1962 Gibson ES-345TDC Cherry, Near Mint, Original Hard, $14,500.00

Gibson’s ES-345TDC is a fantastic guitar and always a great find, more so when it’s a 1962 with PAF humbucking pickups and a great neck. Typically this model has gold parts; this rare variant serial number 87621 was special ordered from Gibson to have factory nickel parts. It’s with great pleasure that we assess the condition of this fine and rare example as near mint all original. Gibson’s gold plating was very thin, so unfortunate when the easily worn plating starts to erode. The gold parts are great but don’t last long and even on very clean guitars you’ll have significant plating wear. This incredible guitar has all of the attributes of a 345 model but with factory nickel parts, simply wonderful. In my opinion this is also a much prettier guitar; it looks like an ES-335 with parallelogram position markers and a Bigsby. In 1962 Gibson was using a deep slightly darker Cherry lacquer finish, this guitar is exactly that and displays very little fading from its original dark factory color. No modifications or repairs, a 100% no issue instrument in near mint all original condition. It has a perfectly straight neck with a working truss rod. No significant fret wear, minor marks on the first five frets treble strings only. All electronics are factory original, all solder joints are factory, all hardware is factory original, this is an unmolested near perfect rarity. The neck is typical of this model this year and is characterized by a wide but fairly thin feel, not as substantial as other solid body models of the same era. This guitar does qualify as near mint but there are a few marks and superficial scratches when one examines it closely. Included with this gorgeous semi hollow is the original Gibson Stereo Varitone instruction sheet, Tune-O-Matic and PAF instructions all packed in the original manila envelope. Also included is the original black large pebble hard shell case with yellow interior. A Gibson 345 is an affordable and undervalued guitar, a great instrument and a great speculation destine to go up in value.