Fender LS-20 Acoustic

This guitar was one of very few made. It was hand built by the luthiers that then went to the Guild custom shop. This is a completely hand built guitar using only solid woods. It is fairly lightweight.

The neck is mahogany; the top is spruce, and the sides and back are rosewood. The fretboard is ebony with smallish frets and mother of pearl dot inlays. This guitar features an extremely thin Nitrocellulose lacquer finish that is slightly amber tinted. The body is a dreadnought, although a little smaller compared to the dreadnought standard. The body is bound with 5-ply material and neck is bound with one-ply, as is the headstock. The headstock has an ebony veneer.

The LS-20 uses gold hardware for the Grover Tune-o-Matic tuners. The bridge and nut are made of Tusq (By Graphtec). An ebony endpin is present. The string retainers are ebony inlaid with pearl. The bridge is ebony.

A SKB plastic case is included with the guitar.

The only thing this guitar lacks is a second strap button.

This guitar simply sounds incredible for the price. It blows away any Martins that I have played. It absolutely demolishes the highest end Seagulls. The sound is rich, and could be used for anything from blues to folk to pop, depending on the strings. I'm sure that there are better sounding guitars out there, but I have yet to find any near the Springhill in price!

The craftsmanship on this guitar is great. The only flaw is that due to the thin nature of the finish, the binding seems to have a seam between the body in some places. The rest of the guitar is wonderful. It plays extremely smoothly; you would think that you are not playing an acoustic with thick strings when you play it. Hand craftsmanship really pays off.

The wood in this guitar is beautiful, the best cut of spruce I have seen on an acoustic (and I have seen many).

This guitar's main weakness it its finish: the finish wears and chips very easily, but so is the sacrifice for sound quality and beauty. Other than that, this guitar is built like a tank.

Fender has horrible customer support. They have no 1-800 number and no e-mail. Often it takes 20 or 30 minutes to talk to someone. Pray that you never have to deal with them. Once you get through, however, they give you what you want.

If this guitar were stolen I would most certainly buy it again, if I could find one. These are VERY rare. If you see one of these SNATCH IT UP!! I bought mine at dealer cost; its original MSRP was $1975. The Springhill line of guitars is going to skyrocket in value.

This was Fender's most recent entry into the high end acoustic market before the purchase of Guild Guitars. The LS-20 was produced in Spring Hill Tennessee from 1993 to 1997 by a group of talented and experienced luthiers who mostly make up the Guild Custom Shop today.
Body - medium size solid rosewood with beautiful grain. Depth - medium at 4 1/2 inches. Back Shape - slightly arched to help focus the sound. Top - select quarter sawn solid spruce with nice silking. Body Style - Grand Concert non cutaway Neck - Mahogony with white binding and ebony fretboard Scale Length - 25 1/2 inches Number of Frets - 20 Finish - Custom Vintage Sunburst - Nitrocellulose Lacquer Case - Custom TKL Vintage Tweed with combination lock

This guitar has it all!! This is a very strong and well balanced instrument. The rich sounding rosewood body brings out just enough bass and beefs up the mids to make this instrument the best balanced acoustic I have ever owned. It is very young, being built in early 1997 and the last Spring Hill Acoustic ever produced. I had the good fortune of visiting the shop and play testing several models before choosing this instrument. It is especially suited for finger style playing but has great tone and volume when picked as well. The balance low to high is dead on as well the tuning up and down the neck. I can not find any dead spots or volume/tuning gripes anywhere.

The set-up on the guitar was adequate, however I like to tweak things myself just a little. The action was extremely low and good for light touch. The finish had a couple of minor checks but were repaired by the factory later. The overall quality of the guitar was excellent by construction standards. The finish being old style nitocellulose will age and check with the expansion and contraction of humidity and temperature. I personally like the character it leaves behind in the top.The neck set is perfect and should be more easily adjusted if ever needed, due to the bolted neck joint design. The frets were perfectly ground to a nice medium to flat level. The top bracing is custom tapered.My top started out a little tight, but is rapidly improving with playing time just as a good instument will. This top was designed to hold up for the long haul.
The materials and accessories with this guitar were of the highest quality. These guitars were all hand made by 3-4 expert luthiers. This is a "Custom Shop" instrument in every respect.

This guitar and several other Spring Hills suffered the same early fate. Mine had to be repaired in the first year due to the center seam on the top seperating. This was timestakingly and expertly repaired by the Guild Custom Shop in Nashville under full Fender warranty. I wish this had not happened to my guitar, but the shop did a great repair and it did not effect the sound or playability of this instrument that I can detect. The hardware is tops with gold Grover tuners,Tusq saddle, and real ebony bridge pins.

As stated, I needed warranty work and the guys were fantastic to work with. The instruments came with a limited lifetime warranty and only a half dozen or less are avaliable new that I am aware of.

These guitars were never marketed due to Fender moving into the high end acoustic line through the purchase of Guild Guitars. I have owned 25+ Acoustic guitars for the 12 years I have been playing. I am not an accomplished guitarist(at least not by Nashville standards)however I know tone and having several vintage and high end acoustics with access to many more in Nashville, TN, I have been well pleased with this guitar. I almost sold this guitar twice, just cause I needed some extra money for more gear. I have never been happier that I decided to keep this one each time I play it. I look forward to many years of playing enjoyment from this guitar.
If you are ever in the market to purchase one of these guitars I think you could find a great instrument for a bargain. The demise of the Spring Hill line came when Fender no longer needed to produce high end acoustics due to it's purchase of Guild. Many of the Spring Hills were cleared out at bargain prices to dealers. They represent a terrific investment if you take time to play and listen. There are a few like mine that turned out exceptional. Only 440 of 9 different models were produced. Very rarely one might find one of these on the market, but if you spot one check it out!!