Product: Tokai Limited Edition 70's Strat
Price Paid: USD 350
Submitted
01/21/2009
at
05:04am
by
marektokar
Email: marektokar at gmail<dot>com
Features
:
10
It was made in 1979-year I was born. It has standard 3 singles configuration and vintage tremolo with massive saddles. Neck has a 3 bolt plate. It used to be arctic white years ago-now turns to aged light green colour. Nut is plastic. Rosewood slapboard glued on the maple neck is 3-4mm thick so it is era correct CBS thickness. CBS tried to save some money thats why they applied thinner fretboard when made of exotic woods like rosewood. I`m not sure about CBS strats but I saw it on a Mustang rosewood boards.
Black pickguard, black knobs, black pickup covers. Aged nitro neck finish.
Sound
:
10
Guitar plays like a dream. Honestly it has that old patine of CBs strats and really resonate all around my belly. I have to mention neck which has medium C profile and feels so gooood..action is super crazy low maybe too low for playing with bottle neck but I use other guitars for bottle neck playing. No string buzzing at all. Frets are vintage type very comfy to play no sharpness anywhere. If it was refretted since 80`s I dont know but it doesnt look like. Pickups have their own distinctie sound. somewhere between vintage and texas sound definately original one. What I dont like is out of date tremolo unit which I am going to replace with wilkinson replacement.
Action, Fit, & Finish
:
10
Bought used so there are some cracks in the finish here and there but hey... guitar is as old as me and I have some cracks in the finish as well. All routing was done properly and guitar feels very solid. Ass tide neck pocket.More solid then hundreds of guitar I played even with 3 bolt neck.
Reliability/Durability
:
10
It withstanded 30 years of abuse in Osaka pubs without any major deformation It will withstand another 30 years in my studio or on the road in EU.
Customer Support
:
10
Those guys are very nice. They gave me all the info on the base of number imprinted on the tremolo cover in 3 days. Fender, Gibson anybody there?
Overall Rating
:
No Opinion
I play 15 years already. I started on violine moved to drums bass and guitars. I own fender custom shop 52 reissue nice guitar 5 times more expansive and plays acctually on the same level. I love overall feeling of Tokai strat superb neck and resonating alder body. I dont like plastic nut which is going to be changed for graphtech soon. Old string trees too. Tremolo is fine but those ooold saddles just brake my strings too often. Wilkinson deluxe is the best of the best. Tuners are old and rusty but surprise -everything stays in tune. Before upgrade this guitar was 8 now is 11 hmm... sorry I mean 10 Look I`m not anymore into Gibson Fender or anything imprinted on the guitar headstock. I like Leos and Gibbis designs with the highest possible quality but still for the human price and thats not the case of fender and gibson anymore.
