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Old 01-25-2010, 09:43 PM
Wade Hampton Wade Hampton is offline
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Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: Chugiak, Alaska
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I've been fairly impressed with most of the Epiphone Masterbilts I've run across, and extremely impressed with a significant percentage of them. I think they represent a terrific value for the money.

Having said that, my overall experience with Asian-made all-solid wood musical instruments, regardless of country of origin in Asia, is that they do tend have a few more problems down the road than acoustic instruments built in North America.

In most cases these guitars, banjos and mandolins have been made of the same tonewoods as North American instruments. So I don't know whether there's less stringent quality control in place in those overseas factories, or if they don't let the woods season for as long before building with them. (I suspect both might be a factor to some degree....)

In any event, what I've found is that structural problems with necks, bracing and bridgeplate can arise more quickly with Asian-made guitars than you'd typically see in a US or Canadian guitar.

BUT - and this is important - when you get a good one, they're GREAT. I still have a made-in-Japan Kentucky mandolin that I will NEVER sell. it's been a dream instrument for the more than twenty years I've owned it.

So my standard advice whenever contemplating the purchase of Asian-made instruments is to just go over them very thoroughly, then choose the one that sounds the best. And if it manifests problems down the road after the warranty has expired, pay to get it fixed. If it's worth buying and playing, it's worth maintaining.

Hope that makes sense.


Wade Hampton Miller
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