Gibson headstock with "stinger" Les Paul and SG

[daveinspain]

Hi Everyone, I'm trying to get some info on what was called a stinger. From what I understand some solid bodies had the back of the headstock painted black and ended in a point where the headstock meets the neck. Why was this done? I was told it was to cover up flaws in the wood. Are stinger headstocks good? Bad? A negative or a plus?

 

[AXE®]

The Stinger Series featured a Gibson Les Paul 1959 Historic Reissue with an extra huge neck, Edwin Wilson utilized the 1958 rough cut and then with minimal sanding produced a very large electric guitar neck. So these were a figured top Gibson Les Paul for those who liked them big necks. We have some customers that prefer the large neck Les Paul and say the bigger the Les Paul neck is, the better they like them. When you check the Stinger Series list there is an X tucked into the product code or model ID as it is listed there for the 1959 Les Paul guitars that were built with the large neck. I don’t remember any Gibson Les Paul guitars with bigger necks regardless of the era. The Stinger Series Gibson Les Paul 1959 Historic Reissues also came with a 1959 Gibson Les Paul neck. This neck size seems to be the most satisfactory neck size for the consumers that Music Machine has the opportunity to talk with. But a lot of other neck sizes were built into the Stinger Series 1959 Gibson Les Paul models

[daveinspain]

Interesting.... What about on an SG?

[Riffster]

Dave,

 

According to George Gruhn in Nashville and his answer to a question on a 1965 SG on Vintage Guitar magazine it says that the stinger is very rare on SGs but a lot different Gibson models of the era had it, even high end models.

 

It says that it was done to hide a veneer or perhaps imperfections of the grain. He also says that in his experience the stinger has no effect on the value of the instrument.