Fender Acoustasonic Guitar + Battery Life

[Dave.P]

Not sure if anyone has one of these guitars, but very tempted as it looks like a useful guitar for my needs. If anyone has hands on experience it would be great to hear what you think.
I tend to keep my guitars rather than trade in and change which got me wondering about the battery life on these things. Not the usage time when charged which is about 20 hours, but what happens when the battery can no longer hold a charge and needs replacing.
I asked Fender support and the reply is 2,500 charges which is between 5-7 years "normal" usage. They mentioned that as the battery is internal this would be a job for a guitar tech which is fair enough I suppose.
What I wondered is how major a job this might be and if any of you folks had any thoughts from replacing battery units on other guitars?
I realise I may be overthinking this, but a £1500 guitar with a dud battery down the line does not appeal to me very much!

[Wonks]

No idea about battery changing complexity but have you realised there is a cheaper Mex-made Player version coming out? Not as wide a range of sounds but for live use, who needs too many sounds? But this one uses 9v batteries, so you can always rig up a remote power supply for it.

https://guitar.com/news/gear-news/fende ... ustasonic/

[Dave.P]

Interesting - did not realise they used 9v!

Thanking you for pointing that out...

[Wonks]

I expect they use a different voltage on the processor board itself and use a voltage regulator or charge pump to adjust as necessary.

[Wonks]

£949 at Andertons. https://www.andertons.co.uk/brands/fend ... er-guitars

Video demo of the Player version on the site as well.

[VOLOVIA]

Please be aware that the cheaper Mexican versions do not have the 'mic' sound, i.e., just the undersaddle piezo. I have watched the video from Andertons and they sounded like any other £100 acoustic guitars with a Fisherman pickup...
You save money, but if you want to replicate an acoustic guitar, than buy the US model or... get a decent acoustic for about £700, then add some small pro-mics or body contact gizmos and you get a much better sonding and flexible instrument.

If you prefered the idea of an electric with a piezo sound instead, then you have a huge choice of new models or retrofit your favourite axe with a piezo bridge.

My opinion, that is...

[Dave.P]

OK I was going Mexico there, but not after the sage advice from Volovia.
My main concern was the battery eventually dying on me for sure.

Seriously all, great advice and help

[Wonks]

It is what it is. If you just want one guitar for live playing that sounds reasonable plugged in in acoustic mode and you need a clean/slightly edgy Tele sound and an overall electric guitar feel to the neck, then there's not a lot else that's going to give you that. Certainly not if you want to do it with some stage volume.

It's not a guitar that particularly appeals to me, but if I was gigging and needed a compact one-guitar acoustic + electric set-up, then I'd certainly give it a look, especially at the price. It is 2/3 the price of the US version, and for just live use, I really don't think you'd miss the extra sounds or the acoustic pickup (unless you were really into tapping the top of the guitar).

For the price of the US version, I'd certainly go with separate acoustic and electric guitars, but the Mex version would at least make me want to give one a try out, which the US version certainly doesn't.

It will be exactly what some people want, and for others it will do nothing at all. Fender obviously see the market for it, as they have been criticised for a while for not building a Mexican or Squier version of it to make it more affordable.

[Dave.P]

Again, thank you for comments all.
I did ask Fender support about availability of a replacement battery for the US models and the reply was that they do not sell replacement batteries for the Acoustasonic range.
As far as I can see the guitar will only fully function as long as the battery lasts!

[Sam Spoons]

It will, without question, be a standard battery which will be available. The issue will be that it is probably soldered to the preamp mainboard. Fender will not sell them as they'll consider them not 'user replaceable' but, most likely a half competent electronics tech will be able to do it, and if your soldering is just a little beyond cable making you probably will cope yourself.

[Wonks]

As Fishman will make the board and battery, it may be worth contacting Fishman to see what they say about a replacement. As these will be sold within the EU, then the 10 years minimum product support laws should apply, so something should be available from Fender or Fishman within that period unless the part is no longer made.



But the battery seems to be a separate item mounted on the rear of the central cover plate. It doesn't look like it's meant to be easily replaceable with that plastic cover glued over it, but I'd thought a new rear plate complete with battery should be available, which at worst would just involve some in-line joints in the wires to replace. You could probably just prise the battery off and stick a suitable replacement on yourself.

But you'd have to hope that it was obvious what the battery type and charge capacity was.

But I would again suggest trying Fishman as they will know far more about the electronics and battery than Fender do!

[Dave.P]

Thanks Guys - will pop a mail to Fishman now and ask.
As I said a guitar with a 5 year lifespan does not exactly appeal and I would imagine this issue will come up in a few years as I gather there are a lot of units out there.

[Wonks]

From the shape of the battery it may even be a standard rechargeable PP3!

[Sam Spoons]

That would be sensible but would make Fender's decision to not make them user replaceable even more puzzling.

[Wonks]

Who knows. I expect the battery wires end in a push-on connector, so with the sealed nature of the battery (or at least sealed to the back of the cover), you'd need a complete battery + cover assembly.

I expect they should become available from somewhere in the future. Maybe Fender will sell the 'backplate' as a spare part, but not just the battery?

[Dave.P]

Will see what Fishman come back with. I certainly need to know this can be sorted in the future.
Why the heck it was not just a rechargeable PP9 like most systems escapes me!
And as you guys say - it may well be.

[Wonks]

Or maybe a couple of rechargeable AAs in a pack.

[Sam Spoons]

As long as you can ascertain the voltage replacing that with something easily available should be pretty simple as Wonky says. It doesn't even involve soldering a new battery to the circuit board. Looking at the pic I'd guess there were a couple of AA rechargeables in there (PP3 is a bit small and 18650 Li-Ion batteries are too big) but, while there are endless possibilities, the replacement only needs to have the correct voltage and be small enough to fit.

[Wonks]

Obviously the battery type needs to match (e.g. NiCad or Li-ion) so the charging circuit is suitable and doesn't overcharge (or undercharge) it.

[Sam Spoons]

Yes, true