This is just another piece in the puzzle I hope the SM-1 that I ordered actually comes.
The writing is definitely on the wall for Kramer. With a manufacturing capability of more than one million guitars per year in factories in Korea, Indonesia, China, and the United. You may be playing an instrument made by the Samick factory and do not know it. is one of the world’s largest producers of musical instruments.
(Traced via the serial number) It is the rarest most valuble guitar I have ever owned. Korean based Samick Musical Instruments Co, Ltd. Two letters six digits The letter indicates the factory code and the next two digits are the last two digits of the year. I have owned and played my Samick (Skulls, Snakes & Swords) guitar for nearly 22 years as I belive it was made in 1985.
I kinda wish the higher end Kramers were made in the Indonesian Samick plant because the equality would have been better and more consistent. Example: Serial number S6031234 is the 1234th guitar built in 1986, 1996 or 2006 at the Samick factory in Korea. This further confirms that Gibson may be getting rid of the Kramer brand. The Hondo professional series was made by Samick in Japan from 1980 to 1983, and the Deluxe Series was made in 1981 in their Korean plant. On hindsight I really should have visited the Korean plant that were making Kramers, but I was just too lazy to make phonecalls. Samick produced models based on the Fender Stratocaster and Gibson Les Paul from 1972 to 1989 for the Hondo guitar company, and they were mainly produced at the Samick factory in Korea. But what you can be certain of is that there are no Kramer guitars being manufactured in Korea anymore but the Indonesian Samick plant is still churning out Kramer guitars. Whether that means the Indonesian factory is making models that used to be made in Korea like the Vintage series I don't know. Kramers are currently still being produced at the Indonesian Samick factory however.
Today, Samick, at its production compound outside Bogor, 90 miles south of Jakarta, produces about 90 of the guitars made in Indonesia under various names including Gibson and Fender models. The guitar is made under Gibson branding with ‘Gibson’ on the truss rod cover. In the early 1990 s Korean manufacturing giant Samick began moving its production base to Indonesia. HowlinWolf wrote:What they told me in my one minute call with them is this: Korean Kramers were being manufactured by another company and not them but that company shut down last year and there are no Korean Kramers being made anymore. A rare to find limited edition Epiphone Telecaster Custom (T310) from 1994, made in the legendary Samick factory in Korea.