What makes a guitar "vintage"?

[Phizix]

[frankpaush]

[cheepaxes]

OK, here's my 2 cents...

The term vintage comes from wine making and refers to the year the wine was made and bottled. You might say the vintage of a given bottle of wine is 1993. Obviously people also use the term for other things with the implication that that thing is both old and good (like wine?).

So a literal definition of "vintage" requires that you be talking about wine. A less literal definition means that *something* was made *sometime* in the past. The most common usage today is that a thing is relatively old and probably better than something made today. How old does it have to be to meet this last definition? It changes. When I first got interested in "vintage" guitars and amps a Fender guitar had to be pre-CBS and an amp had to be blackface. Then guitars had to be pre-1970 and amps could be silverface but had to be pre-pull boost. Now people are paying crazy money for "vintage" big headstock '70s guitars and pretty much anything silverface is considered old enouh and good enough to be considered valuable.

-Scott

[mrblanche]

[jedistar]

[guitarjunky.ca]

I have played guitars from the 40's, 50's, 60's and the 70's and I must say that some had mojo that you could not find in any new guitar... Time brings something to the instrument that is hard to describe but that you feel when you get your hands on an old instrument... There is something romantic about it...

As for what is vintage, serious collectors will say that anything after 1970 is not vintage... It's used...

However strats and teles from the early 70's are rising in price now...