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Heritage Owners Club

Fake or Real H150?


DetroitBlues

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It is router marks. It looks like it got cleaned up AFTER paint for some reason. I think I just got blocked/removed from the group because I don't agree with admin "Sam Hedrick" , who has declared in his infinite wisdom that it's definitely a laminate. They have even had logical answers from people who work at Heritage, but he KNOWS. There's also some guy in Poland who KNOWS it's a laminate.

That would have to be VOIDLESS laminate, which is not cheap. There's no production time savings from using a laminated maple top.

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Count down the first 4 layers from the top.  The top layer is maple.  If the next 3 were laminate, at least 1 would be endgrain.  Endgrain routers differently from sidegrain.  There would be an obvious difference in tooling marks.  This looks like there was a template put on the face of the guitar and a flush-trim bit was lowered ~1/4" with successive cuts.  Not ply

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Yeah, I wasn't even getting into the whole "sloppy workmanship"  thing. Some were convinced it was a laminate, and the threadstarter was pissed that there was no "official response" to his Facebook thread? He should have talked to his dealer first, and brought it in, before starting a Facebook thread. Then the Admin of the group ran with it, declaring that the whole instrument was laminated, and then veneered. He was also pretty rude to anyone who disagreed with him.

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19 minutes ago, DetroitBlues said:

Seems I haven’t been banned from the Facebook page, “Heritage Guitar Owners”, the thread was deleted.  Guess Sam didn’t like being wrong.

Thank you Mr. Steiner for a most excellent explanation!

Just another reason why I don't have a Facebook account (or Twitter or Instagram or etc.)!!!!

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48 minutes ago, tbonesullivan said:

Yeah, I wasn't even getting into the whole "sloppy workmanship"  thing. Some were convinced it was a laminate, and the threadstarter was pissed that there was no "official response" to his Facebook thread? He should have talked to his dealer first, and brought it in, before starting a Facebook thread. Then the Admin of the group ran with it, declaring that the whole instrument was laminated, and then veneered. He was also pretty rude to anyone who disagreed with him.

Yes he was.  But I gave it right back to him.

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Here we can witness the birth of fake news. Some bad seed has been sown and much later could easily become a Heritage fact. Most probably it can never be traced back again to these Facebook idiots. Best to stay away from this type of social media.

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I followed that thread with increasing incredulity, noting that at no point was there any mention of how the guitar sounded. I'm guessing a plywood 150 wouldn't sound like a real 150...

If you take the photo and increase the contrast, you can more easily see the continuity in the wood between the "layers".

 

150 top.jpg

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I had just started reading that thread, and was astonished at the 60+ posts in about 5 hours.    Then it disappeared as quickly as it started.   There was one picture that I wasn't able to capture which showed the whole routing down to the bottom and you could clearly see 4 or 5 more "laminates" in the mahogany as well.   I'm surprised that they didn't claim the whole guitar was a laminate.   Clearly it was router marking, but the OP was so convinced that he had been shafted that there was no convincing him (or the moderator) of anything else.

Even more amazing to me was the immediate blame placed on the the new "Chinese" owners for cheapening the product.   REALLY?   The guitar was built two year ago (2016 model), when Plaza was first starting to get involved with the company.    Meng wasn't even in the picture then, and he's not Chinese.   I guess they don't teach geography anymore.    Then the idea that it was the new inexperienced workers that don't know how to build a guitar.   That whole episode was in 2018!   

Its clear that some people will never let facts and knowledge get in the way of a good pissing match.   Thankfully the thread was deleted.  

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Actually, the heritage group admin Sam Hedrick did assert that the entire guitar was a laminate, which had been veneered. I also did point out that the striations that went down in the mahogany, but the opposition was already convinced.

They also had the heritage shop manager as well as the drill bit supplier commenting that it was due to the type of bit, but no one cared. They already had made up their minds that the entire thing. Then they got accused of being corporate trolls.

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5 hours ago, bobmeyrick said:

I followed that thread with increasing incredulity, noting that at no point was there any mention of how the guitar sounded. I'm guessing a plywood 150 wouldn't sound like a real 150...

If you take the photo and increase the contrast, you can more easily see the continuity in the wood between the "layers".

 

150 top.jpg

I stated the same thing... no way that’s laminated because you can match the grains up.

