PRS 1996 ARTIST GOLD PLATED CUSTOM 24 FRETS GUITAR WITH ORIGINAL LEATHER CASE in Ingleby Barwick, Durham for sale

PLEASE NOTE WE ARE A FRIENDLY MIDDLESBROUGH FAMILY LIVING ON TEESSIDE, ALWAYS AIMING TO HELP. IF IT IS DIFFICULT TO COLLECT, WE CAN SEND THE ITEM BY POST OR COURIER. PRS 1996 ARTIST GOLD PLATED CUSTOM 24 FRETS GUITAR WITH ORIGINAL LEATHER CASE THIS WONDERFUL INSTRUMENT IS THE STRADIVARIUS OF THE GUITAR WORLD. ITS RICH COLOUR MAKES IT STAND OUT AMONGST OTHER GUITARS AND ITS FABULOUS TONES MAKES THE PLAYER AN AMAZING SOUND SELECTOR. SHOULD YOU WANT TO TRY IT YOU WILL BE KNOCKED OVER BY ITS INCREDIBLE VERSATILITY Paul Reed Smith was a guitar player who began building guitars while he was in college. Early guitar players to use his hand-built guitars were Derek St. Holmes (of Ted Nugent's band) and Howard Leese (then with Heart), but Smith's big break came when Carlos Santana began playing the still hand-built guitars, which at the time looked like a Gibson Les Paul with a double cut-away and were made of expensive woods like curly maple. He used the custom as a prototype to raise orders on the road worth nearly $300,000. Smith set up a limited partnership with his wife Barbara and business man Warren Esanu, and set up a factory in Virginia Avenue, Annapolis. Smith produced 20 guitars for the 1985 NAMM Show (those guitars are now known as the "NAMM 20"), and managed to find a niche in the guitar market: the mid-1980s was the time of the Superstrat, and there was little competition for the higher-quality, upscale guitars PRS was building, guitars with "an elegant, modern, vintage-inspired design--the kind of guitar one might have expected Fenders and Gibsons to evolve into". At first there were eight workers taking up one third of the building which they shared with a furniture-stripping shop. After three years PRS had taken over most of the building, with 45 people producing 15 guitars every day, and as time progressed a separate woodshop was added. By 1995 the factory was making 25-30 guitars daily and employed 80 people. In 1996 production moved to a new factory in Stevensville on Kent Island, just across a bridge from Annapolis. By the end of 1998 Prs was producing 700 guitars a month with a staff of 110 people. Construction PRS Custom Materials The bodies of most PRS guitars are crafted of mahogany, with a maple top on most models. They often feature highly figured tops, including flame maple, quilt maple and figured maple creating the effect of tiger stripes. A small number of bodies are made of korina wood. PRS necks are usually made from mahogany, although some models feature maple or Indian or Brazilian rosewood necks; fingerboards are normally made of rosewood. PRS's signature fret markers include the standard birds, and the optional moons (becoming rare nowadays). The moons appear similar to standard dot inlays, but have a crescent more prominent than the rest of the dot. The bird inlays feature nine or ten different birds inlayed with often expensive material. A very small percentage of maple trees cut in North America are actually figured. To make "10-Top" status, a PRS top must have clearly defined figure across its entire top with no "dead" spots. A guitar designated as a 10-Top will usually have a small "10" written on the back of the headstock in the upper right corner. Some earlier guitars have the "10" stamped into the finish in the same position. Hardware Nuts are synthetic and tuners are of PRS's own design, although some models feature Korean-made Kluson-style tuners. PRS guitars feature three original bridge designs: a one-piece pre-intonated stoptail, vibrato, and wrapover tailpiece.The Vibrato was designed with the help of guitar engineer John Mann. It was an update on the classic Fender vibrato and used cam-locking tuners, which offered wide pitch bending with exceptional tuning stability.The pre-intonated stoptail is unique to PRS, however, this design does not allow intonation to be adjusted to compensate for variations in string thickness or drop tuning. The PRS vibrato resembles a vintage Fender Stratocaster unit, and the more recent compensated wrapover tailpiece allows for minimal intonation adjustment. An adjustable wrapover bridge is available as an extra. Pickups Pickups are designed and wound in-house. While most of the pickups are humbuckers, some are actually a pair of single coils wound in opposing directions, one intended for the neck and one for the bridge position. Through the use of a unique rotary pick up selector switch, PRS pickups offer 5 different sounds: a combination of thick humbucking Gibson-like tones, and thinner single-coil Stratocaster-like tones. The Standard Treble and Standard Bass pick ups use magnetic pole pieces in the non-adjustable inner coil, and a rear-placed feeder magnet in order to achieve a more authentic single-coil tone when split by the rotary switch PRS developed pickups for the aggressive rock market, offering pick ups such as the chainsaw, and the HFS (Hot-Fat-Screams) initially used on the Special model. The Vintage Treble and Vintage Bass humbuckers were used on the Classic Electric Model, and a combination of HFS and Vintage bass pick ups were used on the CE maple top models, the Standard, and The Custom models. In 1998 an electronic upgrade kit was released for pre-1993 instruments which included, lighter weight tuner buttons, nickel-plated brass screws for saddles and intonation, a simulated tone control, and a high capacitance hook up wire. WE ALSO HAVE OTHER GUITARS, AMPS, FOOT PEDALS / SWITCHES, CASES AND VARIOUS ACCESSORIES FOR SALE PLUS VARIOUS OTHER HOUSEHOLD ITEMS IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR ANYTHING SPECIFIC PLEASE FEEL FREE TO CONTACT US AND WE MAY BE ABLE TO HELP