That is the "buy of the year," and if it isn't gone already.... it should be.I have 2 of them myself (one is for sale since I bought my Hamer Korina Vector,) and I can tell by looking at the body that the serial number probably starts with 98 or 97. I upgraded the p/ups & electronics on both. These excellent playing (better with a fret leveling) korina V's were made by Samick under contract to Epiphone until 1999, when someone else started making them. The wierd look and mis-matched finish color on back of the neck (near headstock) is merely a scarf-jointed neck (it is a maple neck, extremely resonant.) With the new maker the dimensions changed slightly, and the formerly gorgeous graining and finish color of this one (korina veneer, on pieced korina) changed to a yucky sort-of mustardy yellow.
The tuners will need to be upgraded, as one or two on each of mine buzzed loudly in sympathy with the string being played, and imitated a really bad truss-rod vibration (others have reported the same problem).
In fact if I didn't already have my 2, I would snatch this one today, and do the same thing Frank Marino does with his SG's.... remove pickguard & electronics, rout in the middle for a Strat pickup, have custom pickguard made to hold 3 Strat pickups and do the controls just like a Strat (replace the switch with a 5-way Strat switch. Don't laugh, if you haven't heard Frank Marino's guitar tone.... like on his version of Crossroads, Voodoo Chile', Red House etc. etc. Something specially delicious about Strat p'ups on mahogany/korina.
