Korea vs Indonesia (QC etc.)

[Eagle]

It’s pretty funny that no matter how bad you can find an example of poor qc nobody took a picture of it.

 

[RandomGuy]

Necroing an old thread, but I have had the worst luck with Cor-tek Indonesia. I've bought five guitars made at that facility:

2006 Ibanex RG2EX1 (300USD): Great guitar for the price. Built like a tank. Played nicely. Sounded amazing with a pickup upgrade.
2019 or 2020 Cort KX500MS (700USD): Garbage. 7th string had no sustain and sounded horrible. Cheap finish and poor fret work as well. Neck felt nice, though.
2025 Hils HN3 (550USD): Horribly uneven frets; unplayable at any reasonable action height. Returned for another...
2025 Hils HN3 (550USD): Horribly cut nut. Low E was resting high above the other strings. Ground bone dust and glue smeared around the groove. Aluminum bridge is cheap and worn with grooves from the strings when I took it out of the box. Tuning pegs were also very difficult to turn. Sent back and walked away.
2024 LTD Deluxe Arrow 1007B w/ Evertune (1800USD): Finish very poor. Buffing swirls all over it fresh out of the box. Also other blemishes that I can't really identify. They look like oil residue but it's in the finish. Tuners were installed crooked due to holes being drilled at the wrong angles. Sounds good and looks good. But doesn't FEEL like a guitar in that price range. This guitar is what brought me to this thread. I've finally reached my breaking point. No Indos again. Ever.

I'm 1 out of 5 on Cor-tek Indonesia. By contrast I've owned a 2008 BC Rich Jr V NJ Deluxe and a Sean Guitarwork Custom V, both made at WMI Korea and they were basically flawless. Sound and play great. Though neither of them are as good as my ESP E-II M-I, which is the best bang-for-buck guitar I've ever played.

 

[Jazz Padd]

I had an Indonesian made Ibanez archtop for a while. The guitar was well made and looked good, but the hardware was poor.

The first part to fail was the tailpiece, easy enough to replace. In looking into that, I found a discussion on another forum in which some one replaced the pickups, upgraded the wiring, and other parts and had themselves a fine guitar. I considered doing that but decided to sell it instead.

As some one has already said here, the factories seem capable of making good guitars, but the companies that order from them hobble the quality capabilities in the interest of keeping costs low as possible.

 

[JerEvil]

Necroing an old thread, but I have had the worst luck with Cor-tek Indonesia. I've bought five guitars made at that facility:

2006 Ibanex RG2EX1 (300USD): Great guitar for the price. Built like a tank. Played nicely. Sounded amazing with a pickup upgrade.
2019 or 2020 Cort KX500MS (700USD): Garbage. 7th string had no sustain and sounded horrible. Cheap finish and poor fret work as well. Neck felt nice, though.
2025 Hils HN3 (550USD): Horribly uneven frets; unplayable at any reasonable action height. Returned for another...
2025 Hils HN3 (550USD): Horribly cut nut. Low E was resting high above the other strings. Ground bone dust and glue smeared around the groove. Aluminum bridge is cheap and worn with grooves from the strings when I took it out of the box. Tuning pegs were also very difficult to turn. Sent back and walked away.
2024 LTD Deluxe Arrow 1007B w/ Evertune (1800USD): Finish very poor. Buffing swirls all over it fresh out of the box. Also other blemishes that I can't really identify. They look like oil residue but it's in the finish. Tuners were installed crooked due to holes being drilled at the wrong angles. Sounds good and looks good. But doesn't FEEL like a guitar in that price range. This guitar is what brought me to this thread. I've finally reached my breaking point. No Indos again. Ever.

I'm 1 out of 5 on Cor-tek Indonesia. By contrast I've owned a 2008 BC Rich Jr V NJ Deluxe and a Sean Guitarwork Custom V, both made at WMI Korea and they were basically flawless. Sound and play great. Though neither of them are as good as my ESP E-II M-I, which is the best bang-for-buck guitar I've ever played.

Yeah I’ll happily take MIJ or MIK if I’m slumming used for the same dough. I got my E-II for $1200 and the MJ Jackson for $1600. Both are mint. No way I’m spending that kind of money for an Indonesian guitar.

 

[Piing]

It’s pretty funny that no matter how bad you can find an example of poor qc nobody took a picture of it.

Here are the pics of an indo PRS SE McCarty 594 that had a faulty contact at the pickup switch. When I opened it, I found that someone did a butchered job.

