djangojessie Posted March 2, 2009 Share Posted March 2, 2009 Hi I live in Australia and normally buy and sell concertinas. While buying a concertina i purchased an Epiphone FT 27 in ex. condition. Dont know anything about this guitar or value. Can anyone shed some light on this one? Its sunburst in colour. You can email me direct if you want patrickcullen54@hotmai.com Serial # 14877 / New York Thank You Patrick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TommyK Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 I'll give you twenty bucks for it.. Actually, if it is indeed a FT27, it could be an oldie. Possibly as old as the 1950s or as young as the 1970s. Pictures would help. This site: http://www.provide.net/~cfh/epiphone.html lists historical models, although the FT27 doesn't show up. An FT28 and a FT30 does. The 30 is the Caballero model smaller body with a tight waist. The 28, if I read it correctly, says it's a Caballero tenor. A tenor guitar is a four string guitar. Like it's 6 string relative is usually strung with the higher four strings only. I was under the impression that the tenors made by Epi had a different prefix than FT. Does this example have four or 6 tuning machines on the headstock? There's more information out there. Search for Gibson Blue Book or Epiphone Bluebook using Ask.com or Yahoo. I've since misplaced the link to this site that is supposed to be the official listing. However, some models do escape being recorded. Since this example is in Australia, this adds another twist. Some importers have had a batch of custom made batch of guit tars with, maybe only cosmetic chages, but do so to accomodate thier unique markets. This could be a FT30 or FT28 like guitar that had some custom features added at the factory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ship of fools Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 Wow you have a really nice guitar there, solid spruce top,mahogany back and sides bound top 14/20 fret rosewood fingerboard witha dot inlay, Masterbilt peghead decal, rosewood bridge, were only made in sunburst finish 14.5 in body width made between 1935-1941 and never made again, to bad too. USD blue book puts them at $750-900 USD in excellent shape,$425-500 in average shape. I recently sold mine for more than what was listed as they are US made and a very nice players, will e-mail you with what I got for mine.Ship Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TommyK Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 This site: http://www.tenorguitar.com/epiphone.html shows a FT28 Caballero which does not have the tight waist I expected. It looks more proportioned like a Gibson B-25. Scroll down to th FT28 thumbnail and click it for a larger view. This FT28 is indeed a tenor guitar. According to the previous page it was made in 1963 - 1968. Look too at the Gibson examples shown on the above page. Gibson's tenor of that era was called a TG-25. He shows one example in natural finish and one bursted. The TG-25 has the same body proportions to the FT28. The older Gibson tenors have radically different body shapes. How does yours compare to the Gibson and Epis shown on the above site? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TommyK Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 Wow you have a really nice guitar there' date=' solid spruce top,mahogany back and sides bound top 14/20 fret rosewood fingerboard witha dot inlay, Masterbilt peghead decal, rosewood bridge, were only made in sunburst finish 14.5 in body width made between 1935-1941 and never made again, to bad too.USD blue book puts them at $750-900 USD in excellent shape,$425-500 in average shape. I recently sold mine for more than what was listed as they are US made and a very nice players, will e-mail you with what I got for mine.Ship[/quote'] Where'd you come up with that SoF? I may have been going down the wrong path. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ship of fools Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 Well I had one just recently Tommy, actually I had several very nice older Epi's that had started to become collecting in the closet and because I am a player and hate to collect, so I unloaded them, as for going down the wrong path, not at all Tommy you were pretty close and its tough to find correct info on some of these models, you should have seen the original Caballerro's, absolutely great guitars to play with. I think you are real asset to this group your info is almost always darn close to what they need.good on you TommyK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TommyK Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 Thanks for that vote of confidence. On the vitage guit tars page liked above, that serial number falls right into 1940, assuming they kept the same serial no. sequence. with other flat tops. Since the model's prefix is FT, I'd say so. Again, djangojessie, is this example a tenor or 6 string? New York is another give-away that it was not made in the 60's. CMI, Chicago Insrument, Inc., owner of Gibson at the time, purchased the Epiphone Bass viol product line in 1957. When the trucks arrived with the Bass parts, and tooling they also received the rest of Epiphone's equipment, lock, stock and barrel. So.. this would be a pre-Gibson Epiphone. As a matter of fact Epimanondas Stathopoulo was still at the helm at this time. He passed in 1943. The company went down hill from there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ship of fools Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 I think they were considered to be just a 6 string, and not tenor, ebn though it was small enough with a 14.5 in waist line.Ship Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djangojessie Posted March 3, 2009 Author Share Posted March 3, 2009 Hi All Thanks for the information. The guitar is a 6string. Going away for a few days and will try and place some photos of the guitar on my return...Monday Djangojessie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TommyK Posted March 4, 2009 Share Posted March 4, 2009 Have a nice weekend Djangojessie. I like Django too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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