1994-2002 Mandolins are custom order only. begins using one set of serial numbers for guitars & mandolins. Any time after '88 if it was the passive model.įYI, the SLB series was manufactured in Korea. 1976 Serial numbers 259996-260020 were also used. If your memory isn't playing tricks on you, and yours was the active model (SLB2A) as opposed to the passive model (SLB2), then you're looking at a date post '90, as that was the year the active model was introduced. I bought mine new as a first bass when I was 15, so I guess we're looking at 88/89. I have something that is near identical, but rather than XRB it has (had.) SLB2A Electronics (how and why can I still remember that?!) - switchgear is the same as yours. Once located, the serial number offers clues as to when the guitar was manufactured, and the first few digits are especially important, as the numbers. I don't have definitive information that production continued in Japan before '88, but it seems a fair assumption to make in the circumstances. Enter your serial number and we'll look up the date of manufacture using our lightning fast engine. The information I've always had was that Aria didn't start production in Korea until '88. Getting started - Guitar Dater, Decoder and Serial Number Search Lookup Tool Currently, we are working on getting our guitar dater lookup and search tool fleshed out. Well its certainly lacking the 'made in japan' stamp on the scratchplate,no string trees, the neck does slant back, and the neck is painted in the same finish as the the sounds of it Kim Jong-il may have played a part in its construction My money's on yours being a 1987 Korean-built example.

The nearest thing to the XRB in the 1986 Catalogue are the RSB/Straycat models which have a very different flavour - pointy horns, soapbar pickups, die cast bridges, larger dot markers etc. I don't see any string trees, does your headstock have a backwards slant as well? Also, is the neck painted or clear coated? I used to own a Korean-built Magna Series 5 string & it shared several design features with your XRB - notably the 'conventional' pickups, 'bent tin' bridge & the small dot markers.

On models with the year of a serial number, vintage guitar made aria pro ii lawsuit guitars guitarsiteposted by steve. There's also a poor quality 1987 Catalogue Scan here.Īs Jon rightly states, 1987 marks the end of the Matsumoku plant - although precisely when it actually closed seems to be rather elusive (it was ownedby Singer & they were having financial difficulties.) Exactly what got made where in this transitional year is open to debate. The bass, as to navigation jump to search.

The Aria Archive pages imply that these are Korean.

Aria guitar serial number check