'63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Discussion of vintage Jazzmasters, Jaguars, Bass VIs, Electric XIIs and any other offset-waist instruments.
lnwt
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'63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by lnwt » Tue Jan 23, 2018 4:04 am

Hi all,

I'm thinking about purchasing a rather delightful '63 Jazzmaster. But I don't know really how to gauge originality or true value of such a guitar by inspecting it.

Could you take a look at the pics at the link below and let me know what you think? If there are any issues or important considerations about this particular machine, please let me know. I'd love to see what you might expect to pay for it, too.

Here's the album: https://imgur.com/a/BKggb

Cheers,

LNWT
Last edited by lnwt on Tue Jan 23, 2018 4:25 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Axolotl
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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by Axolotl » Tue Jan 23, 2018 4:17 am

In my opinion looks all legit, original and a beautiful example at that. Nice!

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windmill
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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by windmill » Tue Jan 23, 2018 5:02 am

It's a nice looking guitar

cant see any major issues

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Ursa Minor
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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by Ursa Minor » Tue Jan 23, 2018 5:05 am

Looks legit to me. :-*
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Despot
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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by Despot » Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:02 am

What colour is the case? Looks to be grey ... is it a cream case that's been painted/stripped?

Looks good. That's quite clean. By way of comparision, I paid just under 4k euro for my '62, which is quite worn and played in. A '63 in this condition would be north of that now I think - I think the cost of replacing mine if it were ever stolen or destroyed would be around 5k on a good day now.

Something to consider - if you like slightly chunky C profile necks you'll like that Jazzmaster. Every single Strat or Jazzmaster that I've played from '63 has a lovely neck profile - quite a full C shape by about the 4th fret. My own '62 is probably actually a '63 - the neck stamp is december '62 and it came with a cream tolex case. If this one has the same neck profile and sounds like mine ... it'll be a keeper.

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by takeittothemall » Tue Jan 23, 2018 7:37 am

I think if you can get it for less than $5k you’re beating the market.
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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by RandyRandom » Wed Jan 24, 2018 6:56 am

looks very good and legit to me. the only thing i see is -whats that underneath the neckplate? did the screws have been ripped out once? or something got fixed there? or is it just some sort of wear?
:D Gotta love them Offsets :D

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by kracdown » Wed Jan 24, 2018 9:00 am

RandyRandom wrote:
Wed Jan 24, 2018 6:56 am
looks very good and legit to me. the only thing i see is -whats that underneath the neckplate? did the screws have been ripped out once? or something got fixed there? or is it just some sort of wear?
Looks like someone overtightened the neck screws, chipping away finish...

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by TinyBabyBrandon » Wed Jan 24, 2018 11:27 am

For what it's worth 1963 has the best neck profiles across the board for Fenders in my opinion. I have played many, many, many real vintage Fenders from literally every single era, and when I pick up a '63 I usually know it immediately. The profile is nice and chunky without any kind of baseball bat clumsiness. Really a perfect fit for the most part. Of course there are exceptions, but in general they are outstanding. The one caveat to this are Jaguars, for whatever reason. They, in my experience, do not share this profile with the other models. 2 of my all time favorite JM's were both 1963. There's a LPB one that I still dream about that was in the vintage shop I worked at probably 5 years ago that was top, top notch. Recently I visited the shop and a battered sunburst JM was there that I picked up and immediately fell in love with. Year? 1963. We had a bunch of Strats and Teles too from 63 that were so much better than the adjacent years. A Tele Custom comes to mind that was the best neck I've ever felt on a Fender. It's owned, no surprise, by the owner of the shop I worked at. So, yeah, go 1963!

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by RandyRandom » Wed Jan 24, 2018 11:26 pm

kracdown wrote:
Wed Jan 24, 2018 9:00 am
RandyRandom wrote:
Wed Jan 24, 2018 6:56 am
looks very good and legit to me. the only thing i see is -whats that underneath the neckplate? did the screws have been ripped out once? or something got fixed there? or is it just some sort of wear?
Looks like someone overtightened the neck screws, chipping away finish...
but why :wtf: i dont believe they screws were not sitting tight enough at that time period :whistle:
:D Gotta love them Offsets :D

Any other austrians around here?

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by PF_Flyer » Thu Jan 25, 2018 4:44 pm

Not to hijack the thread, but I was at my guitar tech the other day picking up a repair, and he showed me this '65 JM - I believe he said it was a '65 anyway - that a customer had recently brought in, in the original case. The customer (original owner) told my tech that he only played the guitar the first year he bought it - in 1965 - then stored it away..

The tech said it still had the original Fender factory strings on it...

I snapped these cell pics while I was in there.

Image

Image

Image

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by Tree's » Thu Jan 25, 2018 8:29 pm

The tech said it still had the original Fender factory strings on it...
Whether it was done in '65 or by the tech , makes me cringe they strung it wrong :squint:

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by PF_Flyer » Fri Jan 26, 2018 1:42 pm

How so???.. ??? ???

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by dm_cambridge_ma » Fri Jan 26, 2018 5:20 pm

PF_Flyer wrote:
Fri Jan 26, 2018 1:42 pm
How so???.. ??? ???
I'd assume Tree's was referring to the clipped string ends that are visibly sting out the sides instead of being stuffed down the center of the tuner barrel.

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Re: '63 Jazzmaster -- your appraisal, please, OSG

Post by djw » Fri Jan 26, 2018 5:21 pm

You're supposed to stick the end of the string into the post holes that go down toward the back of the headstock -- perpendicular to the direction of the strings -- so that they don't stick out like they do on this one. Usually that means you cut a few inches off the string so you don't have too many winds around the post.

At least, that's how I learned how to string with vintage tuners like this...

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