep them or give them away to friends or students, or sell them if I have much invested in them.

[badpenguin]

Here's my thinking on it:

 

price of Squier. 80.00

inexpensive decent pickups, 50.00

Better tuners 30.00

better bridge 50.00

new decent pots & switch 30.00

Yes, a cool pickguard 20.00

Total 260.00 give or take.

 

For a guitar that if you try to sell it, you might get 150 with a case. Hey, it's a Squire, right?

If doing for the learning experience, then great, grab it, and start getting parts. If you ever decide to sell it, you won't get near what you paid.

If looking for a great guitar on the cheap, hunt thru Craigslist, and buy the best you can afford.

 

 

[gardo]

Gardo should pitch in since he has an Affinity Tele that he modded and loves.

Yes I do love it. Its my go to guitar.

Money wise it may not be worth it but mine was a gift from Mrs. Gardo so for me it was a good investment.

The first thing I found out on the Tele was that nothing fit ,I mean nothing fit. I had to open up the bridge plate for the new pickups. The pots were 500k I went to 250k They didn't fit.either,the control plate had to be drilled out and of course the knobs were now too small so they were replaced . The 3-way switch was cheap so it was replaced.The plastic jack plate didn't last very long before it broke and was replaced by a steel plate and Switchcraft jack. Really all electronics were replaced. The bridge rattled but heavier strings and higher action (my preference ) stabilized that. Sure I love the guitar because it was all done my way . The nut width is a little narrow but I don't have a problem with it.

 

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

Good points and excellent feed back, thanks guys

[Freeman Keller]

You know me - I'll suggest that a used Squire would be a great guitar to work on your setup skills. Do the frets, do the action and all the things that go with it. Then do the mods. P90's will probably require some wood or pickguard mods - that should be fun. FWIW, I've built two tele clones with P90's in the neck - the owners talk about liking the additional tone options.

[badpenguin]

Oh, and by the way, I am a pawn shop Master. Don't you DARE pay what they are asking! point out the flaws, the neck needed to be adjusted, the things that will cost money, and shoot for 50. Settle for 60. If they don't want to budge, walk away.

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

BP - haggle it down, good point.

Freeman- can you suggest a good pickup That won't require that much wood work. I have played p90s before and liked them quite a bit, anything similar come to mind ?

[sammyreynolds01]

They're a good modders platform.

[steve_man]

check out the Classic Vibe series... or the Vintage Modified... some of them play as good or better than the MIM Fender models.

[GAS Man]

For me Squiers have been a real mixed bag. My first experience was buying a laminate bodied Strat for my son somewhere around '93 (he wasn't sure if he was going to bother giving "learning guitar" a try, and I was simply coaxing) and that thing was poor throughout; except they'd done a miraculous job of putting in cheap hot ceramic pickups that actually got more body out of that POS guitar than any good quality p'up would have unearthed. I found that out the hard way by trying to upgrade them, and that laminate body, devoid of any resonance, just made good pickups sound thin. Plus tone robbing pots, a seriously high fret and the worst chunky tuners evah! And I can't forget the strap buttons where the screws pulled out. because screws don't hold well screwed in between parallel layers of plywood. That's more like screwing into wood glue than wood, but that was another early fix.

 

Since then, with Squier leaving the laminate body designs behind (in all but their least expensive models) I've found Squiers to have established a well defined progression of product line that bring along worthy upgrades along each price grade. But usually, I can pick up a fairly crappy model and still have my moments with them too. But I think my biggest single complaint has been the volume pots that roll off the highs way too abruptly. I found that one model I had enjoyed in home jams (where I'd adjust volume at the amp) couldn't be used in jams with my band mates because I'd have to use the guitar's volume in a live setting and any positions on the pots, other than wide open, would cause the guitar to sound too muddy fade into the mix. (a Tele Custom II) And yes, I know that can be fixed by mods, but it would also be so easy for Fender if they could have just spend another buck or two on better pots.

 

But once you get to the Classic Vibe model, your getting a nice, albeit, signature tone. There's still issues like "less than stellar tremolos" and thinner bodies but I do believe they are a better tone-bang for the buck than many other brand name lines.

 

Here's mine.

[TABLE=border: 0, cellpadding: 0, cellspacing: 0]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER '51 BLONDE[/TD]

[/TR]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER '51 2TSB[/TD]

[/TR]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER TELE CUSTOM II[/TD]

[/TR]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER AFFINITY TELECASTER SPECIAL[/TD]

[/TR]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER CLASSIC VIBE DUO-SONIC '50s Electric Guitar (Desert Sand)[/TD]

[/TR]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER 60th Anniversary Classic Vibe '50s Stratocaster - Aztec Gold + Fender Metro 60th Anniversary Strat Gig Bag [/TD]

[/TR]

[TR]

[TD]SQUIER HELLO KITTY STRATOCASTER (used) $270 + HK Strap + HK Gig Bag[/TD]

[/TR]

[/TABLE]

 

 

Of all of them, I've probably been happiest with my decision to buy that Duo-Sonic. It's just so damn comfy to play, the action is easy, the body is light, but yet noticeably adds it own resonance to the tone, the pickups have good responsiveness, clarity and vibe, and the tuners are vintage styled but work just fine. That would be the one the I'd buy again without thinking twice (except I might be tempted now by Fender's similarly priced MIM line of Duo-Sonics. Those are a little more money than the $255 I paid for my DS, but then that was in 2009 (Great Recession era) dollars.

 

But as one other forumite here once said, "I find they stick to you like glue". So I'd recommend trying out a few different models or hone your ebay skills. Something I plan on doing myself in another few years. ;^)

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

Yeah it's just a thought I had, never done a mod before. I was just thinking electronics, but if I have to deal with fret ends and woodwork then I think I'll find another project.

[gardo]

The fret ends on my Squier were perfect from day one,better than my MIM Strat

If you see a serial number beginning with CY you found a good one

[crustoleum]

I like my pelham blue Squire deluxe Stratocaster with "satin finish" neck fret board...Very pleasantly surprised at that one

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[crustoleum]

And "Butterscotch" Telecaster...the "legend that is"

[Freeman Keller]

Absolutely try to deal but also remember that pawn shops have very good pricing guides and pretty much know the value of their merchandise. The days of picking up a vintage axe for pennies is pretty much over.

[Freeman Keller]

You didn't say whether this is a Squire tele or strat and what it has in it now for pups. My experience is with teles and a P90 is a different size hole than the standard single coil and mounts differently Also depends on whether you want to run a pickguard on it or not. Here is a standard single coil route

 

 

Here is a P90

 

 

The single coil hangs from a ring or the pickguard, the P90 usually screws to the back of the cavity (there are variations).

 

The pups that I used on these guitars were Budz T-Bars (about half way down the page)

 

http://www.budzguitars.com/budz-pickups/budz-soap-bars.html

 

The players seemed to like the true tele sound from the bridge but a bit more warmth from the neck

[satmanjf@gmail.com]

Good call Gardo, I will check that out.

What does CY indicate ?