- Traces of old wires that were previously soldered to the switch and have been cut. It looks like this is a recycled switch.
- When touching the cables, the white wire of the bridge pickup was disconnected. Faulty soldering!! Maybe it was not even soldered, just touching, or a cold-soldering.
- Green wire partially melted.
- Very dirty and unprofessional job. The person that did that had zero soldering skills and probably had to meet some deadline in a rush.

It didn't came with a proper setup. I had to do a major adjustment at the truss-rod, and reverse the G string saddle for properly intonation because it already arrived to the end.

Brand new. That was the first batch of this PRS that arrived to Thailand, just a few days after it was globally announced. It didn't had any trace of having been unboxed before I got it. I grabbed it directly from the shop of the PRS dealer, few minutes after they received that lot.

BTW: I was accused of malevolence for exposing this matter at TGP. PRS seems to be sacrosanct and above criticism there

 

[RandomGuy]

Yeah I’ll happily take MIJ or MIK if I’m slumming used for the same dough. I got my E-II for $1200 and the MJ Jackson for $1600. Both are mint. No way I’m spending that kind of money for an Indonesian guitar.

Funny that you post those. I'm actually considering the MJ Rhoads and the E-II Arrow. What are your thoughts on them? Which would you recommend? I was a little skeptical of the switch to the basswood on the Rhoads but I love the way they look. And I've got an SL1 with the JB so I know it'll sound killer.

 

[RandomGuy]

Here are the pics of an indo PRS SE McCarty 594 that had a faulty contact at the pickup switch. When I opened it, I found that someone did a butchered job.

- Traces of old wires that were previously soldered to the switch and have been cut. It looks like this is a recycled switch.
- When touching the cables, the white wire of the bridge pickup was disconnected. Faulty soldering!! Maybe it was not even soldered, just touching, or a cold-soldering.
- Green wire partially melted.
- Very dirty and unprofessional job. The person that did that had zero soldering skills and probably had to meet some deadline in a rush.
View attachment 50259
View attachment 50272

It didn't came with a proper setup. I had to do a major adjustment at the truss-rod, and reverse the G string saddle for properly intonation because it already arrived to the end.
View attachment 50260
Brand new. That was the first batch of this PRS that arrived to Thailand, just a few days after it was globally announced. It didn't had any trace of having been unboxed before I got it. I grabbed it directly from the shop of the PRS dealer, few minutes after they received that lot.

BTW: I was accused of malevolence for exposing this matter at TGP. PRS seems to be sacrosanct and above criticism there

I wish I still had the photos of the HILS HN3 that I was sent. The nut was horrendous. You get a nice little QC check-off sheet with every guitar. Both of the ones I got had serious issues and were signed off on by the same guy. It's pretty funny to think about some guy just signing every piece of paper in a big stack without even having any guitars in front of him.

 

[JerEvil]

Funny that you post those. I'm actually considering the MJ Rhoads and the E-II Arrow. What are your thoughts on them? Which would you recommend? I was a little skeptical of the switch to the basswood on the Rhoads but I love the way they look. And I've got an SL1 with the JB so I know it'll sound killer.

Yeah i was too at first. Honestly they’re pretty neck and neck in terms of quality. Tempe RR SOUNDS better and I like the bridge-feel better underhand but both are phenomenal.

My biggest issue with the E-II is I need to get rid of the Fishman Moderns. I HATE them.

The neck on the E-II is fatter too which I don’t mind. The Jackson has a faster/thinner neck profile.

Both are keepers though for sure.

 

[RandomGuy]

Yeah i was too at first. Honestly they’re pretty neck and neck in terms of quality. Tempe RR SOUNDS better and I like the bridge-feel better underhand but both are phenomenal.

My biggest issue with the E-II is I need to get rid of the Fishman Moderns. I HATE them.

The neck on the E-II is fatter too which I don’t mind. The Jackson has a faster/thinner neck profile.

Both are keepers though for sure.

I have a Sean Guitarworks Custom V that I bought while living in Korea. https://www.seanguitarworks.com/en/custom-v

I got the illusion colored one. It's basically a blue/purple candy paint type thing. Great guitar. Love it. But it has the Fishman Fluence Moderns. Really overrated pickup. I hate them. Really washed out kind of wah sound in the mids is the best way I've heard somebody describe them. The note separation is non-existent. Both my JB and EMG81 are infinitely better. Oddly enough, the 7 string version of those pickups are actually pretty good because in spite of what I mentioned above, they do a really good job keeping that 7th string nice and tight.

