Whether it's attention to detail, customer service, or building spectacular guitars that produce the tone you've always dreamed of, King Bee Guitars simply can't be beat.  It's good to be the King!

We do gold hardware same price as the standard nickel.

Got an idea of a relic guitar you've never seen before?  We love building those!  All you have to do is ask us and wei'll figure out a way to make it happen.

Bodies

We offer relic finish or new finish replacement bodies for Stratocaster, Telecaster, and Jazzmaster in in the following tone woods:

Alder is used extensively for bodies because of its lighter weight and its full sound. Its closed grain makes this wood easy to finish. Alder's natural color is a light tan with little or no distinct grain lines. It looks good with a sunburst or a solid color finish. The tone is reputed to be most balanced with equal doses of lows, mids and highs.

Swamp Ash is a prized wood for many reasons. It is a fairly light weight wood which makes it easily distinguishable from Hard Ash. Many of the 50's Fenders were made of Swamp Ash. The grain is open and the color is creamy. This wood is a very nice choice for clear finishes. It is a very musical wood offering a very nice balance of brightness and warmth with a lot of "pop".  We finish Ash with all of the same colors that we finish other woods with.

Pine is a great choice and is super-light.  It doesn't really look so hot, but the tone definitley makes up for it.  It has a little more top-end than ash but isn't ear-piercing at all.  A very nice choice for any style of music.  The main problem with PIne is that it isn't always available.

Mahogany is a medium to heavy weight wood. Mahogany is a fine grained wood with great musical properties. The tone is warm and full with good sustain. Looks good with clear or transparent finish. To the best of my recollection, the 1963 Fender Telecaster had the option of a mahogany body.

I start with OIL BASED wood grain filler and proceed to finish these bodies with a lacquer-based primer, lacquer color coat and finally several lacquer clear coats - which is how they used to finish guitars.

Today's mass-produced guitars are covered with a super-hard poly coat that is self leveling prior to spraying the color and clear coats - this prevents the extensive sanding that used to be necessary. The problem with this poly coat is that it "suffocates" the body and prevents the tone wood from resonating like it should. The result is a guitar that sounds like a block of concrete. We don't like the sound of concrete so we usually spend about two to three hours just sanding the body.

From that point on it is just a matter of adding subtle signs of wear and tear that make these guitar bodies look like timeless classics. The amount of aging is totally up to you. "Checking" on the paint can be obtained once the body is about a year old with instructions which I can provide with the body.

Colors that we offer

If you can find a picture, we can make that color.  Period.

All finishes are 100% nitrocellulose lacquer or oil-based products.

My opinion has always been that a medium weight or heavy body is going to accomodate a higher output pickups better than an ultra light body.  I asked the folks over at Lollar Pickups what their opinion was and this is what they had to say:

"it is possible to “underbuild” in certain cases with a light wood that can diffuse the energy of the string vibration rather than sustaining it like a denser wood would. (no pun intended!)"

Please email me with any questions that you may have in regards to bodies or to order one. We're dealing with organic material and no two pieces of wood are the same. It's kind of like buying lobster...market price.

Guitar Necks

I can provide a neck with any radius ( 7.25", 9.5", 10", or 12"), back contour, or fret size in both flame maple, quarter-sawn maple, and rosewood.   Left-handed necks are also available at a small up-charge.

There are many other options available upon request including scalloped necks, baritone necks, and short-scale necks among others. Feel free to email me with any questions that you may have.

Aged REPLACEMENT hardware for your Telecaster or Stratocaster

If you've already got a Fender Telecaster, Fender Stratocaster, or a project guitar and you want to transform it into a relic you can buy almost any part you need from me.  Just email me at info@kingbeeguitars.com for any of your relic guitar needs.

King Bee Custom Orders

Since our relic guitars are all on a made-to-order basis and are all unique to one another, there really isn't a set price on an S-type or T-type guitar.  However, just to put things into perspective either model starts out with a base-price of $1500.00.  Extra-light bodies, translucent-grade swamp ash, quartersawn maple necks, custom pickup configurations, and many other options will add to this price.  The best thing to do is to email us with a detailed description of what you want so that we can send an accurate estimate of how much your custom relic guitar will cost.