Double Bass Epiphone Upright bass value?

[Mathicus7]

Hello all,

I have an Epiphone upright bass and was wondering if anyone knew how much they are worth and when it was made? I have tried contacting Gibson about it but they do not know. I purchased it from a church back in 1999 for $400. It has been restored with a new nut and bridge and sounds great. Please look at attached photos.

Thanks

 

[Nadav]

Epiphone made an upright?

 

[Marcus Johnson]

Epiphone made lots of DBs. I had a great one for awhile, and let it go (dammit!).

 

[DrDelicious]

That's a beautiful instrument.

 

[Jim Ingraham]

Which model is it... it should have like a B3, B4 or B5 on the brass nameplate. B5's are top of the line are relatively valuable for a laminated bass. I have a B4 which i dearly love.

 

[Mathicus7]

according to the tailpiece it is a b5

 

[Paul Warburton]

This one looks great! Again, if y'all just use the search function, you'll find tons of info on Epis...from their history, models, prices. They, IMO, are the boss laminate bass from the old days. Most sound good and are great fun.
I see you have the etched COLOR full plate machines. Some have an extra turn on the real scrolls. The angle of your pic ture, unfortunately, doesn't show this.
I saw one once owned by an L.A. studio player that had some of the most outrageous maple figure i've EVER seen on any instrument. This one had a great custom ebony fingerboard as well!
I'm real fond of those huge F holes too. You can practically put your whole damn hand in there. Congratulations!

How about a shot of the back?

 

[Jim Ingraham]

according to the tailpiece it is a b5

OK..now look on the bottom of the finger board and there is a number stamped into the wood. Mine is 1841 and i think it is a late 40 early 50s although im not sure. As far as value, you're probably in the 3-4k range.

 

[Mathicus7]

I have looked all over my bass and can not find any numbers. The fingerboard has been reshaped and the numbers might have been removed then.

 

[Jim Ingraham]

On mine they're located right here:

They're on the thin plane of the bottom of the fingerboard that faces the floor. I looked for about 25 years to find them and then someone here explained where to look. You almost need a flashlight to see them as they're stamped into the wood and not very clear.

 

[Mathicus7]

I double checked and there are no numbers at the end of the fingerboard. I think when they reworked my bass they were sanded off. You can see the original finish on the sides but the bottom end is different.

 

[Jim Ingraham]

oh well...bummer.. beautiful looking bass anyway.. how's it sound and play??

 

[alavakian]

Try looking at the bottom of the scroll area.

 

[wpatton11]

There's a whole web site dedicated to Epiphone DBs, here: epiphone
That little beauty in my picture is a late 40s Epi.