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Travis Bean makes the scene
It’s kind of like seeing a unicorn. There were a mere 755 of these produced during the company’s relatively short existence during the 1970s. This one is a beauty! From Wikipedia: Clifford Travis Bean (21 August 1947 – 10 July 2011, aged 63) was an American luthier and machinist from California. In 1974, he partnered with Marc McElwee and Gary Kramer to start Travis Bean Guitars, which made high-end electric guitars and basses featuring machined aluminum necks. The aluminum center section ran through the instrument body, with the pickups directly mounted to the aluminum. The majority of these instruments featured solid Koa wood bodies and Humbucker pickups. Though praised for their…
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Black Strat with a crook in its neck
Today’s patient is a Fender Stratocaster, circa 2002. The initial complaint from the player was a “stripped truss rod nut, and it’s just not playable.” I made some quick measurements and found the neck to be quite bowed. This model of Strat is equipped with Fender’s BiFlex Truss Rod, which works differently than a typical dual action truss rod. A dual action setup utilizes a matched pair of rods anchored at the nut and at the heel of the neck, allowing for quite a bit of movement in either direction, as well as a good amount of man handling. The BiFlex setup utilizes a single rod, anchored in the center,…
Brooklyn Fretworks
Baltimore guitar design, repair and modification
