j45nick

Nice SJ. Beautiful condition from that photo, but more pictures would be nice. It looks like it might be in very slightly better condition than one of my 1950 J-45s. Price is a bit hard to swallow without more and better pictures. Surprised there is no FON. Sometimes they are very faded.

Thanks for that info.

That's a bit of an oddity, since the J-45 has mahogany back and sides except for some maple Banners during WW2, and a few customs that are not Legends in any way. I can't seem to get to their Gibson acoustic new guitars page, and they do not list this guitar under used guitars.

I thought Gibson moved a fair number of fixtures from the Kalamazoo plant to Bozeman. I have no idea what those might have been. This invitation down the rabbit hole made me drag out my three slope-Js: two 1950 J-45s, and a 2006 1943 SJ re-issue. The modern re-issue is pretty much spot-on the nominal dimensions at 16" across the lower bout, 3 3/4" depth at the neck heel, and 4 3/4" at the end pin. The two 1950 J-45s vary from each other, and from the modern Bozeman guitar, even though all three line up reasonably well in body plan, except as caused by slight dimensional differences. FON 3358 (1950 J-45) width lower bout: 16 1/8" ; depth neck heel: 3 7/8"; depth end pin 4 13/16" FON 3644 (1950 J-45) with lower bout: 16 1/4"; depth neck heel: 3 13/16"; depth end pin 4 3/4+ " 3644 was re-topped by Gibson in 1968, but that top has been thinned twice: once in 1971 when the 1968 cherryburst was removed and the guitar top finished natural, and again in 2010 before shooting a new traditional sunburst on it. I call FON 3644 "the Fat Girl". I have to squeeze her into a custom Cali Girl case that the other two pretty much drop into. All are kept in the exact same climate-controlled environment, so should be at the same humidity levels. I have not compared their body plans with the 1957 J-45 construction drawing from Stewmac..

Nice job. Great voice, Gumbino!

Hah!

I have no way of knowing the answer to your question. I can say, however, that if you take a J-45 Legend and put it next to a real 1942 J-45, and carefully examine both, it will take you about two seconds to determine which is which. Just the fact that Gibson uses a different rosewood species for the bridges and soundboards than the species used in 1942 is pretty definitive. That's a pretty good fraud preventive measure, if there is any question about it. And yes, testing can determine which species of rosewood you have, if it comes to that. As an aside, I have two 1950 J-45s that have FONs that are probably a few weeks apart. One has a lower bout width that is 1/8" (3mm) wider than the other. The other has a body depth that is almost the same amount deeper. One fits easily in one case I have, and you pretty much have to force the other into the same case.

Source? That's a pretty serious accusation.

A "real" 1937 'bone D-28 is worth around $100k or more. A "real" 1937 L-00 might be worth $6k in near-perfect condition, and a real 1942 J-45 maybe $12-15k or so in the same condition. You can actually buy a new distressed 1937 Authentic for something like $8k. There is a lot more incentive for faking the more valuable guitar. It is usually pretty easy to tell a "new" vintage guitar from one that is 80+ years old. I suspect that forgery market is pretty small right now, if it exists. I've handled some pretty valuable 1930s Martins. You'd be hard-pressed to fake the level of wear on them over the last 80 years. Not saying it couldn't happen. Guitars like the 1937 Authentic D-28 aren't even the same species of rosewood as the originals, except for rare, well documented versions.

My '43 SJ re-issue was one of a special-order run for Fuller's, built to their specifications. It's a very nice guitar.

It almost sounds like yours might have a Luthier's Choice neck. I have a 1943 SJ re-issue that was part of a custom run. It, too, has a 19-fret neck which is wide at the nut (1.78"/45+mm), but fairly shallow in section. That guitar has accurate details like a belly-down bridge with slot-through saddle, but also has a bound fretboard, which would not be period-correct. Bottom line is that if you want something that is 100% right, you find something like a Legend, custom-order brand new to your specs, or.....buy vintage, preferably one in unmolested condition. Your money, your choice. If how the guitar sounds and plays is more important, you just play a lot of them until you find one that sings to you. That may be a more rational attitude, unless you are a collector rather than a player.

