San Dimas Natural / Custom Shop

[Monkeychunki]

Hi,

Can anyone tell me what the differences are between the San Dimas Custom shop guitars with natural finish & the San Dimas Music Zoo exclusive natural finish guitars

thanks

[Grandturk]

Well, I played a few of the naturals and a couple of The Music Zoo's Custom Shop models when I was there a few weeks ago. To me, there was a difference between the two. There was a little bit better attention to detail on the custom shop models - fret ends were nicely rounded and polished. Finish and hardware were impecable.

The naturals felt about on par with the production series with the exception of the German Floyd - which to me is a minimal difference. Truth be told, I was disappointed with the switches on the natural which felt floppy to me - and the knobs felt light.

I know their prices vary, but the naturals felt about $100-200 better than the production series.

I'd say, if the naturals wing your wang, go for it. But if you want a custom shop, get a custom shop.

[Monkeychunki]

thats great, thanks for the info - just what i was after

[neilli]

The first batch(or first few) were generally regarded to be of a higher standard. I guess to test the waters somewhat. These have the 'Custom Shop' logo on the headstock...

[Grandturk]

The first batch(or first few) were generally regarded to be of a higher standard. I guess to test the waters somewhat. These have the 'Custom Shop' logo on the headstock...

The naturals I played did not have a "Custom Shop" logo on them.

[neilli]

Yeah, the early batches are long gone - I got mine when I was still in the UK, so that must have been 3 years or so ago...

[voodoosound]

Well, I played a few of the naturals and a couple of The Music Zoo's Custom Shop models when I was there a few weeks ago. To me, there was a difference between the two. There was a little bit better attention to detail on the custom shop models - fret ends were nicely rounded and polished. Finish and hardware were impecable.

The naturals felt about on par with the production series with the exception of the German Floyd - which to me is a minimal difference. Truth be told, I was disappointed with the switches on the natural which felt floppy to me - and the knobs felt light.

I know their prices vary, but the naturals felt about $100-200 better than the production series.

I'd say, if the naturals wing your wang, go for it. But if you want a custom shop, get a custom shop.

WOW that couldn't be farther from what I found. I bought 3 customs and 2 naturals. All were wood. The naturals I have are everybit as good as any of my customs. To put the naturals on par with the production series is like comparing Bogner XTC to a Bogner alchemist.

Other than sharing the bogner name they are not even in the same ballpark. The production series is the same way. It shouldn't have the same logo on it as the Zoo charvels or the customs.

[Grandturk]

Like I said, to me the naturals felt about the same as the production series. YOur feelings may vary.

[voodoosound]

Like I said, to me the naturals felt about the same as the production series. YOur feelings may vary.

Don't know about my feelings but I am sure our experience levels are very varied. I have been playing charvels since the early 80s 5 I bought new.

The Production series feels nothing like those guitars. My customs are right on and my zoos are pretty damn close.

[Grandturk]

Don't know about my feelings but I am sure our experience levels are very varied. I have been playing charvels since the early 80s 5 I bought new.

The Production series feels nothing like those guitars. My customs are right on and my zoos are pretty damn close.

[snide comment deleted - but you know it was there]

The point of the original post was how do the Naturals feel in comparison to a Custom Shop. Having just played both (admittedly, in a store demo environment - which I originally stated), I noted that the Custom Shops felt like a better guitar - in particular, the fret ends, the knobs and the switch (the hardware may all be the same, but the 3 naturals I played, when measured against the 2 CS's that I played, yielded those results - they felt different).

What I did notice was that the two types of guitars are not worlds apart. I also did not compare either to the "real" ones (whatever they are). And yes, I don't own a "real" Charvel, but I have been playing my Production series pretty much non-stop since I bought it (that's a lie - I just pulled out by Ibanez last night) - and in comparison, the Natural felt very similar to the Production series - they were not worlds apart - and truth be told, I like the meatgrinder knob on the ProMod better (even though I just replaced it on mine).

Now that all said - maybe I'm biased, because I'm fairly certain I would never buy a natural finished guitar - they just don't make my nuts move.