Nash Guitars S-62 Stratocaster

It's a Strat. You already know the features.

Sounds like a great vintage Strat. It compares to real vintage Fender.

The guitar was set up well. My only complaint is that the action was too low. But hey, it's not like that's hard to fix. The finish is as good as a regular custom shop Fender relic guitar.

Just like a real Strat: simple and built to take a beating and still play just fine.

I haven't dealt with Bill Nash or anyone who works for him. I couldn't tell you what they're like.

I've been playing for 22 years and this guitar is as nice as my main guitar: an Eric Johnson Strat. I've owned a Custom Shop Strat, and the Nash kills it; but that particular Custom Shop Strat sucked and was a bad example. I put this guitar on par with a really nice Fender sound wise. Although it was a little expensive --- $1600 new --- that's way less than new custom shop Strat.

I've heard the good and the bad about Nash guitars and I'm really happy with this guitar. But like all makes of guitars there are good ones and bad ones. Go to your nearest Nash dealer and try one out; it's not like anyone will notice if you scuff it by accident.

2002 Reliced Lefty white strat w/ faded gold hardware. Looks AWESOME! Faded gold Klusons stay in tune even while bashing the crap out of it. The bridge works great, smooth. To my surprise the standard no frills Seymour Duncan SSL pickups sound excellent and was everything I needed in a high output pickup, sounds like the perfect beefy classic strat. Goes from a mean balsy strat tone to a punchy loud blusey tone, and roling off the volume a very delicate crisp tone. The pickups cost about $50.00 each but they are exactly what I've been looking for. They are also very quiet and don't feedback much. I've seen this guitar hanging in a guitar shop for about a year before I bought it. It just played better than everything else in the store, I'm glad I bought it. I gig and record with it regularly, I bought it as a back up for my early 70's strat but this became my #1.

I play in a hard rock band, our other guitar player plays Les Pauls and this is a perfect fit. Both of them compliment each other well, and this strat isn't buired in the thick Les Paul grawl. I also play early rock-n-roll with it and it sounds like a 50's strat. I have a good collection of vintage and "botique" amps and this sounds great with everything. I mostly play out with a Roccaforte 45 watt amp with the hard rock band and it sounds like a monster, not like your typical strat. When I play the garage rock, it goes through a few different 60's and 70's Fender amps and thay all sound great, like a louder and better sounding custom shop (and I've been through a few of those). I guess the "Less Is More" thorey works in the case of these Duncan's! I like the relic look because I use my guitars regularly for touring and recording. I don't wory about scratching it or dinging it up. The dings and other things that I put on it just adds to it.

It came set up OK, it buzzed and had some other wierd thing with it. I don't know if I could blame Bill for that or the fact that it was hanging in a guitar store for over a year (its a lefty so I doubt it was played much). I took it to my trusty repair guy and he did his voodoo on it. Replaced the nut with a hand made bone nut, re-dressed the frets,intonation and away we go. Remember that it is a Partsocaster but then again every strat pretty much is, I can't deny that it plays like a dream.

I have had a mic stand fly into it and it didn't even phase it, our singer accidently threw a mic into it and it didn't even scratch it. It gets thrown in the back of a van and tours around the country with no problems. Tough paint job, the whole guitar is solid and Bill did a clean solder job on the electronics. I have done a few local gigs without a backup and it never let me down. , oddly it doesn't break strings much.

Never contacted Bill, and if I did it would be to tell him to make me lefty's!! If there is a problem I'll take to my repair guy. Its a strat, anyone can fix it!

I've been playing for 20+ years touring and recordinf for that whole time and still playing! I own several early 70's strats, late 70's tele, 65 SG JR , 58' Les Paul TV yellow JR, 60's and 70's Les Paul Customs and others, 70's Hiwatt Stack, 60's and 70's Fender amps and others. Bill does a great job on these strats, I would definately buy another one if this was stolen. It was $1400.00 but well worth it.

21 fret maple neck with brazilian rosewood fretboard, Callaham real clay fret markers and 7.25 neck radius. Two piece alder body with medium relic job and three tone sunburst finish. Callaham tremolo, Gotoh Klusson tuners, and Lindy Fralin Real '54s. Body and neck are from USA Custom Guitars.

The Fralin pickups make this guitar sound good, but it is still not as nice nor does it give the tone of my Fender Custom Shop '56 and '60 Strat or my other partsocaster.

