Poly finish separating from body

[Gottastopbuyinggear]

Not a bass but my American Tele.  There’s some flex if you touch either side of the crack, so the finish has obviously separated from the body.  I’m not impressed:

 

 

Any ideas what I could do to stop this getting worse?

[BlueMoon]

I had the same thing happen on a Fender Jazz that was made around 2005. I managed to “wick in” some liquid superglue into the crack; first depressing one side then the other. While it did work, there was extra tension on the poly and eventually another small crack appeared a little further away. 

[Gottastopbuyinggear]

1 hour ago, BlueMoon said:

I had the same thing happen on a Fender Jazz that was made around 2005. I managed to “wick in” some liquid superglue into the crack; first depressing one side then the other. While it did work, there was extra tension on the poly and eventually another small crack appeared a little further away. 

Was it an American made Jazz?  My Tele was October 2004.  Two instruments in as many years isn’t a massive sample, but you can’t help thinking “quality control”….  
 

I several other poly finish instruments of a similar age with no finish problems, and the limited searching I did only came up with chips rather than finish separations.
 

I’m a lot more sanguine about this than I would have been when I was younger (and perhaps closer to the point where I parted with the cash for it…) but it is frustrating. I always take good care of my gear - even my gigging basses are pretty much pristine. 

[BlueMoon]

48 minutes ago, Gottastopbuyinggear said:

Was it an American made Jazz?

Yes, it was a USA-made bass. I took it in exchange when I made a sale, so I do not know under what conditions it was kept in by the previous owner(s). I have seen poly crack after being exposed to repeated hot/cold environments during storage or load out, but in my case with the Jazz it was more like a de-lamination of the poly from the wood. Almost as if the wood behind had shrunk and the poly not.

 

Fender QC has been patchy over the years, but I’m not sure if mid 2000s was especially bad.

[gafbass02]

My 1990 mij jazz has loads of this, the finish has cracked and fallen off in several places 

[Doctor J]

I had a 2000 US strat where the finish on the neck started to crack and peel before it was even a year old. As I had bought it new, they replaced the neck under warranty but the new neck felt nothing like the old neck and played substantially worse, too. I could never get it to set up like the old neck, despite them being the same series made one year apart. It was junk. It made me a lot more open to exploring other brands and, as it turned out, finding the grass actually was a lot greener elsewhere.

[LeftyJ]

1 hour ago, Doctor J said:

I had a 2000 US strat where the finish on the neck started to crack and peel before it was even a year old. As I had bought it new, they replaced the neck under warranty but the new neck felt nothing like the old neck and played substantially worse, too. I could never get it to set up like the old neck, despite them being the same series made one year apart. It was junk. It made me a lot more open to exploring other brands and, as it turned out, finding the grass actually was a lot greener elsewhere.

 

I had a 2000 US Tele with a full maple neck that had this too. The neck finish had cracks and in places the finish had delaminated from the skunk stripe and the fingerboard dots, which are lacquered over on the maple necks. It would gradually spread from there. Luckily I bought it used at a VERY good price (€500) so I couldn't really complain. Played it a LOT for about a year, then sold it on because it made me hanker back to my old G&L ASAT Special.