Not so happy new gear day, kiesel photomatch gone wrong - FINAL UPDATE: 5-3-16

[Nag]

We should make a sticky thread with a list of all the custom/semi-custom builders we know, and strike out all the names that have proven to be unreliable. The list would end up quite short...

 

[SnowfaLL]

We should make a sticky thread with a list of all the custom/semi-custom builders we know, and strike out all the names that have proven to be unreliable. The list would end up quite short...

It would be 0. Every single builder makes mistakes, no one is perfect.

 

[Five Ten]

I messed around briefly in photoshop. Not sure how accurate the colors are, but I find it interesting that it looks like it's natural to blue and not pale blue to darker blue.

Unfortunately, and I hate agreeing with it, but it looks like they made an honest, albeit poor, attempt at the color. It's not like you asked for blue and got pink. Unfortunately when you get option 50's, custom colors being exactly how you hoped is not covered.

Huge bummer, but it kind of comes with the territory. I know I'd feel let down, but I also wouldn't be expecting them to refund me anything. I likely wouldn't order anything from them again though that's for sure. At least nothing that can't be returned.

 

[Nag]

It would be 0. Every single builder makes mistakes, no one is perfect.

I didn't say "not perfect", I said "unreliable".

Daemoness probably has made a mistake once. He's still incredibly popular because he does stellar work, and he's reliable. And I'm sure he'd stand by his product and correct a mistake if a customer noticed something wrong.

Just as an example. Not every brand would do that. Kiesel just showed us.

 

[laxu]

Yeah that's some shoddy work for sure and very disappointing. I didn't do any photomatching, but did send a Photoshop mockup to Kiesel and the guitar I ended up with looks pretty much exactly as the mockup I supplied. Granted that it's using their standard colors but I asked for dark red mahogany and they definitely delivered on that.

I would not accept that as it's clearly nothing like what you wanted.

 

[Rawkmann]

Add me to the 'Never Again' pile regarding Kiesel/Carvin. I had bad experiences last year with them, received a subpar guitar with fundamental problems, sent it back for repair and they basically just put a metaphorical band-aid on the problems and sent it back. I sold it off (for a loss) and vowed to just stay away from them from then on.

 

[sullyman89]

That is pretty off man. I love my Kiesel/Carvins but I can't deny that's lame on their end

 

[Andromalia]

A color being different from what you expected is not grounds for a factory defect.

Uh, sorry, but if I order a blue guitar and get a yellow one that certainly is going back. It's not like the seller can't tell me he can't do a blue one when I order.

I'm going to have to take a temporary break from the Internet due to the sheer amount of spam attack messages I'm receiving from complete strangers for complaining about this. Are people that brand devoted and brainwashed?

I vote on Carvin employees not reveealing their affiliation trying to bully you. That kind of thing has sadly become commonplace in the internet, with companies hiring "community managers" for that kind of job.

 

[Konstantine]

Kiesel has no intention of resolving this so I would go ahead and do a Chargeback through your bank or cc company depending on who you used. You should be able to get your money back fairly easily.

the problem with that is that the majority of the payment (about 2200 dollars) was done on the initial build and not refunded since it was used for the rebuild, and that payment was sent back in january I think which was months ago now. I wouldn't be able to charge back that would I? I sent an additional payment to cover the extra cost of the photomatch finish recently but that payment was only 300 something odd dollars.

 

[Arkeion]

I think the guitar you received is ugly as fvck, and I'd be pissed if they told me they thought it even remotely looked like the finish you requested.

 

[Konstantine]

I think the side by side comparison illustrates clearly enough that the match was off the mark by a long shot but people are asking for additional pics so here are some from the reverb listing I made...

 

[HeHasTheJazzHands]

It doesn't even look that good, at least in my opinion. I was hoping it would look good even though the finish isn't exact, but it doesn't really look good IMO. The finish looks MUCH better on the Agile.

 

[Konstantine]

I'm going to contact Ricardo at customer service this coming monday afternoon and see if Jeff will take 3 minutes of his time to hear me out.

 

[Nag]

What they should do for custom finishes, color matches etc is just, make a small sample of it, show it to the customer, get it right, and then reproduce it on the guitar. and yeah, if that costs a bit more, charge a bit more, but have a happier customer.

 

[MrWulf]

The light blue in the Agile is much better than this blue in the Kiesel.
Welp. Gonna go with Agile next time if I want anything custom.

 

[mystix]

Sorry to hear about your troubles. What are the specs on this? Looks nice but i don't see how it costs $2400

 

[Konstantine]

Sorry to hear about your troubles. What are the specs on this? Looks nice but i don't see how it costs $2400

per the build sheet that came in the box with it:

7 string passive 969
burl maple top 400
burl headstock 80
luminlays 30
body binding 80
photomatch 300
tone delete 3 way blade 80
painted satin neck 120
clear maple neck/mahog 50 not sure why thats even on the list?
blk sides with blk burst bk 50
stainless steel jb 40
blk hrdw 30
drop logo 20
case 60
7 inline revr 40

adds up to 2349 dollars before taxes, after taxes it came out to 2513 dollars and 43 cents. I got killed, in the sense I paid even more to specifically have the finish match and now I not only got stuck paying a substantial upcharge but paid it for a finish that doesn't match what I asked for, I didn't receive any warnings or contact from them stating they felt they couldnt come close to pulling it off and advise me to try going with something else.

 

[Bdtunn]

If anything refund the colour match and top charge as they were both lack lustre.

 

[Warg Master]

Well, that's disappointing... I have some money wrapped up in a couple of builds with kiesel. ....

 

[mystix]

per the build sheet that came in the box with it:

7 string passive 969
burl maple top 400
burl headstock 80
luminlays 30
body binding 80
photomatch 300
tone delete 3 way blade 80
painted satin neck 120
clear maple neck/mahog 50 not sure why thats even on the list?
blk sides with blk burst bk 50
stainless steel jb 40
blk hrdw 30
drop logo 20
case 60
7 inline revr 40

adds up to 2349 dollars before taxes, after taxes it came out to 2513 dollars and 43 cents. I got killed, in the sense I paid even more to specifically have the finish match and now I not only got stuck paying a substantial upcharge but paid it for a finish that doesn't match what I asked for, I didn't receive any warnings or contact from them stating they felt they couldnt come close to pulling it off and advise me to try going with something else.

That's rough. I'm a big fan of the company and I actually placed an order for an Aries yesterday. Luckily, if I'm not happy with mine I can return it. I'm sorry about what you're going through. There are a lot of fantastic guitars in that price range and I'm sorry that you had to deal with this issue