My complaint with this guitar is mostly with the body. The body of the guitar had a very poor finish. The body had a lot of overspray and circular scratches over the entire body. The scratches were not part of the relicing look but where the finish had been sanded to make it look dull and remove paint from the typical wear spots. It looked very fake and unnatural. The body is a two piece body that is has a very unmatched grain pattern and you can see the line down the center where the two pieces are joined. The body is also not resonant at all. The poorly matched body and dead wood are the fault of USA Custom Guitars for selling the body to Bill, but he should have rejected it based on looke alone because when you are asking $1500 for a guitar that is basically a partsocaster and you are claiming it rivals the Fender Custom Shop you should have better quality control.

I give the guitar a one in this category because everyone compares these guitars to the Fender Custom Shop guitars and this guitar isn't even close. I have never seen a Fender Custom Shop or even a regular production model with such a poorly matched body, sloppy paint job, dead piece of wood for the body. Nash guitars are very overrated. He uses bodies and necks from all of the different aftermarket suppliers.
The only thing he really does is paint the guitar and relic it, which he did a poor job of.

I have owned the guitar for over two years I haven't had any problems with the pickups or hardware. I give the guitar a 10 for reliability because I don't anticipate problems with any of the parts breaking.
To me the guitar doesn't live up to the hype and the quality of wood used for the body was poor. The finish was also a joke for the money, but those problems will have no bearing on the guitars reliability as far as pickup or hardware failure.

Called Bill about returning, but he didn't beleive there was any fault with the guitar. He wanted me to pay for shipping and a 20% fee for returning it. I decided to just keep the guitar and maybe sell it later on E-bay.

I have been playing for 17 years. My amps are a Fender Twin and Mesa Dual Rectifier half stack. I have a '56 and '60 Fender Custom Shop Relic guitars, '92 Standard Strat, three partsocasters, and Wolfgang.
If the guitar were to be stolen I would hate I lost $1500, but would care less about replacing it with another Nash. As I said earlier I don't understand the hype and interest abot these guitars. Bill uses All Parts, Warmoth, USACG, etc. bodies and necks. The same bodies and necks everyone else uses for building a partsocaster. Nash guitars are just partsocasters not hand made botique guitars. All he does is order parts, try to paint and relic, then put it together. Don't fall into the hype, save yourself the money and build one yourself.

I brought this reliced Strat from the guys at Killer Vintage in the Fall of 2005. It is a typical Strat setup - Fiesta Red, 3 Van Zandt Blues Pickups 5 way switch. Really cool vintage look. Found a decal on the internet and it looks like the real deal.

The sound is out of this world. I seldom played a Strat before this one as they can sound a little thin live, this one sings!!! I have been playing it through a Fender Blues Deville and it produces a nice warm round tone.

Bill Nash did a wonderful job on this guitar. I had a couple of so called "vintage experts" fooled by this guitar. I set it up to the basic Fender setup and it plays beautifully. The neck it great. Smooth to the touch and the fret job is top notch

It's well build. I'm sure it will hold up to the abuse of live playing.

I bought the guitar from Killer Vintage and had some contact with Bill Nash before that. All these guys were great to deal with. I live south of the Bahamas so anything I buy I have to either buy it in Miami or buy it off the internet. It is a pleasure to deal with people who can follow up and get products to their customers.

I have to give this guitar top marks. It does everything I want it to and more. I can highly recommend these things. They sound real sweet!!! At this point in my life I have way too many guitars. Gibsons, Fenders Ibanez. This one is a keeper though. It has some real Voo Doo happening.

2 piece alder body, 3 tone sunburst, worn to match a ?64 strat I liked, 6105s, slab board w/ genuine clay dots, Lindy Fralin-Vintage Hots, transition logo, L serial number stamped neck plate, cloth wired, repro tuners, lightly flamed neck, compound radius fretboard (flattens out to 10 inches I believe), 2 pick guards -mint and tortoise, 2 G & G cases, vintage nut w/ extra uninstalled Earvana nut.

Set-up: Strat/PRS ?> FDII ?> Holland lil?jimi (6l6s (GE), hand wired, orange drops, blah blah ?beautiful boutique 35 watt amp)- all George Ls cables.

Bill Nash?s guitar sings. Just what a strat should be. But, you?ve heard that pitch before. Certainly, if you have a well built guitar w/ similar model Fralin?s, you?ve got a decent idea of how this guitar sounds. But, if I left this review at that you would be the poorer for it.

I?ve had Fralin?s in various Fender guitars in the past and loved them. What?s the difference here? All the world I tell you. Bill?s guitar adds a character to the Fralin?s that I haven?t heard or felt without playing the genuine article. I haven?t played an embarrassing number of vintage Fenders, but have plunked around on a few. For me, this is undoubtably my favorite guitar.

