Fender® Custom Shop
Fat Sound Guitars is an Authorized Dealer For Fender® Musical Instruments. You can visit the official Fender® website by clicking This Link or the Fender® Custom Shop Banner below. Fat Sound is only authorized to sell and ship Fender® products within the USA.
Fat Sound Originals™
Our name for these guitars is derived from Fat Sound Guitars having been the first Fender® Custom Shop dealer to take Time Machine™ models and tweak them to include flatter fingerboards, larger, non-vintage sized fretwire and the larger neck carves that many Strat® players find more comfortable and less fatiguing with the added benefit of possibly increasing a guitar's overall resonance and sustain. In 1995, Fat Sound's owner, a die-hard Strat® player, had his personal '60's Custom Shop refretted with 6105 fretwire, the fingerboard planed form its original 7.25" radius to his preferred 9.5" and the pickups swapped out for Lindy Fralin Vintage Hots in the neck and middle positions and a Fralin Steel Pole 43 in the bridge. After the work was completed, everyone who played his Fiesta Red Strat® thought it one of the most amazing guitars they had experienced. Based on the universally positive reaction of friends and clients to this reworked Custom Shop guitar it quickly became obvious that there was s strong demand in the marketplace for this melding of timeless, vintage look and tone with more modern playability. We don't claim to have invented this concept, merely to have been the first guys to work with the Custom Shop to come up these killer variations on the standard Time Machine™ models to be offered as our standard.
The Importance of The Little Things
It boils down to our years of experience creating correctly tweaked Time Machine™ instruments. The Fat Sound Original™ models have literally been the better part of two decades in the making. Every spec' we change from the standard offerings serves a specific purpose and results in what we fell are meaningful improvements in both Tone and Playability. What began as a simple plan to make Time Machine guitars more marketable to the majority of our customers who wanted modern playability with the vintage look ended up as a journey of discovery through the nuances that make the vintage Fender® guitars so desirable. Ultimately we ended up with guitars that play beautifully and sound remarkably close to the best of the vintage, pre-CBS era Fenders®. The combination of Fender's® craftsman and our boots-on-the-ground experience combined to create a fantastic team.
While a few of the other well-known and respected Fender® Custom Shop dealers who share our passion for vintage Fenders® have long since caught on to the advantages of creating their own Time Machine™ variants with spec's similar to what we were initially doing 15 years ago, our original tweaks were merely a starting point to improve playability. We're confident that we are among a very small group of Custom Shop dealers who have invested the time, energy and passion to continue to develop unique Time Machine™ specifications that not only result in guitars that look period correct and that play effortlessly, but that, more importantly, have very special design elements (some of which we hold close to the vest) that result in guitars that actually sound as close as possible to the most exceptional examples of vintage Fender® guitars. We stock a limited number of these guitars and schedule them for a slow, steady flow rather than ordering 50 at a time primarily because we want to know each piece intimately enough to be able to give our customers an honest assessment of how each available guitar rates versus others we might have in stock as well as FSO™ guitars we've previously sold.
Why Our Fat Sound Original™ Guitars Are So Special - The Unclassified Bullet Points
- Not Merely a Flatter Fingerboard Radius: A flatter fingerboard radius is now commonly spec'd by Custom Shop dealers who are actively tweaking their Time Machine™ models to give their vintage style guitars the more modern playability that's been so successful for us. We've experimented with the most popular, modern radii including 9.5", 10" and 12". After years of experimenting with this vital spec' we believe that a radius of 9.5" is ideal. The staggered pole pieces of traditional single coil pickups are a critical element in achieving the most accurate vintage tone possible. Since the pole piece stagger was specifically designed by Leo Fender to align correctly with strings whose height was set to mirror the original 7.25" fingerboard radius it's clearly important to keep the curvature of the fingerboard as close as possible to the vintage spec' in order to retain as correct a string to pole piece relationship as possible while enlarging the fingerboard's curvature to improve playability. We have found the 1/2" difference between our 9.5" radius specification and a 10" radius, for example, to be considerably more critical than one might imagine. The difference in playability is essentially undetectable, but the difference in tone is not.
