The R9 from 2002 is quite an amazing beast and also quite rare as R9's go.The reason being that they basically ran out of quality tops in 2001 (1500 guitars made apparently) so had to shift over to Eastern Maple tops to make only 300 R9's in 2002. And for some reason they all seemed to have amazing sunbursts, which, looking at the pic, you could hardly argue. If there ever was a guitar that warranted it's price tag, it would be this one.
The Cherry burst to the left is also an interesting beast. It's walked out of the Heritage factory, probably because there was an issue with the spraying of the neck as the fret-board had some red flecks of paint on it that I had to remove once I bought it.
Built in 1988 it's quite a rare beast. Heritage H140CMV which in original form should have house some switches for variable sounds from their own pickups.
The guitar came as new from the factory without a nut or holes bored for the bridge nor tail.
I left that job to a pro luthier to ensure everything would match up.Tail and bridge ended up lockable Tone Pros and as I wanted a project for EMG's, I decided to go for a new set of Zakk W EMGs'. To keep the electrics simple and as the 3 switch holes were already drilled, I used the Kerry King EMG overdrive switch in one of them, a phase switch in one and left one as a dummy switch. I then coupled together a couple of 9V's to run the system into 18Vs.
In a way, with the quality of wood in this guitar, it's a bit of a waste to run EMGs. But that's the way it went. The quality of Heritage guitars is fantastic and it's no surprise if you consider it's ex Gibson employees who didn't want to move when they closed down the factory in Kalamazoo.
Neck is fantastic, weight of the guitar reflects the quality and the finish is beautiful. very under rated guitars and they deserve a lot more praise in my opinion.
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