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Confused, perhaps someone can help.

#21
Maybe it is "Designed in California/USA, Made in _____________" like most other things these days. If it bugs you, grind it off with a Dremel. I agree that's annoying but maybe you can just return it, too. If it's on the bottom and not visible, I probably would not be as annoyed. I also have Squiers made in Indonesia. The ones I've kept are pretty decent playing and after I upgrade them, they are fully gig worthy and I do gig them.

I bought some generic Musiclilly high mass bridges off A-zon. Pretty sure they are made in Korea. They are heavy, solid, great chrome and work well. They have no markings anywhere for brand or origin. Also, my matching tuxedo Korean P bass and J bass are fantastic, well built and just as good quality as American. I agree it should be disclosed but would be surprised if the quality is sub-par.
 
#22
MCS4 said:
Considering how many Fenders are made overseas and how many guitar parts generally are made overseas, I'm not sure it makes sense to assume Fender parts were made in the US unless that is something they have explicitly stated.
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Okay, now we are getting somewhere. I have just never witnessed a Fender accessory made South Korea before. I was confused about the whole thing and I wondered if anyone else knew anything about it. Sorry about the confusion and annoyance of everyone involved. Thank you for tackling my confusion, now I'm informed
 
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#23
Most manufactured goods use parts sourced globally. There are no fully-American cars or trucks. Musical instruments are no different.

'Made in America' totally is very rare for just about anything you can think of, and in the home products space this is virtually impossible as. WalMart, Amazon, and many others mercilessly flog suppliers for the lowest prices. WalMart for instance, ran most denim jean manufacturing to close in America and pushed most of it into Mexico.

For Wall St, hedge funds, etc., 'Made in America' often translates to 'Unnecessary Overhead'.
 
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#25
BassHole1 said:
Maybe it is "Designed in California/USA, Made in _____________" like most other things these days. If it bugs you, grind it off with a Dremel. I agree that's annoying but maybe you can just return it, too. If it's on the bottom and not visible, I probably would not be as annoyed. I also have Squiers made in Indonesia. The ones I've kept are pretty decent playing and after I upgrade them, they are fully gig worthy and I do gig them.

I bought some generic Musiclilly high mass bridges off A-zon. Pretty sure they are made in Korea. They are heavy, solid, great chrome and work well. They have no markings anywhere for brand or origin. Also, my matching tuxedo Korean P bass and J bass are fantastic, well built and just as good quality as American. I agree it should be disclosed but would be surprised if the quality is sub-par.
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I love the Musiclily stuff! Plus, they send you free picks. My confusion has been addressed. I won't return it I love the bridge. Just confused the package said South Korea that's all. It doesn't annoy me I just wanted to know more about, that's all
J Wilson said:
Most manufactured goods use parts sourced globally. There are no fully-American cars or trucks. Musical instruments are no different.

'Made in America' totally is very rare for just about anything you can think of, and in the home products space this is virtually impossible as. WalMart, Amazon, and many others mercilessly flog suppliers for the lowest prices. WalMart for instance, ran most denim jean manufacturing to close in America and pushed most of it into Mexico.

For Wall St, hedge funds, etc., 'Made in America' often translates to 'Unnecessary Overhead'.
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Yes, and it's also the horrifying taxes and regulations that are slapped on American companies. This is what causes most outsourcing. A lot of people think it's the greed of the company it's actually not. They get wood and parts sourced from other countries. I have no problem with it I was just curious of the situation.
 
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#31
User_420634 said:
Yes, it's still a nice bridge nothing wrong with that. I've had Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese guitars and all of them are better than the brand name stuff by far. My p bass is the Standard Indonesian, I'm not saying that's a bad thing. Recently I had a Warwick (Rockbass) Streamer that was made in China.... It was used for $600. I think that's overpriced considering I can get a bass on Amazon from China for $100. I would love to have a Japanese Fender as they were better made than American ones. It's just a Fender bridge made in South Korea .. that's a new one on me.
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Lakland initially started their skyline product line in Korea. The quality was so high, it almost put the US line out of business. They moved production to Indonesia, and still offer extremely good quality for the Skyline series. They then licensed their 55 and 44 lines to ESP Japan for distribution as the “shoreline” versions in the Asia Pacific market, and they too were US build quality. Sadowsky’s production line ( non handmade) original MetroExpress lines ( The good one) were also made by ESP in Japan and offered NYC quality at 50% less.

Ironically, moving production to china during a pandemic took its toll on the now Chinese made Metroexpress line. The metroExpress line hasn’t really recovered from that snafu, and its reputation has suffered despite robust sales.

Regarding your Warwick comment. I’ve never felt the chinese Warwick ( or Sadowsky) models to warrant the new asking price. I also own a German warwick thats absolutley stellar. But I’ve also owned briefly ( returned as defective) a severly twisted Warwick Germany Streamer Jazzman. So again, country of origin doesn’t dictate or guarantee a quality part or instrument.

Point being, China, S Korea, Indonesia all offer varying degrees of quality, but have greatly improved in the past decades. And if you are comfy paying a higher price for an expensive offshore item, in many but instances, you’ll likely enjoy good value from the purchase.
 
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#32
User_420634 said:
I just bought a brand new Fender high mass bridge for my bass, as I prefer them. I noticed on the back of the package did not say "Made in USA" but said Made in Korea"? I thought all Fender accessories were made in USA.
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Well. Those Fender branded hi-mass bridges are actually made by kluson not Fender. Also a lot of people don't know but there's also two types. One is the regular zinc and the other has brass saddles that are plated. I don't think that Fender actually makes any of their hardware anymore when it comes to Bridges or tuners. those are made by other suppliers and actually have been almost since Fender went into production in the beginning. They have a long history with kluson

Also when CBS took over and they switched away from the kluson deluxe tuners and went with the newer tuners with the sealed backs those are made by Ping Well industrial. That is a company that makes OEM hardware for many different musical instrument manufacturers and they are based out of Taiwan. Kluson has facilities both here in the US and in South Korea. Although I don't know if it makes any difference when you buy one where it comes from. Supposedly the high end stuff is supposed to still be made here in the US.
 
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#33
60bass said:
Well. Those Fender branded hi-mass bridges are actually made by kluson not Fender. Also a lot of people don't know but there's also two types. One is the regular zinc and the other has brass saddles that are plated. I don't think that Fender actually makes any of their hardware anymore when it comes to Bridges or tuners. those are made by other suppliers and actually have been almost since Fender went into production in the beginning. They have a long history with kluson

Also when CBS took over and they switched away from the kluson deluxe tuners and went with the newer tuners with the sealed backs those are made by Ping Well industrial. That is a company that makes OEM hardware for many different musical instrument manufacturers and they are based out of Taiwan. Kluson has facilities both here in the US and in South Korea. Although I don't know if it makes any difference when you buy one where it comes from. Supposedly the high end stuff is supposed to still be made here in the US.
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Wow! Kluson? Didn't know that. Thank you for the info
 
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#36
SharpCat said:
Wasn’t Fender shipping MIM bodies from Ensenada up to Corona for a while for finishing of some sort, and then sending them back to complete the instruments?
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Yes I think I remember reading once where they were shipping bodies from Corona to ensenada because there were no restrictions on painting with nitro paint in Mexico like there were in California. They would send the bodies down there and spray the finishes and everything on them and then ship them back up to Corona where they would be assembled.
 
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