Serial number ordering

[OmniCognateSnr]

Having recently purchased a Special 22 Semi-hollow 10-top I have been searching tinterweb for guitars of the same spec ( mainly to validate the purchase price to try and justify to myself that I got a good deal, because I’m so shallow ). Haven’t found any in the U.K. of the same spec, which makes my shallowness quite happy, and the couple I found in the US are about the same price I paid at the same spec or slightly more expensive, so with import costs my petty self is still quite happy that I, at least wasn’t ripped-off.

However, this search has raised an interesting issue that I don’t entirely understand. I found one guitar in a US dealer that has a serial number the same as mine but ending in ....0069, with a build date of 4th sept 2019. Mine has the same serial number but ending in ...0048, but my build date is 17th Sept 2019.

How come my serial number is lower than a guitar that claims to have been built 2 weeks BEFORE mine? Do I need to call Dr.Who? Is there some kind of temporal anomaly going on here? I suspect the answer is a little more down to Earth, and hopefully doesn’t include the word “fake” ( I bought mine new from a PRS dealer so I think that’s unlikely). Incidentally all the other hand writing and signatures on the PRS card on both mine and the one on-line are identical, so the cards were clearly written by the same person, and signed by the same people.

Are the serial numbers put on at the end of the build or written on the headstock before the guitars are actually assembled ? That would work because they may just pick a neck to mate with a body and have a bunch of necks laying around already numbered.

Anyone know the real answer here?

 

[RickP]

I'm not sure of the exact reason, but I do recall that it's not just random pre-numbered necks. The neck, once mating it to a guitar begins, stays with that instrument from then on. The guitars aren't worked on or finished in serial number order, so I wouldn't be concerned if there is some overlap anomalies between the serial number sequence and the dates of two guitars close to one another in production.

 

[Egads]

It could also be a QC delay. Sometimes a guitar gets put back through sanding, buffing, etc., which could delay an earlier number.

Or, maybe someone really liked yours and held onto a couple weeks.

It's nothing to worry about. It happens. Ask some Private Stock buyers. There are often hundreds finished before others, due to the specific needs/requests for the guitar.

 

[bodia]

Yeah, they’re going to get a serial number early in the process, but it wont actually go onto the guitar until after the finishing process. There could be a hundreds of reasons why guitars don’t get completed in serial number sequence.

 

[vchizzle]

As the others said, maybe yours just went into final assembly later or made an extra trip to buff the finish. Build dates happen somewhere very close to the end of the build process, probably during final setup or qc checks.

 

[alantig]

Some guitars change their serial number to hide their age.