- Not Just "Medium Jumbo" Fretwire: We rarely encounter a Strat® or Telecaster® player who actually prefers the low profile vintage fretwire (.078" x .043") therefore our Fat Sound Original™ guitars are built using larger Dunlop wire for improved leverage while bending strings. The combination of the flatter radius mentioned above and the larger fretwire makes the Time Machine™ guitar you purchase from Fat Sound exceptionally playable. 6100 (.110" x .055") and 6105 (.090" x .055") profile wire have both been very popular for the past 20 years, we've used it ourselves, but we started using 6150 (.102" x .042") as our standard in 2009 and feel we finally hit on the perfect fretwire for big bends, reduced fret buzz and that, versus the taller 6100 and 6105, offers better intonation while playing; especially for players who fret aggressively. If you want to take it a step farther we'll gladly spec' a guitar for you with a vintage 7.25" radius, the playability issues of which are somewhat mitigated by our taller 6150 fretwire. However, we find the 9.5" radius and 6150 wire a perfect solution with an extremely minimal compromise when weighed against the benefits.
- Not Just "Rosewood": While Brazilian is the "correct" vintage spec' for the fingerboards on late 50's and early 60's Strats™ when it comes to the use of rosewood for fingerboards, we can't honestly say the we hear any difference whatsoever between Brazilian and East Indian so we see absolutely no reason to pay an enormous upcharge for Brazilian. If there was, we'd be doing it. However, We do want to make sure that the look is correct. The rosewood boards on vintage Fenders® invariable have an almost jet black, oily appearance which most Strat® fans agree is a critical element to the their overall visual vibe. Not only do we spec's dark rosewood, for which we pay a small upcharge, but we request that only the darkest rosewood Fender has on hand be used for our FSO™ models. This is merely a cosmetic tweak, but for most folks makes a huge difference in how correct our FSO™ models look. The tone and playability are the most important things, but we don't disocunt the vibe!
- All Tremolo Blocks Are Not Created Equally: This is why our FSO™ guitars are equipped with Callaham's Vintage Repro Enhanced Tremolo Block with Virtual Pop-In Tremolo Bar and a zero clearance fit Delrin bushing. This is a very meaningful upgrade that replaces the stock, hot rolled, leaded steel Synchromatic tremolo block with a vintage correct, cold rolled, non-leaded steel inertia block. This is critical to achieving the correct level of sustain and harmonic content that pre-CBS guitars posses. Furthermore, all tremolo users really should insist on a compression fit style tremolo bar rather than the 1950's style screw in wiggle stick. While a screw in tremolo arm is certainly traditional, anyone who actually uses their tremolo knows how much slop these bars quickly develop due to wear caused by the different hardness ratings of the arm's threads and the block. With a compression fit bar you lose the slop while gaining a direct, tight fit that allows for much greater control due to this design's superior feeling of connectivity between hand and tremolo. The Callaham "64" Virtual Pop-In arm, which is 3/4" shorter than the standard bar, is also a nice ergonomic improvement that allows most players to hold the arm in their palm while still being able to pick comfortably.
