At least you didn’t just buy a thousand dollar schecter with about 1700 yards of spaghetti wiring in the control cavity…never seen someone use so much wiring to wire up 2 pickups and 2 knobs then zip tie all the slack up horribly and stuff it in there. It’s wild. Idk even know how the solders managed to hold up from the extreme bends twists and pulls in there.
From what I've seen, Epiphones, even the cheapest ones, are wired up very well, full size pots and nice soldering work. The fret work and nut slots can be hit or miss on the low end and they still use bottom of the barrel covered gear tuners on the cheapest SG and LP models.
There are clearly some very skilled craftsmen they've got in the Epiphone factory. Not all factories will have the same Q/C wherever you go, regardless of origin. I've got a few of Epi LP's and I've always been happy. I just got the new Epi Les Paul Studio in Smokehouse burst and it's super quality. In fairness, even the cheap SG style guitar in this video isn't completely terrible, it works well. It's just messy if you want to go in and get modding. Most people are not going to know the difference until they start opening things up. Keep rockin'
I have the latest BB King, the guitar is near perfect in terms of the body, great fret ends. A really nice guitar. But the wiring must have been done by Stevie Wonder. It started playing up after a week and then went back to Epiphone and was repaired a week later it has gone again. So it will be repaired and sold on. It's too frustrating not knowing if it will work each time it's played. I would not expect this on a guitar at this price. A guitar tech said rip it all out and start again. Not a cost worth doing on a new guitar
I'm so sorry to hear that... thanks for sharing. I've not had any problems with Epiphones so far, but it can happen. Such a shame. That's a lovely unique guitar too! It could even be a bit of bad soldering. That can be the cause of so many issues and it's a relatively easy fix. Can you maybe get a second opinion from another guitar tech?
The Stagg guitar's finish looks a lot thicker than the Epiphone's, which may go some way to explaining the difference. That, and the fact that the Stagg is built to a much lower price point. I've owned a few Epiphones, and they've all been decent, gig-quality guitars.
Agreed, I think that's the thing with these guitars. The Stagg is actually a really good guitar overall despite being cheap. It plays brilliantly (I did put in some work, but then it had a neck break that I needed to fix too...!). The pickups are a bit on the dull side. I had high-ish hopes when I opened it up and you can see it was done at some speed to meet a budget which was to be expected... So I was thinking of switching out the electrics for something like the coil splitting in the Epi. I knew the Epi has it and it's really tidy in there. Much like your experience, I've been very happy with my Epiphones. I've also since switched out the pickups in the Stagg and it's made a world of difference. I used inexpensive Fleor pickups and left the pots for now - it's a bit of a cat's cradle to deal with when modding, but not impossible. I'd never heard of Fleor until recently, but they are pretty impressive. I did a quick video of them here if you're interested: czcams.com/video/Hcpis9va_D8/video.htmlsi=rAMuMj5BTM9TTniP
So far I've had good experiences with Epiphone, and it seems they're going from strength to strength. Epiphone prices at the top end e.g. Adam Jones, Alex Lifeson et al, are reaching all time highs so you would expect nothing less than great quality from those. My latest Gibson has the PCB in the back where everything connects. That can come under fire too - mainly for actually lacking manual intervention - but it is very neat and tidy... and the Gibson sounds great so it's hard for me to complain. I need to try Sire for sure.
Ah, that's a tough one... inflation, cost of materials, labour, more competition etc. It's constantly getting more challenging to make a product at a price point that, not only will your audience accept, but makes sense financially to produce. I just got myself a new Epiphone Les Paul Studio - CTS points, solid tuners, nice weight, nice feel. But yeah, it's not super cheap. I'm lucky that so far I've had good experiences with Epiphone. They seem to be moving more and more into the premium pricing point... we'll have to see if long-term they can keep the quality up.
Thanks for this interesting video ! Appreciated.
Glad you enjoyed it!
