Question: settings upon delivery?

[Norstorm]

I went looking for the JP12, and no store had them in stock yet.. so I fiddled around with some other JP models.. And they all had different stringhights and bridge settings.
So I wonder.. Was that just a bummer from a nosey customer, or the store..?
Will the guitars be delivered with a surtain setting from the factory, or.. is it wiz and by?

[ohdamnitsdevin]

From what I've read all guitars are inspected before shipment. This includes setup. What happens to the guitar once it arrives at guitar center is on guitar center. I would think Managment would want their higher end guitars maintained well. I would say something to GC's Managment.

[threeminutesboy]

Factory setup is just the best!

[straycat113]

I do not like to play guitars that are not set up well when I go into a store. But I honestly never hold this against any manufacturer as who knows what journey a guitar entails once it leaves the factory. I also know that I will get the guitar set up to my preferences anyway. This is one of those topics I find not so big a deal of in guitar gear interviews. Though a guitar store on the other hand should have there guitars in good playing shape, especially high end models!

[Jack FFR1846]

Depends on the store. I know Pete checks every single guitar that comes in to his store (I've watched him). I also often go to 2 different Guitar Centers. One (smaller one) has a program where the tech fills any downtime by pulling guitars off the rack in the store and doing a full setup. The other (larger one where Glenn goes) pulls a $6000 guitar or $200 guitar out of the box and puts it on the wall and that's all they do.

People want their guitars set up their way. One day at DuBaldo's, there were 2 Lukes. One had a decked trem and the other was floating. Very different setups, but both were done perfectly.

[DrKev]

In 2010 I worked in the warehouse of the largest music store in Paris. I've tested and setup thousands of guitars from many of the major brands, straight off the back of the truck from their respective distributors. In my opinion, factory setup is something of a myth. Some guitars arrive in-tune, some don't. Some have 1/8" action, some are unplayably low. Truss rods vary from way too tight to totally slack. Nuts are usually too high. The majority of instruments are far enough from the manufacturers specifications that adjustments are required. It's pretty sad. Depressing, even.

The most consistent setups, by a very large margin, were Gibson and Music Man. Gibson disappointed in some other aspects so for me Music Man were the clear winners. Obviously, I'm a Music Man fan and I'm happy to admit my bias in their favor. But where consistency, build quality, and 'fit and finish' are concerned, I also have some real objective experience behind me when I say that I think Music Man truly are the best in the business.

There are lots of reasons why two guitars that should have been identically setup might not be. Once a guitar arrives somewhere, it may well be checked by a technician in the store (or warehouse) before customers get to see the instruments. And that's a good thing! But that also means that a technician could decide that a factory setup just wasn't to their liking and adjust things differently. And of course some technicians are simply better or more experienced than others. Or perhaps a customer in the store asked for an adjustment before buying and didn't like it, or the store staff arranged a loan or a trial for a customer who did their own adjustment, and the guitar was never returned to original spec. But if the two guitars that didn't 'match' were EBMMs, you can be pretty sure that they left the factory the same and something changed on one of them later on.

[TSHOW]

Thanks Dr Kev!!!

[dkannen]

The music man guitars at my local GC all seem like they have 1 cm action... it's terrible! even the ones in the platinum room :0