Senior Master Built 20th Anniversary Strat® | Previously Owned |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $4200.00 | AVAILABILITY: In Stock | |
| ADDITIONAL INFO: We Pay the Shipping to any Destination within the Continental US. | ||
|
||
Vital Stat's
From Fender's 2007 Press ReleaseThe Fender Custom Shop started in 1987. Now, 20 years later, it has become a world-renowned success and represents the pinnacle of the industry. To commemorate those first 20 amazing years, we’re proud to announce the Custom Shop Ltd 20th Anniversary Master-Built 2007 Stratocaster. Features and Specifications
Senior Master Builder Mark KendrickMark Kendrick is revered for building iconic Fender guitars and basses, and is respected for his attention to historical detail and willingness to push the creative envelope. He is a second-generation Fender man (his uncle handled “field services” for Leo in the mid-‘50s) who started in the Custom Shop in 1990. In the decade he’s been at Fender, Kendrick has amassed a stellar list of players for whom he has built instruments, including Marty Stuart, Sting, Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Keith Richards and many, many others. In late 1997, he built a custom one-off gold Stratocaster® for Eric Clapton. Many of the instruments Kendrick crafted are now housed, in fact, in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, Ohio, and at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, Tenn. |
||
 Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
'60 Fat Sound Original Stratocaster® | Fiesta Red NOS |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $3099.00 | AVAILABILITY: On Order | |
| ADDITIONAL INFO: Our FSO™ Strat in Fiesta is sold out once again. Back in stock soon! | ||
|
||
Features and Specifications
|
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
'60 Fat Sound Original Strat® | Left Handed | Fiesta Red NOS |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $3599.00 | AVAILABILITY: Sold | |
|
||
Lefty Upcharge - Yes. Fender Custom Shop charges an addition $600.00 (msrp) for their left-handed guitars. Fat Sound only passes our cost for this upgrade along to our customers. The Fat Sound Original™As always with batches of our Fat Sound Original™ guitars we had very specific instructions for this most recent group of NOS and Closet Classic '59 and '60's Strats. Our spec's have been developed over the course of nearly two decades of ordering heavily tweaked Custom Shop pieces. Via an extreme amount of trial-and-error based on my personal passion for these guitars I feel we offer the finest Custom Shop guitars you can buy. The folks who end up with these guitars will have heirloom quality Strats that they'll enjoy and be inspired by for the rest of their lives. It took me several years of both "running the racks" and ordering Custom Shop Stratocasters before I found that truly magical guitar. Our local clientele know my personal, 60's Fiesta Red guitar and how exceptional it is. I've owned that piece, my #1, for 15 years now and have developed a serious attachment to it. My goal throughout the development of our Fat Sound Original™ Stratocasters has always been to discover what combination of specifications and tweaks is needed so that we can dramatically improve the odds of being able to provide our customers with Custom Shop guitars that are consistently as excellent as the 60's Custom Shop Strat it took me a decade to find. Some of the specifications we have come up with were relatively obvious and have been a part of our FSO offerings from the very beginning while others were more elusive and took years to discover. We're confident that after many years of gradually getting closer to our goal that this most recent batch of Fat Sound Original™ guitars are so exceptional that the time and effort we've put into this project has finally paid off. No further tweaks are required......the FSO guitar series is now absolutely perfect! I'm not going to give away all of our secrets, but let's talk about the more obvious stuff! We were very specific about the weight spec's and each guitar in this batch came in at exactly 7.6 pounds.....dead center of our preferred weight range for Alder Strats®. We're also very particular about the Rosewood used for the FSO's fingerboards. First of all we specified East Indian which Fender Custom Shop no longer defaults to unless specifically asked and then there is a small upcharge. Secondly, the East Indian Rosewood had to be as dark as possible and our inside guy at the Custom Shop managed to find us a batch of rosewood that is almost black! While ultra-dark rosewood is merely a cosmetic consideration, I consider this an absolutely vital part of getting the look just right I've never seen a pre-CBS, rosewood board guitar that didn't have a dark, oily looking fingerboard. The country of original for the Rosewood however is not merely cosmetic. Also, for our FSO guitars, the fretwork has to be absolutely perfect. Look at the close shots of the edges of the fingerboards for each of these guitar. Beautiful fret end treatment, flawlessly cut fret slot depth and the edges of the fingerboard show that perfect, almost scalloped look between the frets that indicates that perfectly rounded over fingerboard treatment which is so critical for creating that comfortable, played-in feel. After 15 years our Fat Sound Original guitars are now perfect! The fit-and-finish, overall cosmetics and, most importantly, playability and tone of each of these guitars is truly exceptional! Eureka!!! Features and Specifications
