Loose Truss Rod = Broken Guitar!!

[NPauly]

Ok, so I recently bought a Squier M-80 from my local Sam Ash here in NYC and I absolutly love this guitar. In fact the only thing I haven't been enjoying is the lack of relief in the neck. Depending on how hard I am strumming it can get pretty buzzy, but I assumed that a quick tweak of the truss rod would fix things.

So I had some spare time the past few days and I decided I would use some of this time to setup my new guitar. Unfortunately for me it appears that the truss rod is completely loose and the neck is either dead straight or might even have a very very slight back bow. The truss rod is so loose that I didn't even bother adjusting it much since I can already tell that it's not doing anything. And to make matters worse when I put a capo on the at 1st fret and then fretted the high e string at the 16th fret I can't even pass a .010 string between the string at any of the frets and the low e string isn't much better.

Now for the worst part ... I am 2 days outside of my exchange period with Sam Ash!! The only thing that may save me is that the Sam Ash on 48th St is my Squier authorized local service center. So I am left with no choice, but to take it to them and plead my case.

I'm pretty bummed because I really like this guitar and I would like to get an exchange, but I'm afraid that my only course of action will be to deal with Squier directly and God only knows how long that will take.

Any advice?

[kerc]

You're supposed to still have a warranty directly from Squier/Fender.

http://www.squierguitars.com/pdf/warranties/SQUIERINSTRUMENT64CEC.pdf

I hope this helps. :)

[NPauly]

So I took the guitar to Sam Ash today and got the run around from the floor sales staff. So I asked to speak to the store manager. The manager also happens to be their head guitar tech (and apparently one of the owners of the Sam Ash chain and website). He took a look at the guitar's truss rod and immediately exchanged the guitar for a new one. He even took the time to setup the guitar in front of me and allowed me to play a little so he could tweak the action so I was happy with it. While he was doing the setup he told me that they don't have to record serial numbers on the Squier guitars and other "low end" guitars they sell so he will just send the guitar back as if they had pulled it out of the box and found that the truss rod was broken. Super nice guy. On my way out I overheard him doling out some pretty harsh words to a few of the floor managers -- woops. I'm pretty sure I will be shopping at the 48th Street Sam Ash again in the future. :)

[NPauly]

Oh yeah ... I forgot to mention the best part.

While he was looking at the truss rod on my guitar I picked up the floor model and after looking it over I told him that I would take it if the truss rod worked and either he or I could do a quick setup on the guitar. He agreed and went to work setting up the floor model, only he didn't get very far because the truss rod was totally slack on that guitar too! Next he went and got a new guitar from their stock room and started setting up that guitar. Everything was cool until we turned it over and it was missing both of the cover plates for the switch and control cavities!! He was exasperated so I spoke up and suggested that he could just take the covers from the guitar I was returning and put them on this guitar and I would be cool with that. He was extremely relived. So much for Squier's quality control ...

[NPauly]

You're supposed to still have a warranty directly from Squier/Fender.

http://www.squierguitars.com/pdf/warranties/SQUIERINSTRUMENT64CEC.pdf

I hope this helps. :)

I guess I should have just bought a Reverend Warhawk instead. ;)

Thanks for the info on the Squier warranty. The guitar came with a warranty card so I had already done some investigation into their coverage. It was really funny to find out that my local Squier authorized service center is the very same Sam Ash where I bought the guitar.