For the past seven or eight years I?ve played a PRS exclusively. Swore by them and still like ?em. But, since the Nash strat arrived, I?ve picked the PRS up only a few times. I?m telling you, this guitar does it for me. I?m in love.

I can?t add much in this section. I?ve never bought a guitar that I didn?t immediately get out the feeler gauges and fart around with the action/relief/intonation. But, if it helps, no this guitar didn?t come set up from the ?factory? exactly to my taste. Nevertheless, 40 minutes after opening the box it was set up and playing like a damn dream.

I should add that the fret work was second to none.

Seriously, reliability? It?s a strat.

This is the part that will impress.

This guitar was my law school graduation present. I emailed a pic of my favorite 64 strat to Bill and he got to work. It was a little unnerving as I didn?t like every guitar I saw on his web site. Some just plain didn?t do it for me. I had a chance to see a bunch of Bill?s guitars in progress, read the customer?s build requests, and see the pictures of their ?vibe targets.? Bill?s ability to match the pictures customers sent was astonishing and my fears waned a bit. The guitars that I didn?t like were exactly what the customer wanted. I remember one specifically. It was a reproduction of the Yngwie Malmsteen strat. It was nearly spot on, but just hit a flat note with me personally.

This was a process. Slowly Bill sent back a few pics that began looking substantially similar to the pics I had forwarded to him just a few weeks before. The guitar took awhile as I specified a couple things that needed to be special ordered. Also, Bill was moving into his new shop at the time. Since I was studying for the Bar Exam at the time, I couldn?t have cared less about the time it was taking.

When the guitar was finished the brown G&G case with yellow interior that I ordered had not arrived yet. So, Bill sends the guitar out anyway in a tweed G&G case with a note saying he?ll ship the brown G&G case as soon as it arrives.

At this point I?d moved to the Gulf Coast to start my brilliant career as a lawyer. Got a house right on the beach overlooking the Gulf. White sand, the whole bit. 3 months later Hurricane Katrina and the Gulf of Mexico reclaimed my house. Not to worry. The family and I had evacuated with the Nash strat and a couple more pieces of cool gear.

After talking with Bill about the color of the wear on the back of the neck, not only does the new brown G&G case arrive, but he also included a glass bottle of his secret wear sauce, a special application pad, a large piece of steel wool, and a description of how to use all these to darken the wear on the back of the neck if I preferred. Bill paid the shipping for all of this by the way.

I can?t say enough positive thinks about Bill Nash.

It?s been a while since I?ve liked guitar this much. I don?t frequent message boards, but I have heard the typical arguments made against buying an aged guitar. I disagree. What I like most about this guitar is it's vibe. I love how I FEEL when I?m playing it. Playing any guitar should be emotional and this guitar gets me to that place faster than any other reasonably priced guitar that I?ve tried. So, my overall rating? Ten. Yea, an easy ten.

Ummm, fairly standard circa 1962 Strat fare but OK here it is:
Made by Bill Nash in Olympia, Washington, USA
21 frets, medium jumbo (I think they are 6105s, measure 0.102 wide and 0.046 high??)
Rosewood slab board maple neck, no skunk stripe, 10" radius, medium C shape
Solid alder body, worn Olympic White with no clear coat
S/S/S Lindy Fralin Vintage Hots passive pups
Vol/Tone/Tone, 5 way selector, 0.022 capacitor on tone
Kluson copy tuners (not Single or double lines, has no words stamped on covers)
Vintage 6 screw bridge, unmarked stamped steel saddles
Guitar weighs about 7.5 lbs

Holy cow does this thing sound good! I have about 12 guitars including 4 strats (more over the years) and this is hands down the best sounding strat of the lot. I play blues, rock, alternative, pop etc pretty much anything except metal. I would actually say that it sounds as good as if not better than most real pre-CBS strats I have played. It has a beautifully detailed and rich sound, all the quack in positions 2 and 4, the neck position is just strat heaven for me - woody and fluid sounding. The bridge sound I normally hardly ever use but on this one is not as harsh as others. Overall the sound can be airy in the top end, a rich detailed mid-range and a good tight bottom end - I would imagine that a lot of this would be attributed to the Lindy Fralin pups. By comparison my CS strat sounds like it has cotton wool over it - muted, muddy and dull! And I used to love that guitar, but there is no comparison sound wise. If you are after great strat sounds this is your guitar.
Set up can vary depending on who I am playing with, but a standard set up would be Strat - A/B > Boss Tuner TU-2 / Teece RMC-2 > G2D Cream Tone or G2D Custom Overdrive > MXR Dyna Comp (70s block logo) > Maxon phaser > Boss DM-3 analog delay > Fender 1966 blackface Super Reverb or Fender 1963 brown tolex Super Amp, cables are all George Ls. If you've never heard of G2D, do yourself a favour and check their stuff out. http://www.g2d.co.nz/ If you are reading this chances are you love the sound of a great strat but can't quite seem to nail the sound you are after (as I have spent the last 20 years doing) I would highly recommend the G2D Cream Tone pedal into a good tube amp for a juicy overdriven blues tone. Alternatively I just go straight to the amp and set it on the sweet spot of just going into overdrive and use the guitar's volume control.

