July 96 Reissue 1951 Nocaster Relic "Cunetto Era"

Pictures of my July 96 Nocaster at the bottom.

The below info was originally posted in the Telecaster Discussion Pages by Vince Cunetto who did all the early
relic work for Fender, prior to the Time Machine Guitars produced now. Mr. Cunetto has developed quite a following and is now making the "Vinetto Line of Guitars".
Keep in mind that from  June of '95 to May of '99 (a little less than 4 years), 860 "line" relics and the occasional one offs were done . That figure may be less than the original run of Nocasters done by Leo in one year, 1951.
(That is but my observation and I have nothing to base it on)  ~ tgm
 

And the Fender Discussion Pages:

Both Discussion Groups are free to join but please help support them with a donation from time to time !

Reposted from The Telecaster discussion board by Vince Cunetto Himself:

 Since there seem to be questions out there regarding the who, what when and
were of the Relics, I thought I'd do my best to try to set the story straight in a nutshell. I'd be happy to respond to any posts that come up regarding anything in here!
The concept of the Relics came out of conversations between my good friend
Jay Black (Custom Shop Master Builder at the time) and myself in late 1994 after I'd sent him a couple of "aged" blackguards for a friend's old Tele. Jay and I had known each other for years, so he was familiar with my work making repro Tele bodies and pickguards, as well as the "aged" Fender replicas I'd built for myself.
Jay and I reasoned that if people bought distressed leather jacket, jeans and reproduction antiques, why not guitars? I sent one of my personal "relics" to Jay, who showed it to John Page. Being the bright guy he is, John saw the potential of the project and gave us permission to go ahead with building some samples to see what we'd get. I started receiving parts and painting the prototypes in my garage!
By the end of December 1994 or early January '95, I'd finished a couple of prototypes that Page liked. He took a risk on this "wacky" idea and, without telling anyone, gave Jay and I approval to show them at '95 NAMM. We finished the final show prototypes in January '95 in just in time for NAMM.
With a great deal of surprise to many Fender folks, The two Relic prototypes
were specially presented "center stage" under custom-made glass displays. It was a blast for John, Jay and myself.
We smiled more than several times when we'd hear dealers comment on "how
cool it was that we included real old Fender's as a tribute" as their reps toured displays with them and wrote orders. It was even more fun when we'd see the dealer's jaws drop as the rep would reply "Cool old guitars, huh? How many would you like?"
Now we had to figure out how to make them, and keep them "real" on a
production basis.
After a few failed attempts at Custom Shop and a serious business proposal,
I convinced John that the best thing for the project would be for me to set up a company as an outside vendor to specialize in doing nothing but the Relics. This wasn't such a stretch for Custom Shop, as they were used to using vendors for special engraving, aluminum bodies, carvings and a lot of the intricate "artwork"
that went into many of the Custom Shop pieces. We saw the artwork required
for the Relics as being no different'
On a handshake with John Page, in April of '95, I moved my family to my wife
's hometown of Bolivar, Missouri, near Springfield, to set up shop under the banner of Cunetto Creative Resources, Inc., the consulting company I operated in Colorado. I found a building, set up booths and equipment and hired and trained employees. We began to receive raw bodies, necks and parts at the end of May 1995. The first shipment from the new facility, 20 Relic Nocasters, went on the truck on June 27, 1995.
As a matter of course, we'd receive raw necks and bodies and all parts from
Custom Shop. Our work involved complete prep, finishing and cosmetic distressing of necks and bodies. We also aged and distressed all hardware, pickguards and metal parts. We got it down to a 20 piece per week schedule, and every Friday we'd lay out the week's guitars on a large, 24-foot padded table.
Every single part on the guitar was then matched for visual consistency and
appearance. We'd match necks to bodies, wear on guards to wear patterns on necks, hardware to body wear and on and on.
Each part of each guitar was then labeled so that they'd be sure to be
assembled as a unit after being packed and sent to Corona for final assembly.
Relic order numbers continued to grow, as did the number of custom and
one-off orders. In May of '96, we moved the company to a larger, better-equipped facility and continued production. As efficiency and employee training improved, so did our shipping numbers. We also upped the number of customs and one-offs produced.
Production continued in the new facility. Over the course of '97, as orders
for the regular Relics began to stabilize and taper, we began work on a new idea for the Relics, which we dubbed "The Relic Classic". The concept was simple: a nicely "aged" guitar in good shape. We'd had requests for pieces like this in custom orders and had done a few prototypes for Custom Shop, which were well
received. In late '97, the "Relic Classic" became the "Closet Classic", but
Fender decided that it was a little late to get it ready for January '98 NAMM. Plans had already been made to re-tool and change the specs of the "Time Machine" Custom Shop guitars over the course of '98, and the new Relic model would be put off until later.
By the latter part of '98, Custom Shop had seen a lot of changes. John Page
had left to run the Fender Museum. Because of new Custom Shop management and corporate policies, it was decided
that the Closet Classics would be done in-house at Custom Shop. We continued
to do the majority of the "standard" Relics during '98, although there were a few done "in-house" as Custom Shop honed their "relicing" chops.
By early '99, things at Custom Shop had changed quite a bit, and I had a
pretty strong feeling that they'd changed enough that using an outside vendor didn't make sense for Custom Shop. In March of this year, I got a call from Mike Eldred, the new Custom Shop manager, informing me that they intended to do all Relics in-house after we finished the then-current back order. That was it, and we
shipped the last "Cunetto Relics" in May of 1999.
From June of '95 to May of '99, 860 "line" (not including custom) Nocasters
were shipped to Fender, with a total of 44 Nocasters shipped from us from January to May of this year.