Fat Sound Original™ Upgrades
The Flame Maple Neck MythI occasionally hear concerns about potential instability of figured maple necks. I'll take partial responsibility for this misconception since I've been pretty outspoken about avoiding certain types of figured maple necks for nearly 20 years now. But, it's always been birdseye figuring, not flame figuring, that I've spoken out against. It's true that Birdseye figuring can cause less than stable necks. Birdseye figuring is created by small knots in the wood which are imperfections that, while attractive, are best avoided. Not all birdseye maple necks prove to be unstable, but there is a degree of risk that's high enough that I recommend avoiding necks with this particular type of figuring. I've owned several guitars with heavy birdseye figuring and only one was problematic, but the neck on that particular guitar was unstable enough that the truss rod required constant tweaking in order to maintain my preferred degree of relief. Further, the greater the degree of birdseye in a given piece of maple the more likely that piece is to be unstable. This attractive type of maple is best reserved for use in decorative furniture laminates or for automotive interior accents. Flame, on the other hand, has never been shown to cause any notable tendency towards instability. While any piece of maple can prove to be unstable, flame maple is generally every bit as stable as unfigured, flat sawn maple. Where birdseye figuring is, in fact, imperfections/voids in the maple, flame is merely a figuring anomaly created by distortions in the wood that run perpendicular to the wood's grain. It looks attractive while having zero effect on a neck's stability. There is a ton of misinformation out there about flame maple some of which can be found on the websites of very respected builders, but we have centuries of proof about the stability of flame maple as used for the neck wood of a wide variety of instruments. Consider the centuries old violins with flame or fiddle back maple necks as well as nearly a century of mandolins built with flame maple necks. In Summary, we advise avoiding birdseye maple necks as a hard and fast rule, but have zero problem recommending flame maple necks if you like the look and desire to have this beautiful cosmetic element as a feature of your guitar. Stu Carter, tone consultant Fat Sound Guitars |
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
'60 Fat Sound Original Stratocaster® | Sonic Blue NOS |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $3099.00 | AVAILABILITY: On Order | |
| ADDITIONAL INFO: Our FSO™ Strat in Sonic Blue NOS finish is sold out once again. Back in stock soon! | ||
|
||
Features and Specifications
Fat Sound Original™ Upgrades
Customer Comment (9-21-2011) Based on An FSO™ From This Same Batch and With These Same Spec'sStu, When I ordered this guitar, I told you that I had never been attached to any guitar I had ever owned. If someone was gassing about it, I would sell it and buy something else. I have had every incarnation of this guitar...... This is "the guitar" I have always wanted. The color, nitro finish, frets, rosewood finger board, neck shape and the pickups are perfect! I would highly recommend this Fat Sound tweaked Strat to anyone wanting to move up to a custom shop guitar. There is a huge difference in feel, playability and tone that you will instantly notice and dig. As always, thanks for your time and assistance with this fine musical acquisition. All the Best, Robert B. The Flame Maple Neck MythWe occasionally hear concerns about potential instability of figured maple necks. It's true that Birdseye figuring can cause less than stable necks because birdseye figuring is created by small knots in the wood which are imperfections that, while pretty, are best avoided. Not all birdseye maple necks prove to be unstable, but there is a risk. I've owned several guitars with heavy birdseye figuring and only one was problematic, but it was unstable enough that the truss rod required constant tweaking until I eventually got fed up and gave the guitar to an underfunded professional guitarist who was badly in need of a new guitar and was happy to be given a guitar even if it meant some aggravation from a noodly neck. Flame, on the other hand, has never shown to cause a tendency towards instability to any greater extent than is possible in an unfigured, flat sawn maple neck. Where birdseye figuring is, in fact, imperfections/voids in the maple, flame is merely a grain anomaly that looks attractive while having zero effect on a neck's stability. Further, a laminated rosewood board and a lacquer finish will increase stability over the long haul. In Summary, we advise avoiding birdseye maple necks, but embracing flame maple necks if you like the look. Stu Carter, tone consultant