I bought this off Ebay and initially had some issues when I pulled it apart. I found the routing messy and had issues with the nut. However the fretwork was the best I had seen out of the box and the sound was phenomenal. The cosmetic flaws are all intentional - it's meant to look like a 40 year old beast - wearing on the arm, nicks, rusted hardware, hardly any finish on the neck. Feels great, broken in and even smells old and "brown". Bill emailed me and let me know that he normally does not worry too much about what his guitars look like under the pickguard as they are meant for playing not collectors which is fair enough, just be aware of this if it bothers you. I'm taking off marks more for the nut (which is a major for me) than the routing, but let me say that the relic job is excellent.

Hey I'll probably be handing this one onto my kid on my deathbed, strats are probably better put together than most humans...

I bought this second hand off Ebay, emailed Bill Nash to see if he could verify that it was his and he emailed me a lengthy and detailed reply himself going over every point I enquired about. How's that for service? It's a good time to be a guitar player, there are several excellent guys like Bill out there who love what they do and are at the coalface doing it and still have time to talk to weirdo anal guitar players on the other side of the planet (I'm in Australia). Hats off, Mr Nash

Been playing 20 years (played classical violin for 7 years prior to that). Other guitars include 1997 Custom Shop strat, 1974 Tele, 1980s Jap Strat w CS Fat 50s pups, 1981 Gibson Les Paul Custom, Brian Moore (not sure what model), 1930s Dobro etc etc too many! I also have a pile of effects that only get pulled out every now and then. Amps mentioned above plus am in the process of acquiring a BF Princeton Reverb (getting old to lug round 65lbs amps! BFPR is a nice small amp with great tone).

If there is any higher rating I can give than this - I am ordering another from Bill built to my specs and addressing the issues mentioned above. How's that for a recommendation! Compared to other Strats this one sounds so much more alive and dynamic and I love the fact that I don't worry about dinging it on an amp or dropping a screwdriver on it. I remember when the whole relic thing first happened and I thought it was kind of weird, I just preferred buying old guitars anyway. Bill Nash saves me from keeping on trading trying to find a guitar how I want it - he can custom make it how you want (this guitar was custom made to someone else's specs) and if you happen to drop it, that's all part of the charm, it's not like you see many strats with broken necks.

COLOR = VINTAGE FIESTA RED
PICKGUARD =WHITE
HARDWARE and PLASTiC =WORKING MAN
1962 Stratocaster Replica.
Pickup assembly contains two Duncan (SSL-1) Pickups in Neck and Middle and a Duncan Hot (SSL-6) in the bridge. This gets all the wonderful sweet strat sounds with super quack in the #2 & 4 positions and breathes fire from the bridge. This is not you usual weak and thin bridge pickup. All plastic parts have been painstakingly aged.

Alder body - 4 lbs 4 oz - nice and light!
Neck - nice birdseye & dark rosewood
Neck is vintage style one piece maple with rosewood board 10 inch radius, medium C shape, medium large frets and a 1 5/8 nut width. Frets have been completely leveled, crowned, dressed and buffed. It plays like a dream and action can be set very low without fret-outs. Gears are Vintage Kluson style.
Vintage style tremolo has solid steel block for super sustain.

Gator case included!

The sound is beautiful. There was a small grounding problem which I told Bill about. I had it fixed at al local guitarshop. Bill paid for this without any problems. He is a reasonable guy!

I am using a Fender Hot Rod deluxe. My line up is mostly:
KORG TUNER,CRYBABY, MOOGERFOOGER RING MOD ,EH MICRO SYNTH, IBANEZ PT-909 PHASER, BIGMUFF OR TS808, MEMORY MAN DELUXE OR MY BELOVED DAN-ECHO.

I alway play on my clean channel and ad my own sound to the guitar + amp. I like very much the sound of this strat.

