the Fly Clone Project

Hello all, I'm starting a youtube series in a week or two about nitefly guitars. I currently own 3 and have owned many more over the years. I would love to include people from this forum in the video series. My plan for the first video is to discuss the basics of the Parker Nitefly and why I believe it's the best super strat of all time. If anyone else agrees or disagrees please share here, and I will include you in the video. I love a healthy guitar gear debate . I plan to do a lot of different videos so for this post please just what you like or dislike about the Nitefly!

Hi @andrefludd—sounds like a fun video series! For me, there’s nothing I hate about the NiteFly (or the Fly for that matter). I agree that they’re everything I loved about my Strat but better!

I suppose that if you have NF version 1 or 2, the passive piezo could be disappointing, especially if you don’t have the NiteMix external piezo preamp, but you can always get a piezo preamp like this or do a rewire with a Fishman Powerchip, but then you’d have to route a 9volt cavity.

I don’t have a USM-era NiteFly and there are a variety of revisions they made that I don’t hate, but don’t like. In general, I don’t find many of the USM-era revisions to the NiteFly or the Fly to be improvements. One thing I do almost hate is that, toward the end of good ol’ Parker Cigars, they made a guitar with a neck that didn’t have composite reinforcement and called it a NiteFly—they were short-lived, but it could have been grounds for a lot of confusion.

Thanks for your reply VJ. I am similar in that I only purchase niteflys with composite necks. I also prefer the thinner body of the later models, the wiring that includes the on/off piezo button, and the ball bridge saddles.

Have a USM era Nitefly. Worst thing about it was really ME. I wished I either had realize the heavy picks I was using would scratch it up so badly (no pickguard on the Nitefly M) OR had just gotten a painted model over the oiled mohogany. I'm a lefty that plays right handed. So my picking aim is not great and I played either a Yamaha with much heavier strings or a CBS era Mustang with high action. So I used very rigid picks. Broke a lot of the stock .09 guage strings before I figured out I could go to a more comfy pick. The finish is a bit marred.

Everything else is super. I drug it all over the USA. Never a problem.