Let's Talk: Kramer

[@markpell8979]

So being a Gibson company and with all we've heard about their recent QC improvement campaign, I'd expect these 'affordable' level Kramers to be more comparable with equivalent Epiphones, but evidently they're not. Recently I looked at a nearly-new Baretta in a pawn shop that looked great and was priced about $150, which incidentally means the shop probably loaned $50 on it to whoever stole it and took ownership of it a month later as collateral on the defaulted loan. So I knew they had wiggle room on the price and it looked interesting. When I grabbed the neck to take it down off the wall and check it out I was shocked at how bad the fret ends were. If I had slid my hand along the neck instead of just grabbing it, it would've sliced my skin, and I have tough hands. Imagine an uninformed parent buying one for a young beginner or a student without knowing what's proper or not. The frets on this guitar would've injured anybody who tried to play it, no question. I cannot imagine how this could've been overlooked in production or passed quality inspection. I can fix frets, the rest of the guitar was pretty much ok except for the setup, and I was looking for an inexpensive project guitar to flip or add to the collection as a mod platform so I explained the serious problem with the frets and offered them $80. No deal, so I wished them luck. After this experience I am not interested in a Kramer. Too many high-quality, reasonably-priced other brands now.

[@SapulpaGuitarAcademy]

Fret sprout can be a deal killer for a lot of players, but it's such a common occurrence with import guitars. Especially now with so much inventory building up with dealers. A lot of these guitars will sit in the warehouse for months, even a year or two. Perfect conditions for fret sprout. Thanks for the excellent information! Always appreciate hearing from you.

[@markpell8979]

@@SapulpaGuitarAcademy Thanks. My experience was probably not typical but it left a lasting bad impression. I own several Squiers and Epiphones and never had frets like that. As you said, we have had a lot of guitars spending extended time in dry warehouses the last few years and the 'affordable' ones are often made from lesser-quality woods that are also not always dried fully before use. A formula for shrinkage and fret sprout.

[@Bequeefed]

I picked a baretta special second hand for £100/$126, love everything about it so far

[@SapulpaGuitarAcademy]

Thanks for the comment. Yeah, I love my Kramer Baretta Special, too!

[@designbyjohnperez]

Your videos are great, enjoying your honesty and unbiased opinions on the brands. The marketing teams do like to fill the web pages with fluff. Which sadly works for noobs like myself that focuses on specs rather than actual feel and experiences of knowing what's good. One day, I'll know what's good and what's not. Until then, I need to worry about practicing more than gear.

[@SapulpaGuitarAcademy]

Thanks John! The marketing hype for guitars is unreal and it's amazing what they can get away with saying. If you think it's bad on the electric side, just wait until you see how they manipulate ad copy for acoustic guitars.

[@jessehutchings]

The crappy tuner question was actually a major reason i decided to go for a more expensive guitar with Grover locking tuners because you can just expect them to work

[@BonJovi1987Fan]

Im lucky that i own the jersey star in both colors because they are out of stock

[@ADM1500]

Do Charvel next! 🤘🏻