Bjames Posted January 6, 2020 Report Share Posted January 6, 2020 Hi Everyone, I just purchased a MIJ Casino that was believed to be made in 1990 at the Terada plant. However when I run the serial number through an online SN decoder, it returns 2 production years - one from 1960 Kalamazoo and one from 1990. The SN on the orange oval label does no contain a space after the 3rd digit which suggests it may be a 1960 model. I dont believe this to be a 60s model as the truss rod cover has 3 screws instead of 2 and Im not sure if the 60s Casinos had the Orange Oval SN sticker inside the F hole. I have attached photos of the SN label, SN decoded results etc Any held helping me understand how to decode the SN would be very helpful. Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobinTheHood Posted January 7, 2020 Report Share Posted January 7, 2020 It's a terada. No orange labels on the American made or matsumoku Epiphones. I've never heard of spaces between numbers on the serial indicating anything and honestly, I'm not sure that's even a thing. I've been studying Epiphone serials for ten years and have never heard of that. Either way, it's definitely not American made and is certainly Japanese as indicated by the amount of serial digits and the three screws on the truss cover. Though, many Japanese Epiphones had only two screws, that didn't apply to archtops. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bjames Posted January 7, 2020 Author Report Share Posted January 7, 2020 Thanks for the quick response. My gut feeling is this guitar is a 1990 model, but Im more curious why it shows a match to a 1960 model in the Serial Number registry. I wonder if the serial numbers were duplicated when they changed to factories. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobinTheHood Posted January 7, 2020 Report Share Posted January 7, 2020 Japan used their own serial number system. It's just a coincidence. However, there were duplicate serials during the earlier USA runs of Epiphone guitars as well, so it's not unique to the Japanese guitars. The USA runs were more difficult to figure out, but the Japanese duplicates are easy because of the different labels and construction differences. Back in the day, Epiphone wasn't good at keeping records of their serial and with Japan having a the same amount of digits as much earlier Epiphones, overlap was inevitable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gralst Posted March 9, 2020 Report Share Posted March 9, 2020 No question about it. Your Casino is a standard production 1990 Terada.. My serial number is 65783...6=1996 5= standard Casino 783= production sequence. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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