The remaining digits are important for product identification, but the first few characters are all you need to determine the instruments age.

The second character will usually be a number.

For US instruments, the serial number will start with a letter.

Serial dating is easiest for instruments made in the USA or Mexico, but is also possible for those made in Japan, Korea, China, and Indonesia.

First, narrow it down by the country of origin.

Here's a brief rundown of how to do it, plus resources for more information. Well, good news it's very easy to figure out the age of Fender and Gibson instruments from the last 30 years. I will say that in most cases, you can do better price-wise on an actual used item.Ever wonder exactly when your favorite guitar was made? You sort of remember when you got it, but you want to really know its history, especially if you're not the first owner. If it looks good, buy it! You just saved a little dough. They 'fix' them, stamp them 'used' and sell them to small resellers, who mostly function on ebay, or in some cases, a mom and pop store.īuying one is not a bad idea, but you need to inspect it very carefully, as the resellers are often not as forthcoming as they could be about what was wrong with it, even though MIRC lists what was wrong with the guitars on their sales sheet.Ĭheck for bad frets, neck set, hump, separating fretbaord-everything. The company in the US that handles most of this for Fender is MIRC, located outside of Nashville. Some of the issues may be fixed (say, electronics) before putting it back not the market, some not (say neck hump, bad neck set).

But it can also be a bad neck set, lifting fretboard, 14th fret hump, etc. Yes, sometimes it is a scratch, or faulty electronics (which can be replaced). That mark is from returned to manufacturer defective merchandise.

Mirc guitar serial number