NGD Blueridge BR 283A

Rayk

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last week I went on a two hour drive to check out a NH F30R it didn't work out tonally for me . The next day I started having thoughts of the BR283A orchestra . I really wanted this guitar a long time back shortly after I bought my BR180A dread in 2014 I believe. Well it got side tracked when Guild came into my life. So I decided that I'm going after it . I have to laugh because I been looking at them for a few weeks now on and off and I almost pulled the trigger one . what held me up is the controversy over the use of Santos rosewood .

I dug into it over a year ago then a few months back and then again last week . You see some dealers claim they used Santos on the 283's since 2010 well Saga musical instruments says nope . Ok now other dealers I met say the same thing but its a more recent change to Santos. so now everyone ( dealer and owners) is on board with the Santos thing. So off to Saga again and its a still nope ! no Santos .

Ok jump ahead to a few days ago, I see my new guitar on Reverb been there a bit as I've viewed it more then once. Its a 2016 and I,m thinking it should be EIR as was before cites kicked in so I bought it ! yes I got a very good price it feels like I stole it actually they were asking 1900.

I ask the shop owner thats not Santos is it ? he said Yup ! Oh for the love of ........ ok well maybe it will impress me but I'm going back to Saga ! SAGA Blocks me LOL no only kidding but they keep tabs on me and I should say this time I went to one of the top dogs and let me tell you not easy to find these guys are ! Yodo chill out !

so end a total of responses is , Santos is not and has not been used on any guitar other the a few small test runs and only on the laminated series. All rosewood is EIR.

The 200 series guitars states premium Tone wood Sagas description have been a tad lacking . so what that means is its a highest grade of Rosewood. OK works for me LOL

I received the guitar last night, played it a second then went to Moms for dinner and I Kept thinking about it . Today I had more time and its pretty darn good so much like my 180A . the 283a sings sustains for like FOREVER ! hahaha no but its really good .

I'm really happy about this guitar after all this time shes finally mine. :)

a demo coming when I get time . a few pics for now.

please excuse typos :)

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Cougar

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I always loved their pickguards, and whoa! abalone up the wazoo on this one! My old sage of a luthier always pitched Blueridge, and I expect for good reason. And now further confirmation - it's pretty hard to please old Ray! Congrats on a beauty!
 

Rayk

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Lol my dread the BR180a sports the same appointments and I loved it from day one . The bridge pins were drilled by a drunk but I refused to return it and the next day my Luthier had it putting on a hand made bridge .
Yes it cost but I don’t reget it at all .
Now it has a sister lol and she performs as well as the dread . I’m pretty dang impressed!
 

ClydeTower

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Congrats Ray! Nerver heard of Santos RW before now... had to look it up. Would you say it sounds like EIR? How about resale value?
Anyways, the grain is beautiful, and the top is pretty too!

Play it in good health!
 

Rayk

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Congrats Ray! Nerver heard of Santos RW before now... had to look it up. Would you say it sounds like EIR? How about resale value?
Anyways, the grain is beautiful, and the top is pretty too!

Play it in good health!

Santos or Par Ferro tone is described as being a cross between Walnut and Mahogany. I’ve not heard one yet well unless mine is Santos lol then it sounds awesome :)

Resale hmmm , I think they hold fairly well but like this guitar you don’t find them. often for sale used .


In comparison my BR180a’s Martin counter part is the D45
The BR183 ( Sitka top ) is Martins 0M42
 
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Rayk

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Congrats on acquiring this beauty. No matter the name on the headstock, as long as it makes you happy. :encouragement:

Enjoy,
Joe

That’s right name is only a thing come sell time .
Blueridge has always been around in background .

It seems they never faltered and just got better over time .

If I were to buy a laminated guitar Blueridge would the first place I go I played a few and they also sound pretty darn good .

I guess in a way there much like Guild in the sense thier a great guitar folks have them but you just see them around every where.

