Italia Maranello Custom

This is to make amends with Italia guitars regarding customer service: read on.

After a month, the guys at Italia did answer and apologized for the delayed response. He did answer the question and clarify the doubt. the plastic control plate model was discontinued in 2005. From then on, the 2 volume, 2 tone pots without the plastic plate is the type in production.

Thanks Italia.

New rating: still relatively low for the US distributor.

This is a Korean, not Italian, made guitar. The year cannot be assessed, because Italia does not provide a serial number on their guitars. something they really should do. These follow the Hagstrom Deluxe shape, a smaller "Les Paul" shape, from the 50's.
This has an alder body, with a flamed maple "top", mine in cherry burst. I would say it has a maple veneer, and not an appropriate top, which has a triple binding. Neck is set-in maple, bound, with triple binding on the headstock, with the Italia "car type" emblem on the black Italia headstock. The rosewood fingerboard is 25" scale with 22 jumbo frets, and block acrylic swirl inlays, and a real bone nut, which is very surprising. The tuners are Italia die-cast sealed.
It has an Italia stop tail with a tune-o-matic bridge.

A 3-way toggle switch and 2 tone, and 2 volume pots with two nickel/silver covered Wilkinson vintage voiced humbuckers.

No accessories included.

I think the maple top claim might be misleading. For all I can see it is a veneered top, just like Epiphones.

I run this guitar through a Peavey Triple XXX, mostly dry, but occasionally use effects. The pup's have an amazing vintage tone with excellent higher output. The neck pup is very warm, and the bridge has very aggressive bite. None of the two become muddy when radically overdriven through the amp. They are AlNiCo V, so they have some hum, but not heard while playing. It has comparable sustain to my two Gibson Les Paul Classics, and have a tone between the relatively dark Gibson tone, and the lack of bass in the Epiphone Les Paul Customs. If compared to Fender Strats, it is a bit bassier, but does not lose any of the highs. My other main guitars are DiPinto Mach IV's, which are a bit brighter than the Italias.

I really really like the tone, volume and overall tonal balance of this guitar. It is in one word, unique.

This guitar came directly to the store from LPD Music, so it is a factory setup. The truss rod was a bit tight, completely straight neck, that I needed to loosen, and the action was extremely low, so I needed to raise the bridge.

The pickups, surprisingly were adequately adjusted.

Routing is flawless with the cavities painted with shielding carbon conductive paint. The fretboard was perfect: not dry or oily. Very well dressed frets, flawless binding, amazing body finish. This has to be the best cherry burst I have ever seen. The red and yellow are just the perfect shades.

Now minuses: the toggle switch was intermittent, and most Korean manufacturers keep using those damned mini pots. I do tech work, so I have a lot of toggle switches, and replaced it immediately, but some one else may have had to get it fixed. Claim warranty or taking it to a tech.

And those damned mini pots. Can we just eliminate them from the face of the Earth??? They always become scratchy even with proper care.

For this to be one of the 2 top models of their Maranello line, I had to invest some work to get it right, the toggle switch should not have passed quality control, setup was a bit iffy, but for the rest of the characteristics evaluated here it was great.

I have played it for the past 3 weeks, live, at home and during rehearsals. It has held well, just like my other Italias. I see no reason why this one has to be any different.

Regardless I always change the buttons for Straplocks, and never gig without a backup.

I didn't want to claim the toggle switch to warranty. I could fix it myself. I have never tried to claim warranty from Italia or LPD Music. I did have to purchase a replacement pickguard for one of my Maranello Classics, and got excellent service from LPD Music and a very good price for it.

Now... If you go to several sites, you will see that there are two versions of the Maranello Custom. One that has 2 volume, and 2 tone pots, the one pictured on the Italia web-site, and another type that has 3 pots, 2 volume, 1 tone, and the jack on a plastic control piece, Maranello name plate on the top of the guitar and an extension plate from the stop tail to the butt of the guitar, which is seen in the LPD website. To be honest the 2nd looks awful.

I wrote Italia to know which is currently in production... this was about a month ago and all I hear are crickets: no answer. When I inquired about the Maranello Speedster, about 3 yrs ago, they were helpful to the extent that they sent me pics of the yet unreleased 2 pup Speedster.

I called LPD Music to inquire which type they had in stock, and the rep who answered my call told me that he thought it was the one with the plastic control plate. I told him that the downloadable catalog had the non-plastic type, he told me that that was an old catalog, to which I replied that it was dated 2006. He responded that he was not aware that there was an '06 Italia Guitars catalog.

Well, thankfully the retailer has the policy that if the guitar you get differs significantly from the guitar pictured on their website, they would refund. The seller received from LPD Music the cleaner, 4 pot model, the one shon in the Italia website, and that was the type I got.

I am a supporter for the underdog. I have been playing for up to 20 years. I own a lot of guitars: Fenders, Gibsons, Epiphones, Gretschs, DiPinto, and obviously Italias. I always gravitate either to the unconventional designs or toward smaller manufacturers. Currently I am using a Fender Toronado GT in puke metallic green Italia Maranello Classics, and a 1 pup Maranello Speedster and DiPinto Mach IV's. I bought this Maranello Custom to add a 2 'bucker, 2 volume, 2 tone model to my current line-up.

I was very happy with Italias before, and in terms of tone, comfort, and value for these guitars is awesome. In these terms the Maranello Custom is great. The scale is so comfortable, as well as the body weight and shape. The tone is just mellow, mellow, mellow, but can bite and be as aggressive as you want.

I think that quality control was a bit off in this particular guitar, something that was not a problem in two guitars I received drop shipped directly from the distributor in US which had factory setups. The toggle switch issue, and the setup, I could deal with, but maybe someone else may have had to claim warranty or pay for repairs. I really wish they would implement serial numbers. The rest of the guitar attributes are great.

I would definitely purchase another one if lost stolen or damaged beyond repair.

It is quite hard to give an overall rating for this category, since some of the problems are minor to me, but may be major for other people. So here it goes... Without those minor problems and customer service of late I would give a 9 or 10.

Regardless I am going to get rid of some of my guitars in my collection. I am definitely going to purchase a Maranello Semi-tone. This other model intrigues me. I'll post review if and when I purchase it.

Remember these are all subjective observations. You should always try out the guitar before purchasing.