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3 hours ago, TalismanRich said:

I had just started reading that thread, and was astonished at the 60+ posts in about 5 hours.    Then it disappeared as quickly as it started.   There was one picture that I wasn't able to capture which showed the whole routing down to the bottom and you could clearly see 4 or 5 more "laminates" in the mahogany as well.   I'm surprised that they didn't claim the whole guitar was a laminate.   Clearly it was router marking, but the OP was so convinced that he had been shafted that there was no convincing him (or the moderator) of anything else.

Even more amazing to me was the immediate blame placed on the the new "Chinese" owners for cheapening the product.   REALLY?   The guitar was built two year ago (2016 model), when Plaza was first starting to get involved with the company.    Meng wasn't even in the picture then, and he's not Chinese.   I guess they don't teach geography anymore.    Then the idea that it was the new inexperienced workers that don't know how to build a guitar.   That whole episode was in 2018!   

Its clear that some people will never let facts and knowledge get in the way of a good pissing match.   Thankfully the thread was deleted.  

I had even offered to talk to the guy over the phone to explain it, but he never called.  

Why is social media such an easy way to slander without repercussions?

I was rather peeved when the OP told me to stop because I was embarrassing myself.

grr... I think the thread was deleted because the OP embarrassed himself.

Side thought... has anyone actually seen a realistic fake Heritage?

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Why would anyone want to fake a Heritage? I even have to explain the real Heritage's to people and why they are cool. If you are going to do a counterfeit guitar, wouldn't it be better to do a Gibson where you wouldn't have to explain Gibson?

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Agreed.   Add to that, until recently, Heritage guitars were usually very undervalued, compared to an older Gibson or Fender.   That's why counterfeiters like to do $20 and up.   There's no profit in counterfeiting $1s and $5s.  

If I was going to build a fake guitar,  why not start with a Monteleone?    You could probably fetch $10,000 for a good fake. 

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3 hours ago, rwinking said:

Why would anyone want to fake a Heritage? I even have to explain the real Heritage's to people and why they are cool. If you are going to do a counterfeit guitar, wouldn't it be better to do a Gibson where you wouldn't have to explain Gibson?

Believe it or not, they actually do though - the Chinese counterfeiters will counterfeit anything. I forget the name of the site (and don't want to give them any potential traffic or hits anyways), but whatever that big site is that sells a bunch of made in China junk has had them listed (likely still do). But I'd wager they sell a lot more fake Gibson's than they do H's. 

 

1 hour ago, TalismanRich said:

Agreed.   Add to that, until recently, Heritage guitars were usually very undervalued, compared to an older Gibson or Fender.   That's why counterfeiters like to do $20 and up.   There's no profit in counterfeiting $1s and $5s.  

If I was going to build a fake guitar,  why not start with a Monteleone?    You could probably fetch $10,000 for a good fake. 

Sadly a lot of the counterfeiters have caught on that many stores only check $20's and up. So fake $10's and $5's have become much more common. 

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8 hours ago, DetroitBlues said:

Side thought... has anyone actually seen a realistic fake Heritage?

I think I saw one in Guitar Center, it said "Gibson Les Paul" on the headstock. The more I think about it it didn't say "Made in Kalamazoo Mi." either.

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This thread reminded me of some guy who was running a Heritage Guitar fan page on Facebook with whom I did clash with years ago. I wonder if this is the same guy. Anyway, why bash Facebook instead of the guy who needs to be bashed? If it weren't for Facebook, the HOC and one other online forum, I would have ZERO regular communication with anyone outside of "being in the office" at work.

As for the guitar, would not sanding the edge clean to remove all the router marks make it very clear that it's all a one piece top? I did something like that once to discover and confirm how many pieces of wood Fender uses in order to make their Stratocaster bodies. That was a very enlightening experience.

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This thread reminds of discussions I had in bars when I was younger about young ladies that where present.

 Real or Fake! :icon_scratch::3some:

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On 1/9/2019 at 4:21 PM, tbonesullivan said:

It is router marks. It looks like it got cleaned up AFTER paint for some reason. I think I just got blocked/removed from the group because I don't agree with admin "Sam Hedrick" , who has declared in his infinite wisdom that it's definitely a laminate. They have even had logical answers from people who work at Heritage, but he KNOWS. There's also some guy in Poland who KNOWS it's a laminate.

That would have to be VOIDLESS laminate, which is not cheap. There's no production time savings from using a laminated maple top.

Guess what? I was just reviewing my FB security settings when I see a name on my blocked list. I thought to myself, Where have I seen that name before?  Guess who? "Sam Hedrick" ! hahahaha Apparently EVERYONE has a problem with that guy!

 

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