Along with the grounding problem which was an easy fix,I decided that the setting was a bit low so I changed that. Besides that,the guitar is 100 % OK.

When I brought it to the guitarshop, people could not believed therre eyes (in a positive way offcourse).

Hardware and plastic is great, looks old and ragged but is 100 % working.

See above. Very very solid stuff. Bill knows what he is doing.

Bill is a very nice reasonable guy, who always answers your mails. great communication. Guitar comes with warranty (check Bill's site at www.nashguitars.com).

He even made my own project site,with lots of pictures .

I pay forabout fifteen years.I owe an Tele USA, Jap '93 Jaguar, Fender parts Strat (my own selfbuilt project) and offcourse my beautiful Relic Fiesta Red Strat Nash Guitar!!!!!!

Believe me guys and dolls: THIS IS TRUE VALUE FOR YOUR HARD-EARNED MONEY! That is why it is almost a TEN out of TEN!

2004 US made '62 recreation "relique" Stratocaster

21 fret vintage style one-piece maple neck with rosewood fretboard.
Ten inch radius, medium C shaped. Medium large frets, and a 1 5/8 inch nut width. Fitted with vintage type Kluson tuners (i.e. not locking). String tree for the two highest two strings. Headstock shape is like a 1962 strat (i.e. the small kind).
Body is two piece basswood strat.
One volume pot, two tone controls, 5 way selector switch.
Duncan SSL-1 in neck and middle, SSL-6 in bridge position.
Vintage style tremolo unit with solid steel block.
I wanted a strat which is really a strat, for fancy pickup switching I already have a G&L Comanche and a Charvel Surfcaster. I know Bill can provide less traditional and more fancy configurations if you ask him.
The guitar came with a tweed case (not G&G though, but for this money who's complaining...)
Oh yeah: my guitar has a BRIDGE COVER. Quite unusual for a strat, and actually it suits my playing and is comfortable to rest my palm on.

My band plays rock songs which are submerged in a bed of sick sounding guitars. So the guitars are at times quite poppy, but there's a lot of sonic mayhem with weird effects going on as well.

I use my beloved 1965 Fender Deluxe for rehearsal at home and recording, and whatever crap is in the room when we rent a booth to play LOUD. The Laney/Peavey/Marshall valvestate bogus gear that rehearsal centers buy sucks up your sound, so this review is based on my trusted old Fender amp.
This Bill Nash strat produces all the strat sounds I like. The tone pots are quite effective in rolling off the highs, and the volume cleans up well when rolled off. The pickups generate a bit more noise than for example my MusicMan Silhouette, but nothing serious.
No click/buzz/farts like an old Fender. But the sound is there! It's what I wanted and I got it, hence another 10.

Bill set it up to his preference. The neck is exceptionally playable, and the setup is kinda low. I may change that a little, because low setups can get annoying for playing slide which I do regularly.
Flaws? It's a reliced guitar, which means rusted screws, dings, the works. BUT: every component which needs to work is fine. I wonder how he does that..... If I would try that myself I'm sure I would ruin things (the tuners for example look like they're about to fall off, but are 100% solid).

I'm sure you could throw it down a flight of stairs and it would still play. Tuners, trem and pots all operate with the right "resistance", I can't find any flimsyness about it.
The way the neck sits tightly in the body reminds me of the confident feeling that my MusicMan gives me, and is better than, say, a regular US Fender or a G&L.
Apart from string breakage I would use it without a backup.
As far as value for money goes, it's hard to beat this Nash guitar in terms of quality.

I've exchanged emails with Bill and he's a likable guy. He's even got a toll free help number you can call. You can custom order anything, if you do so he even makes a web page so you can watch your guitar being built.... You get a warranty of 48 months I believe.
Don't think I'm gonna need it.
This kind of personal attention is an example to everyone, but I think it's unrivalled given the price tag!

Been playing for 15 years, self taught. I own a very early G&L ASAT, a Charvel Surfcaster, a G&L Comanche, a 1963 Fender Jaguar, a MusicMan Silhouette special. I did have G&L Legacy for a while but that wasn't the real deal to me soundwise (a good guitar nonetheless, but not great).
This is one fine guitar, AND A STEAL. Get a custom shop quality relic for the price of a normal USA strat and two stompboxes...
If it were lost or stolen, I would hunt down the <insert grave insults> who did it and string him up by the <insert sensitive body part>. Alternatively I would order another one from Bill...

So this looks like a biased rave review. But the value for money factor weighs in considerably! It's really a steal.