RELIC NOCASTER SPECS: Original Series:
- 9.5 neck radius
- Wider gear spacing
- Slightly inaccurate body shape
- Serial Number stamped on neckplate
- Hot bridge pickup (Broadcaster) around 9.5 to 10 k
- Phillips screws
- Pressed jackcup

RELIC NOCASTER SPECS: New Series
- 7.25 radius
- Correct peghead shape and gear spacing with stepped-off tuner holes
- Accurate body shape with "hump" in cutaway
- Serial number beginning with "R" stamped on BRIDGEPLATE. The new
bridgeplate system
started over at "R0001" and YES, these numbers were duplicated with neck
plate numbers that had
already been used.
- Slotted screws and milled jackcup (to the best of my knowledge)


RELIC RUMOURS CLARIFIED:

RUMOR: Relic production began in January of 1995: FALSE. The first
production batch of Relics
shipped from my facility on June 27, 1995. They probably shipped to dealers
from Custom Shop by
mid July.

RUMOR: Until this year, the Relic "aging process" was not done at Custom
Shop, but farmed out to
an out of state vendor: TRUE

RUMOR: Those Relics were painted with a true old-fashioned 100%
top-to-bottom nitrocellulose
lacquer finish: TRUE and FALSE. The color coats of the metallics and and
some plain custom
colors were DuPont LUCITE acrylic lacquer (just like the later, post "DUCO"
originals!) over a
nitro basecoat and finished with a nitro clear coat. All blonde and sunburst
finishes, as well as Fiesta
Red, Oly White and Daphne Blue are 100% Nitro.

RUMOR: Relic body wood was specially baked to improve dryness and resonance:
FALSE

RUMOR: Relics were dragged behind trucks to age them: FALSE

RUMOR: The ultra-thin relic finish has a great deal to do with the tone of
the instruments: TRUE

RUMOR: Many famous rock and country stars use Relics regularly: TRUE. but we
can't tell you who they are!

There you have (some) of it folks! Post any other rumors and I'll clarify as
many as I can.

Take care!

One of Fender's Finest ever !

Reposted from The Fender Discussion Pages by Vince Cunetto Himself:

Figure out the date of your Pre-Time Machine Relic:

"Just in case... 6 digits, first is the last number of the year, next three are the day of that year, and the last two are the "serial number" for that batch, usually 20 to 40 of a particular color".

Example:  622516 ; 225th day of '96, #16 out of 20 in that batch. This applies to bodies and necks.


"We marked them the day they were put into prep for paint, to track production in the shop, identification for shipping and invoicing, and good old fashioned anal guitar dating to give guys like us something to obsess over in the coming years! :)"