NGD: UNEXPECTED Chibson

[DaPhotoGuy66]

So I was on Temu it's a couple pictures of parts of a guitar. It was on clearance like everything is on that site. Only $222. I didn't own any semi hollows and the little bit of the pictures I could see it had a cool top. I discussed it with my eye and gave it the limited pictures from the site. It swore to me that it was a West Creek 333 version 2. I researched as much as I could but found nothing that would tell me that it was a West Creek guitar. I decided to trust the AI and went ahead and ordered it. This is what I got.

Check out those polished fret ends. I think that was the thing that surprised me the most. It plays and sounds great. I need to put new strings on it, clean and oil the fretboard, and I'm thinking of getting a roller bridge but lots of people with bigsby's put roller bridges on them.

 

[newholland]

its bigsby R liensed.

 

[DISTORT6]

its bigsby R liensed.

Quality.

 

[DaPhotoGuy66]

its bigsby R liensed.

Yea. All sorts of things that tell it's not genuine. The headstock shape is a little off. The biggest tell is the binding that goes across the back of the body by the neck joint. No true Gibson has binding like that.

 

[newholland]

i largely kid- especially if its a playable guit!

 

[laxu]

Yeah it's just very silly why this had to be a fake in the first place. Just sell it as a $222 guitar of some brand and it would be fine. Going all the way to make a poor fake Bigsby and slap a Gibson label on the headstock is just so stupid.

Despite the nice rounding, those frets look like they are too short. I could see some minor issues with the low E when doing a big vibrato.

 

[DaPhotoGuy66]

Yeah it's just very silly why this had to be a fake in the first place. Just sell it as a $222 guitar of some brand and it would be fine. Going all the way to make a poor fake Bigsby and slap a Gibson label on the headstock is just so stupid.

Despite the nice rounding, those frets look like they are too short. I could see some minor issues with the low E when doing a big vibrato.

I personally don't think the length of the frets is going to be any sort of issue. They may look short in the picture but there's plenty of room.

What will be an issue is that the pickups are very microphonic. I had been playing it on clean channels as that's how I intended on using it mostly and it sounds great that way. But if you put it on any channel with any amount of gain it's squealing like crazy. Give the pickups a light little tap with your pic and you really hear the pop. I've always wanted to try wax potting a pickup maybe this will give me that chance. Probably easier just to buy a set of humbuckers and put them in but I like a challenge sometimes.

 

[DaPhotoGuy66]

Changed my mind on wax potting the pickups. Played at low volumes or even through headphones the sound is unique and really nice for clean sounds. I think wax potting that might deaden that. Besides the original pickups weren't wax potted. I've got plenty of guitars with wax potted humbucker pickups that I can play in a band setting if I need the higher gain.

 

[Slooky]

Wow,,that looks pretty impressive. Like someone else said, why put they Gibson name on it. Not really liking the top. Its as if someone painted it and then let the cat walk all over it.

 

[FuzzyAce]

 

[SillyOctpuss]

Yeah I'm no Chibson fan, except for Chibson USA. I'd buy a Behringturd before I'd buy a Chibson.

 

[FuzzyAce]

I'd buy a Behringturd before I'd buy a Chibson.

 

[SillyOctpuss]

I feel kinda dirty now because I just realised you're right.

 

[Hollowway]

Man, it's crazy how inexpensive these things are. I'm assuming a decent margin on them, but maybe it's not? I just want to know what it actually cost to make this thing.

@DaPhotoGuy66 are you in the US? Curious about how much the tariffs are on Temu, etc. guitars. I won't want to buy something inexpensive and then pay a bunch more in Freedom Taxes.

 

[DaPhotoGuy66]

Man, it's crazy how inexpensive these things are. I'm assuming a decent margin on them, but maybe it's not? I just want to know what it actually cost to make this thing.

@DaPhotoGuy66 are you in the US? Curious about how much the tariffs are on Temu, etc. guitars. I won't want to buy something inexpensive and then pay a bunch more in Freedom Taxes.

Yes, I live in the state of Nebraska in the United States. This particular guitar was already in the United States at one of Temus warehouses here. It was listed as $222.75 and after sales tax I paid $238.34. shipping was free of course

 

[richey88]

Really interesting top, if it plays and sounds, rock on!