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Norlin era 59 reissues


NiceGuyEddie

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Does any body know if there were any 59 reissues ( I use the term loosely because i know they were not all made that way) that had 8 digit serial numbers in '85? I am looking at a beautiful 85 in heritage cherry sunburst...vivid flame,paf stickers on the pickup rings...however...it has a "standard" truss rod cover and the 8 digit serial number. The guy selling says its a reissue.

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Does any body know if there were any 59 reissues ( I use the term loosely because i know they were not all made that way) that had 8 digit serial numbers in '85? I am looking at a beautiful 85 in heritage cherry sunburst...vivid flame,paf stickers on the pickup rings...however...it has a "standard" truss rod cover and the 8 digit serial number. The guy selling says its a reissue.

 

I am not the person to answer your question (I am sure someone will be along soon who really knows) but I read somewhere the other day that there were "early" reissues. However, these early "reissues" were not of the same exactness of copy (nothing like it) that more recent reissues have become.

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PAF stickers on the pickup rings? I don't know much about "pre historics" but that sounds very wrong.

There were indeed PAF stickers on the pickup rings on some models around 1980. I just searched for a topic where they appeared a few months ago, but didn't find it. As far as I remember, on the guitar pictured there one of these rings was broken.

 

I hope that Pippy will be of help in this regard.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sorry to get to the party so late but I rarely peek in here...

 

Yes, Gibson finally got around to listing what they termed a "Les Paul Re-Issue Outfit" in 1985.

These were different from the Heritage 80, Standard 82 and Heritage 83 models but I can't say in what form the serial numbers were although I doubt they were any different from the norm. (EDIT : See bottom of page!)

I suspect they would have the regular 8-digit number. I also think the 'long neck tenon' didn't make an appearance until the '90s so the authenticity of it being a R-I can't be done this way either.

 

This from the Tony Bacon book on the LP;

"...in 1985 Gibson began to make an official early-style Standard and Gold-Top....

Here was a pair of 'Les Paul Re-Issue Outfits'........They came in curly maple top or gold top finishes and, when they appeard on pricelists in 1985 were pitched at $1,599 and $1,299 respectively."

Regular Standards were $999 by comparison.

 

One possible indication would be the bridge, though.

AFAIK the regular LP Standard came with a regular Nashville-style Tune-O-Matic whereas in the photographs I have of the early re-issues these instruments were given the earlier ABR-1 style bridge.

These early R-Is were sold with plain TRCs.

 

TRCs are easily swapped-out. Whether the guitar in question is a genuine Pre-Historic or just a regular Standard is impossible to say from this detail. But it does raise the question 'Why a 'Standard' TRC?'...

 

Yes, PAF stickers appeared on some guitars p'up rings and the bases of the p'ups themselves but whether these were exclusive to the R-I's? Probably not.

 

Very detailed photographs might help.

Again, I think the Standard of the time had the wide binding in the cutaway and I think the early R-Is had the narrow binding.

 

Sorry I can't be of more definite help.

 

EDIT : I remembered Mike Slubowski (LesPaulForum) had written an article on the Pre-Historics and it's still there! Hardly definitive but a most interesting read nevertheless.

On the opening page of the link click the "1983 - 1993..." article almost dead-centre of the screen;

http://www.lespaulfo...es/frameset.htm

 

P.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Thankyou so much!

 

PAF stickers on the rings suggest that these are Shaw pick ups. These pickups were an early attempt by Gibson to recapture the sound and feel of older style PAF pickups.

 

Look closely in this picture on the bottom of the triangular silver label, that was the style of the script of the PAF stickers on the pick up rings and/or the base plates of Shaw pick ups. This is a picture of the box that my Shaw pick ups came in in the mid-1980s.

 

8543118560_a663debdba_b.jpg

 

Those pickups were used on Heritage series reissues and Les Paul Customs in the early to mid 80's.

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