The high end models like this one are rare to find for sale used . I guess either folks give them away for free lol or don’t part with them . Lol
 

Westerly Wood

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i would love one day a high end Blueridge dread. Even a 160 would be sweet.
 

merlin6666

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Apparently from 2004-2008 they used BRW, those were the good ones to look for. I just don't get their headstock design, way too gaudy for me.
 

merlin6666

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Santos or Par Ferro tone is described as being a cross between Walnut and Mahogany. I’ve not heard one yet well unless mine is Santos lol then it sounds awesome

On Wikipedia this wood is described as
The tonal characteristics are said to be between rosewood and ebony, with a slightly "snappier" sound, being "Slightly brighter than Rosewood but with the same depth and warmth".

Michael Bashkin says: “Pau Ferro. I think is a visually appealing wood with carmel colors and can have ink dark ink growth lines. It is easy to obtain in well quarted sets, which is a good thing because flatsawn areas can be unstable. It is a closed pore wood so it is nice to finish and machines well. For tone although is is heavy and looks like a “rosewood” is has a dryer tap tone, and does not have the glassy brilliance of woods like Honduran, Brazilian rosewood or Cocobolo. It would work well for a someone seeking a tone between Rosewood and Mahogany. ”
 
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Rayk

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On Wikipedia this wood is described as

Michael Bashkin says: “Pau Ferro. I think is a visually appealing wood with carmel colors and can have ink dark ink growth lines. It is easy to obtain in well quarted sets, which is a good thing because flatsawn areas can be unstable. It is a closed pore wood so it is nice to finish and machines well. For tone although is is heavy and looks like a “rosewood” is has a dryer tap tone, and does not have the glassy brilliance of woods like Honduran, Brazilian rosewood or Cocobolo. It would work well for a someone seeking a tone between Rosewood and Mahogany. ”

I’ll go with that . All I know for sure is the guitar sounds bloody fantastic . 😁
 

txbumper57

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Congrats Ray, She is a Beauty! Just a tidbit of info on Pau Ferro. Back in the late 80's when Fender decided to make a SRV or Stevie Ray Vaughn signature strat designed after his Famous #1 Strat they had to find a suitable substitute for the Brazilian Rosewood fretboard used on the original late 50's/early 60's Strats like SRV's. The closest they could get to the original Brazilian tone and feel for the fretboard was Pau Ferro. So when you see a SRV strat for sale from the early 90's (which is when they went into production after SRV's death) the fretboards are made out of Pau Ferro on them. Not sure but they may have switched the material on later builds of the same model. It is a great tone wood and from your pictures has a beautiful grain pattern to it on the right cuts of wood. I hope you enjoy your new Blueridge for a long time to come man!

TX
 

Rayk

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Congrats Ray, She is a Beauty! Just a tidbit of info on Pau Ferro. Back in the late 80's when Fender decided to make a SRV or Stevie Ray Vaughn signature strat designed after his Famous #1 Strat they had to find a suitable substitute for the Brazilian Rosewood fretboard used on the original late 50's/early 60's Strats like SRV's. The closest they could get to the original Brazilian tone and feel for the fretboard was Pau Ferro. So when you see a SRV strat for sale from the early 90's (which is when they went into production after SRV's death) the fretboards are made out of Pau Ferro on them. Not sure but they may have switched the material on later builds of the same model. It is a great tone wood and from your pictures has a beautiful grain pattern to it on the right cuts of wood. I hope you enjoy your new Blueridge for a long time to come man!

TX

Thanks Tx hope your well .
Folks outside of Saga/Blueridge say it’s Pau Ferro,
Saga themselves swear it’s East Indian Rosewood.

Saga/Blueridge has not had any stock on this models for a good while they wait for the new models which is clearly stated as Pau Ferro . 🙂
 

Westerly Wood

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looks like an adi top too, i bet it was loud and warm. really a great guitar.
 

Rayk

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looks like an adi top too, i bet it was loud and warm. really a great guitar.

It’s is Adirondack it can get loud but I just use my fingers lol

I have it tuned to a F# something haha . I was wondering about the action height after reading a recent post in the acoustic section and I was surprised the action was at .060 on both E’s .

