Charvel Custom Shop Exclusive Nitro Aged San Dimas Electric Guitar

Includes: Hardshell Case, Tremolo Arm, and Paperwork

"The Sky is the Limit." That describes how we at The Music Zoo felt after we worked with Charvel's Custom Shop a couple years ago on our first exclusive Charvel Custom Run: the San Dimas Natural Series. A San Dimas Natural is a stripped down, no-frills workhorse at a great price. After the success of those guitars, we couldn't help but dream about the "ultimate" Charvel San Dimas we had been envisioning. How would we build a Charvel San Dimas that would be near-perfect blend of old and new, looks and tone, and be the one of the most comfortable guitars we've ever picked up?

To answer that question, The Zoo's owner and Vintage Charvel aficianado Tommy Colletti got back on a plane to Corona, CA, in 2007 to again sit down with the Charvel Custom Shop, and this time he brought with him the neck from his beloved 1980 San Dimas. Since Tommy first learned that the famed Stratocaster® headstock could once again be put on a Charvel guitar, he only had one thought: to replicate his favorite guitar neck of all time, the well-worn 21 fret Strat-headstock beauty that he had been playing since it was new. Vintage San Dimas necks have always been heralded for their feel; they seem to just fit right in your hand. Fast, but with a weight in the shoulders that make chording and rhythm playing feel great too. For Tommy, his '80 is "the one". He knew that to make the "perfect" San Dimas, it would have to have that neck. Charvel digitally modeled Tommy's vintage 1980 San Dimas neck using a 3D laser scanner to use as the master neck profile for every example of this new guitar. Every one of these necks has the edges of the fingerboard "rolled" to provide that extra softness and comfort that comes naturally after 25 years of playing. Tommy did it to his neck the old-fashioned way, now your guitar can have that feeling too. The 21 fret necks feature a 1 3/4" nut width, brass side dots, walnut fretboard dots, purpleheart plug, and Gotoh crown head tuners.

The original Charvel San Dimas guitars of the late '70s and early '80s were all sprayed with a polyurethane finish. Poly was and still is a popular finish for guitars; it's extremely durable, easy to apply, and is inexpensive. But the "ultimate" San Dimas needs the ultimate finish, and to us, that means nitrocellulose lacquer. A lacquer finish, like you'll find on the great Fender and Gibson guitars of the '50s and '60s, is much thinner and allows the guitar to more freely resonate. And it's no secret that The Music Zoo is a big fan of the "relic" guitar treatments that have been made popular in the last 5-10 years (in fact, we have our own line of those too) so having the nitro finish was great because it allowed us to spec these new guitars from a "closet classic" type finish all the way to a cracked, chipped, and well-played relic appearance. These are replicas of guitars that never existed - vintage style San Dimas guitars with nitro finishes: the best of both worlds.

We are shooting Nitro Aged San Dimas guitars in a wide palette of colors; 2 and 3 color sunbursts, '50s Dupont/Fender original colors like Burgandy Mist Metallic, Daphne Blue, Olympic White, or, whatever you want. These guitars are extremely customizable, and we can order one to your specs. We have been ordering them with Floyd Rose tremolos and NOS-style vintage tremolo bridges, DiMarzio, Seymour Duncan, and Lindy Fralin pickups, and every Nitro Aged comes with a black G&G hardshell case.

Charvel®, San Dimas®, and the distinctive headstock design commonly found on Charvel® guitars are registered trademarks of FMIC under license to JCMI.