Thoughts on buying an old guitar
 

Hey all. So looking around Im starting to fall in love with old guitars. Say 60's and older.. My obsession is with Martin, some one selling an 1947 0-17 here in Vermont for $1700. Im doing a road trip and was thinking of picking up something. Could be Martin, Gibson, dont know any others.

One thing I have been able to find with some of these are that they were serviced by a luthier. Neck, bridge all that could be a nightmare on an old guitar.

Some how I think I can go back in time with one of these guitars and revisit a part of America. Does anyone have any thoughts on the matter? Perhaps some models to stay away from and other to go for? Is it just me or is there some mystique in antiquity.

I bought a '62 D-18 from Will @ Lowe Vintage in Burlington, NC. Great guy and they stand behind their guitars and have an in house luthier make any adjustments/repairs. Mine has had a neck set/refret and several cracks repaired. Love it! Best of luck!

It's a long and winding path, but well worth the effort. The most important task beyond educating yourself on what you want and how to spot issues, is developing relationships with one or two good repairmen. Not all repairmen are experienced with vintage repairs. It requires special skills. Again though, well worth the effort. :)

If I had a good relationship with a competent repair shop, I'd love to have an old guitar.

I had a 1930s Martin 0-18 Tenor that was superb. But when the neck was clearly bowing and I heard some rattling inside, it was time to sell (disclosing issues of course). Not just because of the potential cost, but the time it would sit in repair shop, not knowing if they'd ruin the mojo, etc.

Value of vintage guitars (Martins and Gibsons in particular) is directly associated with condition: the more original, the better.

Of paramount consideration is the finish. Not whether it looks good or not, but whether it is original. A beat-up "vintage" (pre-1965) Martin will be worth twice what a refinished one will. Also desirable are original tuners, original bridge and bridgeplate, and a relatively crack-free guitar. Expect to throw at least a few hundred bucks into getting one squared away, once you own it.

Generally, older is more expensive than younger, back to about 1930. Pre-1930's guitars generally do not sell for as much.

The most ridiculously expensive Martins are 1934-39, followed by 1940-45, followed by 1946-64. In 1964, Martin moved to their modern factory and stopped using all hide glue construction.

Most valuable Gibsons are the "banner" wartime models.

Yep, I love the though of owning an old guitar. (Martin D18 or even a D28, a Gibson J45, an old Stratocaster or Telecaster and even an old Fender amp).

I like the idea of being an old guy (60s) and owning a bunch of new guitars. (Well my D-55 is approaching 40 though...)

Some old guitars are priced higher than new guitars of the same model. In that case, the only reason why you would buy an old guitar is because it sounds better than a newer guitar. imho

I don't buy old guitars unless they are clearly stable and sound. I have lots of experience and thus do not encounter bad surprises in buying something only to find, later, that is has problems. I prefer older guitars not only because they often sound better than similar new models, but also because the good ones have settled in and you don't have to deal with body bellying, etc. which can affect many new guitars as they age. That stuff has mostly already happened to an old guitar, if it's going to. The only element of buying old acoustics that really does worry me is the "gonna need a reset" situation. I absolutely will not even consider a guitar that needs a reset or looks like it will before long. I know this job can be done well (by some), but I do not buy old guitars where you know an operation will be needed. My oldest guitar is a '36, and I had a '47 for a long time. Gibson, Martin. Both are solid as new, but soooooooo much better.

Guitars wear out. We shouldn't think of a vintage guitar the same way a violinist thinks of a vintage Stradivarius. While many vintage guitars are worth considerable money because of their value as collector's items, few will be as playable as a high-end modern guitar properly dialed in.

My first love was a Guild D-25 I purchased new in Santa Fe in 1973. I performed on that guitar hundreds of times, travelled with it extensively, and lived with it in New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona and then coastal California. When it got to the point where a renown luthier deemed it "unplayable," and advised me that I could purchase a better guitar for half as much as it would cost me to restore it, I simply stopped playing for a couple years.

This was a huge mistake.

While there's certainly something romantic about owning an historic instrument, once the lights go down it's all about the music.

I have not experienced that.

Tell that to Stephen Stills. :)

"...Stephen Stills compared the quality of C.F. Martin & Co. guitars to Stradivarius violins made 400 years ago..."

I have not experienced that either. Many of the most valuable vintage guitars are not the rarest, they're the ones people play. And there's no reason a vintage guitar can't be just as playable as a modern guitar.

My guitars were all built between 1933 to 1957. They range from those you could go a lifetime and not run across for sale to some of the most common guitars on the face of the planet. While some were in fine playing condition, I am also a notorious cheapskate so have snagged my share of basket cases. A couple of them had nothing that would readily identify who built them so I had to go by features. Some had all original parts were others were stripped carcasses. One was even found sticking out of a trash can.

Obviously, you need to know what you are looking at. But that is a lot easier to know when dealing with Martins and Gibsons. Tons of info out there. And you need to be able to identify condition issues and form an estimate in your head of what it will cost to get them in playing condition. The one thing I never think about is what they would be worth in a future re-sale. I have a couple that are worth easily double to five times what I have in them. With others I would never even come close to recouping my investment. It just does matter to me.

The oldest instrument I own is a 1919 Gibson mandolin. For as much as it has in common with modern builds, it may as well be a different instrument. The difference is not age but how it was constructed. I would probably like one built the same in 1999 but no one does it. Very complex top carve, use of a lateral brace, birch back and side.

It has a repaired crack and the repair is effective, but not cosmetically up to what a modern repair would be. Probably done at a time when the instrument had little value and the owner wasn't concerned with retaining originality or putting money into maintaining cosmetics.

With older instruments, you are buying all the previous owners' bad decisions so the fewer of those you inherit, the better. The longer the time period when the instrument had little monetary value, the more likely it is to show evidence of bad decisions.

I tend to be agnostic on vintage instruments but would admit that its hard to play one today and not wonder where its been and how it was played over its lifetime and that extra layer of enjoyment is not available with newer instruments.

Not my experience at all.

Sure, an older Martin might need a neck reset and that might cost you $500-$600. I found a ‘67 D-18S a few years ago for a friend who had always wanted a slot-head Martin. It needed a neck reset and I got that cost knocked off what they were asking for the guitar. The work was done and now he has a killer vintage guitar with about 2K invested. It’s worth more than he has in it, and irreplaceable to him.

The music is there with whatever you’re playing, but the tone isn’t. And with guitars, it’s “all about” the tone.

So true...tone is the first consideration always.