Members roygbiv Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I think the 51 is an incredible starter guitar. Can you imagine a starter with these features available for under $100 back when you bought your first guitar? I know some gigging musicians who play 51s and make them sound great. I like the feel of the neck and like the raw pickups. The only negative I can find is that mine sounds a little thin compared to my other guitars. But it is a fun guitar to play and I still enjoy mine... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members axegrinder Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I love mine. I'd like another myself... blonde preferably. But I'd settle for a $99 black one... who's got 'em? Here's mine... Duncan, GFS Bridge, Gibby 3way, stacked vol/tone, tinted neck, new paint etc. Nice job on the refinish. I bought a second '51 specifically to refinish in gold just like that...someday.I think it would be a nice compliment to my first one.BTW I put new knobs on mine. Anyone who doesn't like the rotary switch on the '51's should try one with a chickenhead knob...huge improvement Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members kidvybes Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 ...some '51 video "sound" clips here:http://youtube.com/watch?v=0UjusvyQcf0 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Doctor Morbius Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 ...imagine the possibilities (pics snatched from the site below)...(check out this site for more modded '51s: http://www.instituteofnoise.com/squier51/forum/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=2That Bel Air Squier '51 is the best mod job I've seen yet. It's beautiful. If I had that kind of talent I'd do that too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Doctor Morbius Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 ...I think it would be a nice compliment to my first one. BTW I put new knobs on mine. Anyone who doesn't like the rotary switch on the '51's should try one with a chickenhead knob...huge improvement I love your '51 also, AG. It's very custom shop looking. How do you like it with those pups? Plenty of JANGLE I would imagine. Did you tap the bridge? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flori Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 ....yup....can't really fault mine!Playable straight from the box - no fret issues - and nicely finished......the wood in my SB actually has some 'flame' and character which was an unexpected bonus.Mine was made in 2007....supposedly 3 months after 'official' discontinuation , so was a bit of of a celebrity on some of the'51 appreciation sites! ......certainly worth the 100 notes I paid for it.flori Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GAS Man Posted October 30, 2007 Author Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 They chose a cheap ass (discontinued?) piece of crap sharp fretted crappy sounding junk pile as their pick? WTF? Okay, maybe a little harsh, but I don't take ANYTHING those {censored}nuts magazines say as meaning anything. The same type of magazines claim if you close your eyes with an Epi LP Studio that it would be impossible to distinguish it from a Gibson LP Standard. WTF? I love the way you can pounce down on a thread with both boots on and still make me smile. Hey, but admit, you had fun buying them and flipping them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members batotman Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I love the way you can pounce down on a thread with both boots on and still make me smile. Hey, but admit, you had fun buying them and flipping them. It's a gift. And it wasn't much fun. I had a helluva time finding buyers! Then one buyer died and the body got returned to me. (The guitar body I sold him....not the buyer). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members axegrinder Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I love your '51 also, AG. It's very custom shop looking. How do you like it with those pups? Plenty of JANGLE I would imagine. Did you tap the bridge? Thanks for the props.The ProTubes sound great to me, especially clean. I even ordered a set of singles for a partsocaster that I haven't gotten around to. Having said that, I think maybe I ordered a tube bucker that is frankly too weak (9k iirc) for the bridge position, especially in split mode. It sounds good but not powerful enough for the 6k single. I should have gone for the 12k model instead. As it stands now I may pop the stock bucker back in with a chrome cover on it.The ProTube HB will probably go into a lap steel someday. I think that would sound great. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Doctor Morbius Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 Thanks for the props.The ProTubes sound great to me, especially clean. I even ordered a set of singles for a partsocaster that I haven't gotten around to. Having said that, I think maybe I ordered a tube bucker that is frankly too weak (9k iirc) for the bridge position, especially in split mode. It sounds good but not powerful enough for the 6k single. I should have gone for the 12k model instead. As it stands now I may pop the stock bucker back in with a chrome cover on it.I assume you've tried adjusting pickup height to compensate? I have 3 '51s and am considering doing a pickup config like yours to one of them. I'd like a TV Jones Powertron in another but am hung up on the $140 price tag. I've thought about repainting 1 or 2 of them also, but getting the poly off would be a real bitch and I don't think I can duplicate the quality of the stock paint job without lots and lots of work and patience. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mr JinX Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 uh the reason they got discontinued is no one bought them until they went on discount Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members myway Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 Did Fender feel it was hurting sales of more expensive guitars?? Hell it probably was! Yep, you got it. Taking too much of a bite out of it's medium range line. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members iowa 51 Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I got mine when they went to $99. I love it. I'm thinking about a new pickguard to replace the black one (mine has the blonde finish). Suggestions? I put the tortoise from GFS on my black 51. Kinda has a 70's vibe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members axegrinder Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I assume you've tried adjusting pickup height to compensate? I have 3 '51s and am considering doing a pickup config like yours to one of them. I'd like a TV Jones Powertron in another but am hung up on the $140 price tag. I've thought about repainting 1 or 2 of them also, but getting the poly off would be a real bitch and I don't think I can duplicate the quality of the stock paint job without lots and lots of work and patience.Yeah I adjusted the pickup heights to their relative extremes. If you go with the ProTubes I recommend that the impedence of your bridge HB be at least twice the impedance of the neck SC (4.5k w/ 9k OR 6k w/ 12k). The painting does take patience, but I am a fan of odd colors. I also like to have something different from what everyone else has. Plus it was a fun challenge for myself seeing what I could do to make that guitar mine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Geeter Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 uh the reason they got discontinued is no one bought them until they went on discountThe truth can be soooo mundane. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GAS Man Posted October 30, 2007 Author Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 I had a helluva time finding buyers! Then one buyer died and the body got returned to me. (The guitar body I sold him....not the buyer). Too bad, had it been the other way around, the parts would have fetched much more! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members yz250f49 Posted October 30, 2007 Members Share Posted October 30, 2007 uh the reason they got discontinued is no one bought them until they went on discountWhat can you expect from a non-believer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GAS Man Posted October 31, 2007 Author Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 uh the reason they got discontinued is no one bought them until they went on discount I've heard that rationale before, but I wonder if it's correct, cuz even before they went on sale, they were one of the most affordable and attractive Squiers out there. Seemed to me IIRC that the street price was still only around $165 or so when they first appeared in the catalogs. So you'd think that would have gotten a fair amount of traffic compared to the rest of their line. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BootRoots Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 the only reason a product is ever discontinued is if its not selling. There was a market for that guitar. Perhaps the market demand was met and Fender tapped it out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mddawso Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 perhaps they built them with little profit margin in order to build the name, and discontinued them when their job was done? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Joe Bones Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 Just my opinion-- It won the award, sold a lot among people on this website, and flopped in the general public for all the same reasons. It was a very different design, something new that really hadn't been done before, and pretty well executed for a cheap guitar. That won it the award just for being new and different. GAS heads like us, well, a lot of us had to have one, hell it's only a hundred bucks. Even then, I want to guess that it's appeal among veteran players was probably largely limited to those who had the technical acumen to install a tone pot. On the other hand, I suspect new and beginning players probably avoided it like the plague, because they have in mind the sort of guitar they want,,,,either a strat or a LP genre copy, or some pointy metal guitar I guess, and the 51 is none of those. There's any number of reasons that good products flop in the marketplace. The 51 is one of them. Me, I'm very glad I have one. I play mine a lot. The only mod I did to mine was the tone pot, and it's good to go otherwise. Mine is butterscotch. I'd buy another if they made a run in Daphne Blue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Funkwire Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 I picked up my '51 in July. It had already been discontinued by that point. I had never heard of the model. In fact, my inbred Squier antipathy almost kept me from pulling it off the wall. But I finally did, and was shocked at the playability and sound of it. I traded a heavily modded Kramer for it. The frets didn't taper down as much as I would have liked, but they weren't sharp. They have gotten more comfortable with just a few months of playing. I have swapped out the bridge for the GFS replacement and filed the nut slots. The other changes I made were cosmetic--staining the neck, taking off the Squier logo, putting on a custom 'Fender Squier Fifty-One' decal, a chrome cover on the HB, and the GFS tortoise-shell pickguard (the guitar is blonde). I like the sound of the guitar as is, so I haven't done the tone pot mod. The cover on the bridge took away some of the harsh quality. I put a pair of old pickup springs under the mounting screws for the neck pickup. As a result, I can adjust the height of the pickup and get a great warm Tele-ish sound. I did a fraction of the work some of the folks in this thread did, but I'm really happy with this guitar. Like I said, I used to be one of those people who thought "Squier = crap", but the '51 has really changed my mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mr JinX Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 What can you expect from a non-believer? tis true though! I had a blonde, and while it was a nice guitar, I am not a fender type person so I sold it to someone here for no profit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members batotman Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 Too bad, had it been the other way around, the parts would have fetched much more! Do I have to sculpt the penis? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Doctor Morbius Posted October 31, 2007 Members Share Posted October 31, 2007 MF has '51s in stock in limited quantity. $100. Black only. http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Squier-51-Electric-Guitar?sku=519636 False alarm. OOS already. My bad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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