Forum - Banjo Ben Clark

Martin guitar advice

#1

I’m looking at purchasing either a 000-15m or 000-rs1 for my wife.

There is a pretty significant price difference between the two (15m is around 1200; rs1 is 750) and I’m having a hard time justifying the price of the 15m.

BUT…the 15m has all solid mohagany (top, back, sides AND neck), is USA made and has NO pickup (which is a plus for my wife, she is sort of old fashioned and doesn’t want anything electronic inside her guitar.

The RS1 is made in mexico? has some kind of recycled laminate hardened neck material and recycled paper mixed with resin for the bridge. something like that.

anyone with experience on either of these guitars. any thoughts about the body shape/size? I think dreadnought is supposed to be preferred for flatpicking right? but she would like something a bit smaller and more comfortable to handle.

thanks for your thoughts banjoben members!

#2

15M would be my advice and for the reasons/comparisons you listed above. You will get what you pay for.

#3

I hate to drive anyone’s choices as I don’t know if they value dollars more than guitar features (that’s kind of a personal decision). With that said, I bought a 0000-15 for my mother in law. It’s a wonderful guitar. They kind that you sit down to briefly play and the time just slips gets away from you. If you watch the buy and sell at places like the unofficial guitar forum you can get a pretty nice discount off a new guitar. I think I have seen 000-15s for about $900. There was a sloped/slot head version for $850 a few months back (I had a hard time not calling on that one). I don’t have any experience with the 000-RS1, but I suspect it would be a really nice guitar for the money. I will say that if you buy a guitar used and get a good deal, you can typically get the money back out of it should you decide to sell it. Another guitar in that same general family that I think are great buys are the 000-1 (an older model). They have laminated sides but a solid top and back, they sound great, and they can be had for $500 to $600 in good shape (although they don’t pop up on the market that often).

#4

As far as the body size… comfort is certainly a good thing. A 000 is a very comfy guitar shape and size. I take my OM (000 size with long scale length) to picking circles and it does fine. It’s maybe not the optimum guitar for that job, but if she gets good enough to worry about that, I’d say cross that bridge when you get to it.

#5

thanks for the comments. I think i’m going with the 000-15m. she is playing more fingerstyle than flatpicking anyway and so I think the 000 size will be good for her right now. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

#6

I saw this come up today (I have no affiliation with and know nothing about the seller):
theunofficialmartinguitarforum.y … 0f11ahdVBk

It looks like it has some pretty wood on the back. The MMV models are guitar center customs. They are usually pretty good bang for the buck.

#7

Here’s a 12 fret 000-15SM at Gruhn’s for $850. Looks pretty cool to me for the money . Sorry, but I enjoy trying to spend other people’s money.
gruhn.com/photo/AB8919.jpg

#8

BTW, you had previously said that the 000-15M were about $1200. I hadn’t priced them for a while, but while looking I saw the list is $1550. That should put the purchase price at about $950 to $1000 (60% is the lowest I have paid, and 65% is the most I have paid for a new Martin). So it looks like the 00015 wouldn’t be much more than the price you were seeing on the RS model.