I’ve heard it said recently, that the new CE’s don’t look or sound as good as the original pre-factory CE-24’s (1988-1994).  I couldn’t agree more.  Pre-Factory CE-24 are among the best playing and sounding guitars that PRS has ever made. Yet, players step right over these naturally aged Alder body vintage pieces to buy their 5th SE or their second S2.  I've heard recently that the newer CE's have SE electronics in them too. Almost every aspect of what made the pre-factory CE’s great has been diluted and designed away since 1995, all while they still call them “Core” guitars today.  This CE-24 was built at a time when PRS made ONLY core guitars. It possesses personal craftsmanship in its build.  No substitutes.  No second or third tier components. No short cuts.

You don’t see this color on a PRS very often.  Neither then, nor now.  I don’t think the color has a specific name but “Fiesta Red” seems about right.  A 1990 model with all the features of the older handmade PRS's, including a short neck heel, a small headstock signature, the one-piece Milcom style tremolo, single set screw (D&G string) PRS locking tuners, original white metal plate HFS/VB pickups and the original design blue wafer mechanical rotary switch.  The neck is SUPER thin and fast.  This guitar was hand made by small group of craftsmen who were on a mission to build a world class guitar company.  The outstanding quality of the pre-factory PRS guitars produced in the first ten years at the Virginia Avenue shop, is the dynamic that built the PRS factory and launched their global brand. 

Here is an overview of the sweeping design changes that took place for the CE-24 model when mass production began at the factory in 1995.

• The wood used for the guitar body was changed from Alder to Mahogany

• The neck heel was extended, impeding access to the upper frets

• The solid block Mil-Com tremolo bridge was redesigned to an assembled unit consisting of five separate pieces

• The mechanical rotary (3 unique versions in the first 10 years) was replaced by a switch with a Printed Circuit board 

• The small headstock decal that identifies the guitar as a vintage original was abandon for a decal of a larger signature

• The individual character of each instrument was homogenized away, by heavily increased automation and mass production

Why These Things Matter:

I’ve bought, sold, owned and gigged hundreds of PRS guitars throughout the past 25 years.  These early CE-24 guitars are perhaps the best performance guitars PRS has ever built.  The combination of body wood, bolt-on design and vintage PRS pickups make pre-factory CE-24 guitars unique in tone and playability. If you want to be heard on stage, these Alder guitars will cut right through the mix, but they can also growl with the best of them when necessary.  The original, mechanical blue wafer rotary switch provides direct connection between the vintage pickups and the output jack.  All guitars that came after 1995 have newly designed rotaries, which utilize a printed circuit board to channel the pickup’s signals. There were three versions of the original rotary which provided unique pickup coil combinations. All rotaries after 1995 are configured exactly the same, while the circuitry subtly suppresses the raw signal from the pickups in a way that the original switches do not. Additionally, the tops on new CE’s (primarily 2016 and up) are cut flat to save wood and to make a less figured piece of wood look more like a ten top. Cosmetic at best, at the cost of diminishing the resonant mass of the instrument.  

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A Word About Vintage Instruments:

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You can tell when you have a true vintage instrument in your hands.  The resonance of the wood which has aged naturally for four decades simply can NOT be duplicated in a new instrument. Retro, Relic, Custom Shop, Re-Issue, Private Stock, Murphy Lab, Master Built, etc. can be built to original spec, but will never replicate the passage of time.  This is a vintage PRS guitar in near-mint condition, which is ready for you to honestly, respectfully and authentically “relic” as you make it your own.  

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