Wayne’s journey for a real Les Paul continues.

October 16th, 2011

Wayne Bauman from Australia has once again been doing one of his usual searches on ebay for second hand Gibson Les Pauls, he “stumbled across this ripper”.

As Wayne puts it, “The price is firstly way too low and the head stock doesn’t look right. Also the good old sticker on the back of the guitar is a dead giveaway. It has the custom book on the headstock but the guitar is clearly not a custom and the serial number doesn’t match up. It’s been advertised as a Gibson but it is clearly an Asian sweat shop knock off. Have a look and see what you think”.

Wayne, I think you are spot on, also the truss rod cover is too close to the nut.

“Ink Blue” ? Les Paul Standard Copy

December 28th, 2009

“GIBSON LES PAUL STANDARD INK BLUE TOP GUITAR” Condition: NEW

and it sold for $1900 in Australia!!! At first glance it looks very legit, appears to be a one of the limited edition colors from a while back, lighter than Manhattan Blue, more like on those fake Epiphones… uh oh.

blueylp
A very convincing copy, the case is one giveaway as you would expect the correct case to come with a new guitar, this guitar also has the “gibson” decal on the pot cavity cover which is never seen on a real Gibson. The seller states in the ad that it was a gift 6 months ago, so perhaps they didn’t know it was a fake. A message was sent to them encouraging them to double check it’s authenticity and not to rip off an unsuspecting buyer but sadly it appears that it was ignored.

bluey headstock

The main giveaways, as usual, lie in the headstock. The truss rod cover had several things wrong with it. It could be blank. or it could have Standard printed on it, but not Les Paul standard. The shape of the headstock is close to the genuine article but the placement of the Gibson logo, (which should be mother of pearl inlay, not a block color decal) is off, as is the font used as the Les Paul signature, though very subtly.

The frets should not travel over the binding, this is common on fakes, it could be argued that the guitar had had a re-fret but this guitar is listed as new, (well, 6 months old, which would not require a re-fret).