At least you didn’t just buy a thousand dollar schecter with about 1700 yards of spaghetti wiring in the control cavity…never seen someone use so much wiring to wire up 2 pickups and 2 knobs then zip tie all the slack up horribly and stuff it in there. It’s wild. Idk even know how the solders managed to hold up from the extreme bends twists and pulls in there.
Wow, sounds like fun!
From what I've seen, Epiphones, even the cheapest ones, are wired up very well, full size pots and nice soldering work. The fret work and nut slots can be hit or miss on the low end and they still use bottom of the barrel covered gear tuners on the cheapest SG and LP models.
I have three 2021 high end Epiphones all are perfect
There are clearly some very skilled craftsmen they've got in the Epiphone factory. Not all factories will have the same Q/C wherever you go, regardless of origin. I've got a few of Epi LP's and I've always been happy. I just got the new Epi Les Paul Studio in Smokehouse burst and it's super quality. In fairness, even the cheap SG style guitar in this video isn't completely terrible, it works well. It's just messy if you want to go in and get modding. Most people are not going to know the difference until they start opening things up. Keep rockin'
I have the latest BB King, the guitar is near perfect in terms of the body, great fret ends. A really nice guitar. But the wiring must have been done by Stevie Wonder. It started playing up after a week and then went back to Epiphone and was repaired a week later it has gone again. So it will be repaired and sold on. It's too frustrating not knowing if it will work each time it's played. I would not expect this on a guitar at this price. A guitar tech said rip it all out and start again. Not a cost worth doing on a new guitar
I'm so sorry to hear that... thanks for sharing. I've not had any problems with Epiphones so far, but it can happen. Such a shame. That's a lovely unique guitar too! It could even be a bit of bad soldering. That can be the cause of so many issues and it's a relatively easy fix. Can you maybe get a second opinion from another guitar tech?
The Stagg guitar's finish looks a lot thicker than the Epiphone's, which may go some way to explaining the difference. That, and the fact that the Stagg is built to a much lower price point. I've owned a few Epiphones, and they've all been decent, gig-quality guitars.
Agreed, I think that's the thing with these guitars. The Stagg is actually a really good guitar overall despite being cheap. It plays brilliantly (I did put in some work, but then it had a neck break that I needed to fix too...!). The pickups are a bit on the dull side. I had high-ish hopes when I opened it up and you can see it was done at some speed to meet a budget which was to be expected... So I was thinking of switching out the electrics for something like the coil splitting in the Epi. I knew the Epi has it and it's really tidy in there. Much like your experience, I've been very happy with my Epiphones. I've also since switched out the pickups in the Stagg and it's made a world of difference. I used inexpensive Fleor pickups and left the pots for now - it's a bit of a cat's cradle to deal with when modding, but not impossible. I'd never heard of Fleor until recently, but they are pretty impressive. I did a quick video of them here if you're interested: czcams.com/video/Hcpis9va_D8/video.htmlsi=rAMuMj5BTM9TTniP
This is an older model... nothing like the new ones...
The quality has gone off the scale since 2020 but before that not so great.
Getting just like their owner, Gibson. This is why I choose Sire guitars.
So far I've had good experiences with Epiphone, and it seems they're going from strength to strength. Epiphone prices at the top end e.g. Adam Jones, Alex Lifeson et al, are reaching all time highs so you would expect nothing less than great quality from those. My latest Gibson has the PCB in the back where everything connects. That can come under fire too - mainly for actually lacking manual intervention - but it is very neat and tidy... and the Gibson sounds great so it's hard for me to complain. I need to try Sire for sure.
Im finding that the quality of most brand is going down while the prices are going up!
Ah, that's a tough one... inflation, cost of materials, labour, more competition etc. It's constantly getting more challenging to make a product at a price point that, not only will your audience accept, but makes sense financially to produce. I just got myself a new Epiphone Les Paul Studio - CTS points, solid tuners, nice weight, nice feel. But yeah, it's not super cheap. I'm lucky that so far I've had good experiences with Epiphone. They seem to be moving more and more into the premium pricing point... we'll have to see if long-term they can keep the quality up.