There’s no buzzing unless I pluck it hard .

It seems every new guitar gets it own special new song written on it for a demo and I just finished this ones . I just need record it when I can get neighborhood and my son to quiet down lol .
 

dreadnut

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My entire main floor is 3/4" thick slabs of Santos Mahogany. The installation of this floor definitely improved the acoustics.
 

Rayk

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My entire main floor is 3/4" thick slabs of Santos Mahogany. The installation of this floor definitely improved the acoustics.

Oh yes the Santos Mahogany has been a curiosity :)
Now I just wish I had a career that would allow me the opportunity to have such cool builds :)
 
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last week I went on a two hour drive to check out a NH F30R it didn't work out tonally for me . The next day I started having thoughts of the BR283A orchestra . I really wanted this guitar a long time back shortly after I bought my BR180A dread in 2014 I believe. Well it got side tracked when Guild came into my life. So I decided that I'm going after it . I have to laugh because I been looking at them for a few weeks now on and off and I almost pulled the trigger one . what held me up is the controversy over the use of Santos rosewood .

I dug into it over a year ago then a few months back and then again last week . You see some dealers claim they used Santos on the 283's since 2010 well Saga musical instruments says nope . Ok now other dealers I met say the same thing but its a more recent change to Santos. so now everyone ( dealer and owners) is on board with the Santos thing. So off to Saga again and its a still nope ! no Santos .

Ok jump ahead to a few days ago, I see my new guitar on Reverb been there a bit as I've viewed it more then once. Its a 2016 and I,m thinking it should be EIR as was before cites kicked in so I bought it ! yes I got a very good price it feels like I stole it actually they were asking 1900.

I ask the shop owner thats not Santos is it ? he said Yup ! Oh for the love of ........ ok well maybe it will impress me but I'm going back to Saga ! SAGA Blocks me LOL no only kidding but they keep tabs on me and I should say this time I went to one of the top dogs and let me tell you not easy to find these guys are ! Yodo chill out !

so end a total of responses is , Santos is not and has not been used on any guitar other the a few small test runs and only on the laminated series. All rosewood is EIR.

The 200 series guitars states premium Tone wood Sagas description have been a tad lacking . so what that means is its a highest grade of Rosewood. OK works for me LOL

I received the guitar last night, played it a second then went to Moms for dinner and I Kept thinking about it . Today I had more time and its pretty darn good so much like my 180A . the 283a sings sustains for like FOREVER ! hahaha no but its really good .

I'm really happy about this guitar after all this time shes finally mine. :)

a demo coming when I get time . a few pics for now.

please excuse typos :)

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Dealers who say that the BR-283A would have been made from Santos / Pao Ferro (literally: Ironwood) since 2010 are DEAD WRONG. Deales only have third hand information. Even the distributors don't get the complete and correct and reliable information from Saga. As a matter of fact Saga/Blueridge has been using certified old stock (pre 1992) Brazilian Rosewood for some time. Demo's of these guitars are on youtube.
When they ran out of Brazilian rosewood, they switched to what Saga called "African Rosewood", not explicitly mentioning the name of the COUNTRY in Africa, the wood came from. They didn't even tell their distributors. They kept it vague. I have such a guitar and I suspect that it's Madagascar Rosewood. That wood was also used on the Martin D-28M Mamas and the Papas Limited Edition.
Martin D-28M Mamas and the Papas Ltd. Ed. played by Erwin van Lighten

It's much darker than Pao Ferro. The list price of these African Rosewood guitars was €3095.-
There wasn't a NEED to switch to Pao Ferro before January 2017, when new CITES rules kicked in.
The Pao Ferro version of the BR-283A has a list price of only €2495.-, so it has become €600.- CHEAPER than it's predecessor. You can imagine that my guitar WAS difficult to sell internationally, because it came WITHOUT the CITES papers from 2017, because it was NOS from the 2014-2016 era. Now that there are NEW CITES rules for musical instruments and their parts, it's totally legal to sell it internationally again WITHOUT any papers, which have become totally redundant.
 
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