 

[JiveTurkey]

Fishman paid someone a LOT of $ at some point to put their pickups in what seems like all guitars everywhere. Ugh.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Fishman paid someone a LOT of $ at some point to put their pickups in what seems like all guitars everywhere. Ugh.

From my very brief testruns (basically just checking guitars in shops), they're a pretty mixed bunch, but I found the Greg Koch signature set to be pretty awsome in a Tele of a mate (too bad the switch/pot mounting plate sucks as much as any standard Tele mounting plate).

 

[RandomGuy]

Re-Necroing.

I recently bought a PRS SE Holcomb SVN from Indonesia. These have been on sale 20% like all the SEs during the end of year blowout. The first one I got had finish issues around the neck joint and on the binding, poor fretwork, and large divots/chips in the fretboard. I told them I would keep it and fix it myself if they offered me some cash back on it. They declined and took it back only to re-list it as scratch and dent and sold it for quite a bit less than I was willing to pay for it. Oh well.

I got a second one sent out to me. This one had a little bit of finish issues on the binding. The satin wasn't fully applied over the binding and dirt/grime got into it a bit. The frets were a little uneven across the board but the first fret was way low. I just took it my guy and he did a full fret job on it. Plays and sounds amazing now. So much so that I just went ahead and ordered the six string version since it's also on sale. Hopefully this one won't need a fret job but I won't hold my breath.

So I'm currently 1/7 on Indos being acceptable out of the box. Will update when I get this other one in a few days.

Side-note: These PRS SE Holcombs are solid guitars for the current 20% off sale price (943 USD for the six string; 999 USD for the seven string) assuming you get a good one. They resonate very nicely and sound good unplugged. The weight and feel of the guitar is good both standing and sitting. It's well-balanced. The nut is the same as on the core guitars. The plate-style fixed bridge is solid. It's a very good alternative to the standard tremolo, as I don't trust cheap import trem systems. The neck is unique, but I like it. It's thicker than you would expect on this kind of guitar, but the radius is flatter than any radius I've ever played (20 inch). It feels closer to a classical guitar than an electric guitar. I dig it. The big winner here is the Duncan Scarlet and Scourge pick-up set. They are mid-output, super clear, and sound great clean an distorted. I have had the Duncan Pegasus and Sentient seven string set and the Scarlet and Scourge are much better. The Scarlet/Scourge seven string set with covers is listed at 358 USD and the six string set with covers is listed at 338 USD. So when you consider that you're getting pick-ups of this caliber the 1000-ish USD price is easier to accept for an Indonesian-made guitar. However, I wouldn't pay full price given the QC issues I've seen and the fact it doesn't come with locking tuners.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Already covered this in a dedicated NGD thread, but my indonesian PRS SE DGT has been pretty much a dud. Horrible string action due to a bridge not screwed in low enough (so you couldn't compensate with the saddles), halfbroken nut (after string replacement the D-string slot was way too low), switch failed occasionally.
Seems to be an exception because pretty much all reviewers say that they've hardly ever seen a guitar in that price bracket with a better factory setup. Mine however went back, but I'm about to get a replacement in 2 weeks or so (Thomann has been out of stock).

 

[paisleywookiee]

Believe it or not, the Holcomb has had the most problems Qc-wise, for our shop anyway. Every one of them has had some sort of issue. It's super weird.

 

[Sascha Franck]

I really have my fingers crossed already, regarding QC of my replacement DGT. In case this comes out bad as well, I'm not gonna give it yet another try.

 

[paisleywookiee]

I really have my fingers crossed already, regarding QC of my replacement DGT. In case this comes out bad as well, I'm not gonna give it yet another try.

I can respect that. I've got the luxury of directly busting their balls and sending shit back to PRS, if there's an issue.

 

[Sascha Franck]

I can respect that. I've got the luxury of directly busting their balls and sending shit back to PRS, if there's an issue.

I'd better not have that option because "busting their balls" would be put pretty carefully.

 

[Dave Lewis]

Korea Indonesia Vietnam China India and Japan all build great quality guitars.
There’s some outstanding guitars built in England
Jon
You get paid and given guitars amps cabs pedals and other gear to review so ??

 

[paisleywookiee]

Korea Indonesia Vietnam China India and Japan all build great quality guitars.
Jon
You get paid and given the guitars to review so ??

He discloses what he gets to demo, and what he buys. So STFU, bellend.

 

[RandomGuy]

I can respect that. I've got the luxury of directly busting their balls and sending shit back to PRS, if there's an issue.

I wonder if the Holcomb being pretty far outside of their normal spec has anything to do with it? The 20 inch radius is vastly different, but you'd think they'd have a process to sort that out.