vic wrote
dan77 wrote
kp247 wrote
I had a very interesting conversation with a friend from the UK today that made me wonder about everything Gibson. Now you will know that I defend Gibson wholeheartedly against these exact replica Tokai guitars and will never buy one . . . . . . . .yet!
The story goes that Gibson apparently ships raw Les Paul blanks to a Chinese mainland factory, where the basic guitars are assembled, necks glued in, pickup routing done, fretboard inlays done, lacquering and polishing completed, before being shipped back to the US for fretting, electronics and pickup fitting and then finally being sold to us as "Made In USA" guitars.
Makes one think hey! As I said, that's how the story goes!
It made me look at my Custom again in much more detail. Is it even real? Made in USA?
At least the serial number is correct.
?
I've read on another guitar forum where oke's were talking about Les Paul guitars that they had bought from the east with actual Gibson Les Paul logos on the headstocks and that were indistinguishable from the real thing. ???
I'll try to find the thread again if I still can and link it here.
but not to the well-trained eye ?
Or even the eye that expects a slight hint of build quality. The only fakes that will ever be good are custom made replicas where the price is agreed up-front. Since the point of a fake is to clinch the deal (at an absurdly low price to sweeten it) at the lowest outlay, they will never be anything more than plywood and glue that looks superficially like a quality guitar. Pull the pickups on those POS and you see off centre-neck joins, huge gaps, Fisher-Price electronics, chipboard. They're pure rubbish. They're for the unwary, the pretentious, and the swindlers.
kp247's Custom was made in the Gibson Custom Shop in the USA - one of the best guitar making institutions on that continent (although pricey). If the friend's rumour is true, it will kill Gibson's market share. It would be insane to try to sneak that kind of thing through. Admittedly the Failbird X shows that there's some kind of insanity at Gibson, but it's not that kind.
