PRS McCarty Question(s)

[TexasFlatpicker]

Hi All,

I'm thinking about a PRS purchase but I'm not all that familiar with them (Fender/Gibsons). I have a chane to but a 1997 McCarty. What would be a fair price? Any gotchas with these? Thanks!

 

[garrett]

The guitar in the picture is a 2002. No gotchas I know of, they're sweet guitars. I'm not much help on price, but I recommend checking the sold listings on eBay or the price guide on Reverb to see what they're reasonably selling for.

 

[TexasFlatpicker]

Interesting. He thinks it's a '97. Probably knows little about them too.

 

[sleary]

It's 2002 according to the Prs serial numbers in the help section.

All I'll say is, if you went over $1700 Canadian dollars , You aren't getting a deal .

 

[AP515]

Range out there right now is $1000 - $1200 for one in very good to excellent condition, no birds, no 10 top.

Great guitar and a steal for that money

 

[Bill SAS 513]

^^^^ ALL OF THIS ^^^^^^^^

 

[gush]

Hi All,

I'm thinking about a PRS purchase but I'm not all that familiar with them (Fender/Gibsons). I have a chane to but a 1997 McCarty. What would be a fair price? Any gotchas with these? Thanks!

I have a 2000 McCarty. I loved the neck pickup but the bridge pickup didn't do it for me. I had put a 5909 in the bridge and that rocked! When i started using it for D and drop C tunings the 5909 was a little weak. It now has M pickups and i will gig with it this way saturday night. hope it sounds great. I love the big fat neck!

 

[Brad737]

The McCarty is a spectacular model. IMHO, the McCarty was a game changer for PRS. They basically changed the way they built guitars, based on advice from Ted McCarty. That seemed to be the seismic shift which finally got Gibson players' attention.

Having said that, this particular guitar looks like it's in pretty nice shape. No gotchas as far as I can see from the photos. I love the Wide-Fat necks on these guitars. If you're not crazy about the pickups, thats a very easy and inexpensive fix. (Some folks think they sound a bit muddy through some amps..) Like our forum brethren have mentioned, it's a 2002, with a non-10 Top, and moon inlays. I agree that $1000 to $1200 is about right.

Oh yeah, one last thing...I'm totally guilty of is looking for guitars with insanely figured tops. While the top on this guitar isn't spectacular, it's still really pretty. It's better than at least half of the original Gibson Flametop Les Pauls from 1958-1960. I'm sure this will sound awesome.

 

[garrett]

I think this is a perfect example of what the McCarty model was originally all about. They were meant to be vintage flavored all around. Mildly flamed tops: the early ones at least used a different type of maple than the other models, forget about 10 top grain. No flashy stuff like bird inlays. Classic finish colors.

I didn't like them at the time because they were TOO vintage for me. But now just looking at that thing makes me want it.

 

[Huggy Love]

I have a mccarty hollow body and it spoiled me to where I can't play my other guitars for more than 10 minutes until I have to put them back in the case. (Mind you they are not PRS)

 

[Goldtop]

I see you're in West Texas; I'm in the panhandle, and I can offer my services if needed. I'll just need said guitar for several months to perform a thorough evaluation...

Goldtop

 

[watelessness]

Everyone should have at least one McCarty...just saying...