Is this bridge original?

J

jhof

New member
Hi All. New to the forum and thinking of getting a Heritage. Hoping to find an older one from the hand-made days. 

Today, I came across this lovely 2003 H535. Not in great condition and possibly over-priced at $2,400. I'm curious about the bridge. It doesn't match that of other H535s I've seen from that time to today, but I did find a photo of an old H555 with the same bridge. 

Were different bridges used depending on availability? 

Also, how about this neck? Does the white-ish grain indicate dryness? And the marks where neck join the body. There's also some fret sprouting on the binding. 

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Yes, Schaller stop, TOM and pups with Grover tuners. The stop and TOM will be metric so if you buy and decide to do a swap of parts keep that in mind.

 
The neck pocket looks solid.   I don't see anything of concern.    I don't think I've ever heard of moisture affecting the color of the grain.  More likely that's just how the wood was stained.

The fret sprout happens when guitars dry out, which happens if you're not in  a humid climate or tightly control the humidity.   The binding will minimize the problem, although it's not unusual to see some small cracks in the binding at the frets after many years.   As long as the binding is still glued securely,  there would be no problem.   I have those cracks on one of my neck's binding and it's never caused any problem.  

$2400 seems like a high price for a 2003.   There are lots of used 535s in the $2000 range.   There's a similar guitar near Cleveland for $2100.  Some negotiation could probably drop that.  

 
TalismanRich said:
The neck pocket looks solid.   I don't see anything of concern.    I don't think I've ever heard of moisture affecting the color of the grain.  More likely that's just how the wood was stained.

The fret sprout happens when guitars dry out, which happens if you're not in  a humid climate or tightly control the humidity.   The binding will minimize the problem, although it's not unusual to see some small cracks in the binding at the frets after many years.   As long as the binding is still glued securely,  there would be no problem.   I have those cracks on one of my neck's binding and it's never caused any problem.  

$2400 seems like a high price for a 2003.   There are lots of used 535s in the $2000 range.   There's a similar guitar near Cleveland for $2100.  Some negotiation could probably drop that.  
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Thanks. Just found another one locally in much better condition for significantly less. Vintage Guitar Price Guide says $1950 at the low end. Not sure how good those numbers are but seems to be all over the place from what I can find online. 

 
Guitar prices during Covid spiked up like crazy, many guitars selling for more than they were new.

Back to the guitar in question.  Schaller was the choice of hardware from the 1980's through the mid 2000's, then switch to Tone Pros, and now some other company I cannot remember who they are.  The changes stemmed from improvements on quality and consistency.

As far as the odd coloration, that's just a natural grain filler.  Until recent years, Heritage did not use different color grain fills consistent with the color the guitar was going to be.  The stain didn't always color the grain filler like it should have, so you'll see this on lighter color finishes.

 
ledzeffer said:
The stop and TOM will be metric so if you buy and decide to do a swap of parts keep that in mind.
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Actually this isn't quite the case. The bushings are the same as a Nashville set, so a Nashville bridge and tailpiece can be direct replacements. According to Stewmac, tailpiece post threads: U.S. 5/16-24, bridge post threads: M5 x .8.

A Nashville set by Gibson or other manufacturer is a direct replacement. I assume the mix of threads happened when they developed the Nashville bridge and kept the tailpiece the same.

 
DetroitBlues said:
Guitar prices during Covid spiked up like crazy, many guitars selling for more than they were new.

Back to the guitar in question.  Schaller was the choice of hardware from the 1980's through the mid 2000's, then switch to Tone Pros, and now some other company I cannot remember who they are.  The changes stemmed from improvements on quality and consistency.

As far as the odd coloration, that's just a natural grain filler.  Until recent years, Heritage did not use different color grain fills consistent with the color the guitar was going to be.  The stain didn't always color the grain filler like it should have, so you'll see this on lighter color finishes.
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Yeah, I'm into cycling and bikes were similar (and a similarly priced item). Prices have come down there but unfortunately have no sense of guitar pricing. 

 
jhof said:
Yeah, I'm into cycling and bikes were similar (and a similarly priced item). Prices have come down there but unfortunately have no sense of guitar pricing. 
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People are still asking crazy high and not budging.  My guess is they don't want to lose money, but at this point, they will be.  I'm selling a couple other guitars at a loss at this point.

 
If your mode of operation is to flip guitars, and you bought while prices were peaking, you have two choices: hold on to the guitar, or lose money selling it for less that you bought it for.    I think I paid $1150 for my used H535.   Granted that was almost 15 years ago, but the prices were still in the $15-1700 range until the pandemic craziness hit.   Then prices shot up about 30 to 40%.    I guess people wanted to spend all that free money that they got from the government.     How they need to spend their own money, that they have to work for,  so things aren't so free.

I also think that some of the folks out there are finally realizing that by the time you add all the Paypal/shipping/Reverb or Ebay fees on something, you end up with a $2000 guitar selling for $2400.  

People look at the inflated prices on Reverb and think that's the normal price.    

 
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