1960s Unbranded Japanese Electric Guitar
THE GUITARCHIVE – This crazy cool unbranded, 1960s, Japanese-made electric guitar has been fully refurbished, and it now plays as well or better than any new guitar or reissue. The guitar is small, but with a full scale length. It’s newly set-up with very low action and no buzzing or squeaking. The frets feel great. The bridge is smooth and comfortable for palm muting. And it sounds out of this world good on these original 1960s pickups. Read this guitar’s story below.
More Info
Apparently, when this guitar came to the previous owner, it had been painted with a roller. The guitar was in great structural shape and all original, so he saw it’s potential (and you can’t help but see it’s cool). So, he sanded and smoothed the guitar, then built up a fresh blue base and alternating layers of clear & sparkle finish nitrocellulose. He put on a new neck plate, strap buttons, and various other screws etc. as all the original stuff was rusted. He then cleaned and smoothed the neck with lacquer to make it a smooth neck, very nice. The neck is solid, not laminate as many of these old guitars are.
Next, the guitar came to us. We liked what had been done so far, but it was a long way from being an excellent player, and it had all the potential to be. So, we leveled the fretboard, removed & reseated 3 frets, intensely cleaned electronics, resoldered loose wires & installed a low profile Pure Tone 1/4″ jack, replaced oversized zinc wood screws in pickguard with smaller Fender nickel screws, and fashioned a new string tree for the existing holes. The original tree was long gone. Then, we set it up with 10 gauge strings.
Now the guitar plays great, so we were happy to sell it to an owner that will put it to work.
Specs
- Body Wood: mahogany
- Neck wood: Japanese elm wood
- Finger Board wood: Japanese rosewood
- Bridge: original w/non-adjustable saddles
- Scale Length: 24&11/16″ or (627mm Ibanez artcore)
- Width at the Nut: 1&5/8″
- String height at 12th Fret: 0.070″ & 0.090″
Not Original
- Finish
- Volume Knobs
- Pickguard Screws
- 2 neck screws
- Pure Tone 1/4″ jack
- Handmade string tree