|
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
'60 Fat Sound Original Stratocaster® | 3-Tone Sunburst NOS |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $2849.00 | AVAILABILITY: On Hold | |
| ADDITIONAL INFO: Our FSO™ Strat in 3-Tone Sunburst NOS finish is sold out once again. Back in stock soon! | ||
|
||
Features and Specifications
Fat Sound Original™ Upgrades
Customer CommentStu, Sincerely, |
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
'59 Fat Sound Original Stratocaster® | Olympic White Closet Classic |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $2969.00 | AVAILABILITY: On Order | |
| ADDITIONAL INFO: Our FSO™ Strat in Olympic is sold out once again. Back in stock soon! | ||
|
||
Features and Specifications
Fat Sound Original™ Upgrades
|
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
'59 Fat Sound Original Stratocaster® | 3-Tone Sunburst Closet Classic orm> |
||
|---|---|---|
| FAT PRICE: $2969.00 | AVAILABILITY: On Order | |
| ADDITIONAL INFO: Our FSO™ Strat in 3-Tone CC finish is sold out once again. Back in stock soon! | ||
|
||
The Fat Sound Original™As always with batches of our Fat Sound Original™ guitars we had very specific instructions for this most recent group of NOS and Closet Classic '59 and '60's Strats. Our spec's have been developed over the course of nearly two decades of ordering heavily tweaked Custom Shop pieces. Via an extreme amount of trial-and-error based on my personal passion for these guitars I feel we offer the finest Custom Shop guitars you can buy. The folks who end up with these guitars will have heirloom quality Strats that they'll enjoy and be inspired by for the rest of their lives. It took me several years of both "running the racks" and ordering Custom Shop Stratocasters before I found that truly magical guitar. Our local clientele know my personal, 60's Fiesta Red guitar and how exceptional it is. I've owned that piece, my #1, for 15 years now and have developed a serious attachment to it. My goal throughout the development of our Fat Sound Original™ Stratocasters has always been to discover what combination of specifications and tweaks is needed so that we can dramatically improve the odds of being able to provide our customers with Custom Shop guitars that are consistently as excellent as the 60's Custom Shop Strat it took me a decade to find. Some of the specifications we have come up with were relatively obvious and have been a part of our FSO offerings from the very beginning while others were more elusive and took years to discover. We're confident that after many years of gradually getting closer to our goal that this most recent batch of Fat Sound Original™ guitars are so exceptional that the time and effort we've put into this project has finally paid off. No further tweaks are required......the FSO guitar series is now absolutely perfect! I'm not going to give away all of our secrets, but let's talk about the more obvious stuff! We were very specific about the weight spec's and each guitar in this batch came in at exactly 7.6 pounds.....dead center of our preferred weight range for Alder Strats®. We're also very particular about the Rosewood used for the FSO's fingerboards. First of all we specified East Indian which Fender Custom Shop no longer defaults to unless specifically asked and then there is a small upcharge. Secondly, the East Indian Rosewood had to be as dark as possible and our inside guy at the Custom Shop managed to find us a batch of rosewood that is almost black! While ultra-dark rosewood is merely a cosmetic consideration, I consider this an absolutely vital part of getting the look just right I've never seen a pre-CBS, rosewood board guitar that didn't have a dark, oily looking fingerboard. The country of original for the Rosewood however is not merely cosmetic. Also, for our FSO guitars, the fretwork has to be absolutely perfect. Look at the closeup shots of the edges of the fingerboards for each of these guitar. Beautiful fret end treatment, flawlessly cut fret slot depth and the edges of the fingerboard show that perfect, almost scalloped look between the frets that indicates that perfectly rounded over fingerboard treatment which is so critical for creating that comfortable, played-in feel. After 15 years our Fat Sound Original guitars are now perfect! The fit-and-finish, overall cosmetics and, most importantly, playability and tone of each of these guitars is truly exceptional! Eureka!!! Features and Specifications
Fat Sound Original™ Upgrades
|
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
Nocaster Relic Limited Edition - Black Nitro - Modern Neck |
||
|---|---|---|
| MSRP: $3600.00 | FAT PRICE: $3600.00 | AVAILABILITY: Sold |
|
||
Highly Recommended!!™ |
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
Nocaster Custom Shop NOS in Blond |
||
|---|---|---|
| MSRP: $3500.00 | FAT PRICE: $3500.00 | AVAILABILITY: Sold |
|
||
Highly Recommended!!™ |
||
| Email Fat Sound Guitars |
||