I can't comment directly on the build quality and tone. However, the Legend series (J-45 and L-00) were build to exacting period details, including all hide glue construction, Adi tops (though they pre-date torrefaction, to the best of my knowledge), 19-fret necks, period-correct bridges and tuners, and tapered headstocks. I believe both have 1 3/4" nut widths. I know my L-00 Legend does. They were generally exact reproductions of period guitars, including the baseball-bat neck on the J-45 and the big V-neck on the L-00. Build quality of both is excellent I do not know all the construction details of the '42 Historic J-45, but I believe it has a torrefied Adi top. However, it also has a 20-fret neck, which is not period-correct, and I suspect it lacks other original details such as the tapered headstock. Likewise, I do not know if it is a guitar with all hide glue construction throughout. The True Vintage J-45--and others--used hide glue for the neck joint (as do all modern Gibsons) and the top bracing, but I believe used Titebond aliphatic resin glue for the rest of the guitar. Titebond is the default glue on modern Gibsons--except for the neck joint--unless the specs indicate otherwise, unless they have changed that. In short, the Legends are as close to period-correct vintage construction and details as you can get. Think of it as walking into a shop in 1937 (L-00 Legend) or 1942 (J-45 Legend) and buying the guitar brand-new. That's what you are getting with the Legends. The '42 Historic has some nice details and construction, but does not replicate the originals exactly in a least some visual aspects. Tone differences? There are more likely to be greater tone differences between two of the same model of any of these, rendering general comparisons "general" at best. They are all very nice guitars, and will almost definitely be in better condition than any 70 year old guitar. (There are exceptions to this "old guitar condition" rule. JT's recent Banner LG-3 is one example. Guitars like that are rare as hen's teeth, and usually priced accordingly.)

There will be a lot of changes in a guitar in an environment that swings from 40% humidity to 60%. Glad you got it sorted out.

Post-banner headstock with straight bridge limits you to 1946 or sometime in 1947. Sometime in that period--maybe a year or two earlier-- the neck width at the nut went from 1 3/4" to 1 11/16", but still with a hefty neck. Up through 1952 or thereabouts, the J-45 retained the slot-through bridge and tapered headstock, so other than the belly bridge vs straight, the J-45s in the years 1947 through 1952 are pretty much the same guitar. The '46 will have a script non-banner headstock logo, but otherwise like the '47. I love the Gibson slope-Js in this period, including the J-45, J-50, and SJ. I have two 1950 J-45s, and they ain't going' anywhere anytime soon. They are my favorites, even though one is far from original at this point in its life. The other was a one-owner guitar when I bought it, and is still all original except for tuner buttons, saddle, and bridge pins, which I changed. Still have the originals, however. There are a few on Reverb from the years you are seeking, but they aren't giving them away. Keep looking, and good luck. .

BK, Thanks for posting that. It's hard to argue with what he says, unless you have BK-style fingers of steel that don't require "synthetic augmentation" in the form of fingerpicks or a flatpick. If I really want to fingerpick with bare fingers, I pick up the L-00 or more recently, the 000-28 EC. Both have a wide nut and wide string spacing at the bridge, by the way.

Mine is also a 2007. Number 13648 of the series, by the label. It's a very nice guitar. What are you using for strings?

You have a 000-28 EC?

John, Thanks for this. It is very informative, not to mention entertaining.

It isn't really good form to trash another member's guitar choices, even if you don't like them.

Nice! It helps to have the bass track....

The bridge almost looks like it has the footprint of some of the 12-string bridges used in that period.

I have seen several Gibsons with nut widths of 1 5/8" from around 1965. I don't know that that was just accidental, or if at some point that was the designed nut width.

A nut width of 1 9/16" was common on Gibsons in the late 1960's, starting sometime in 1965 in most cases. The "official" Gibson serial number search engine is mediocre at best. There are other, better ones online. Gibson's re-use of the same serial numbers in some periods can complicate life, but those guitars are often sorted out by their physical characteristics, such as the nut width on your guitar.

Maybe that's a knock-off, rather than a Gibson. Either that, or it might have been re-topped badly at some point in the past. The pictures raise more questions than they answer.

I believe there have been several runs of the L-00 Legend over the years. Mine has a 2010 serial number ink-stamped on the neckblock. It did not come with a paper label, but I did not get the guitar brand-new, so it may have been lost. The bill of sale said it was built in 2007, but the serial number says 2010. I think I bought it in 2012. The price was reasonable because the seller thought the surface of the guitar had polishing scratches. It was actually just the VOS finish that Gibson used on that particular guitar. The certificate says "The 1937 L-00 Legend Model", and says nothing about the number in the run. The certificate was printed on both sides of a sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 paper, and it was in a black envelope with a glassine face, so you could read the cert without removing it from the envelope. The back of the certificate has the detailed scaled drawings by Ren Ferguson of Lee Roy Parnell's 1937 L-00, which was the guitar used as the archetype when creating the L-00 Legend. The deep-V neck of the Legend was the typical Gibson neck in at least part of the 1930's. I don't know any of the details of the '32 model, unfortunately.