MixO'Lydian
Junior Member
- Joined
- Dec 25, 2023
- Messages
- 12
- Reaction score
- 15
- Guild Total
- 2
Owner of a 1978 Artist Award and now a 2013 (?) M-75 Aristocrat. I had been looking for one of these for years, but never saw one for sale near me. I could never tell if they were fully holly or chambered, or hollow with a center block. It’s still confusing on this very website. Then suddenly two came up near me, one at a store and one on Craigslist, and after trying both I bought the Craigslist guitar, which was near mint, serial number KSG 1300658.
The guitar has the excellent fit and finish quality typical of a high end Korean made guitar. The nut was extremely well cut and the frets were level and well polished, with some wear on a few below the fifth fret. The downside is like a lot of Asian made instruments it has a thickish poly finish which kind of pools in the corners. Neck is on the thinner side but very comfortable, even though I usually prefer fat necks. I'm here to report yes it's a fully hollow guitar, with a relatively shallow arched spruce top. Interior photos show it has bent sides and a back plate. but it takes some effort to confirm it.
The Franz reproduction pickups are great—basically to me they sound like underwound p-90s, so they are brighter with less output and less midrange, but still have the fatter quality of p-90s. I’m guessing the tone pots are 500K, because I like to have the tone knob backed down a bit.
Changes made:
I took the pick guard off. I don’t like the shape of the stock guard or the fact that it says “guild” on it. II put round headed brass escutcheon pins in the screw holes. I found some knobs very similar to the ones on some of the 1950s M75s yellow Acrylic and I painted the undersides gold. I like these better than the apron knobs irt came with
The pickups on this guitar aren’t height adjustable. The bridge pickup was high enough that I couldn’t lower the action to where I wanted it without the strings hitting the pickup.
I borrowed a gooseneck camera to attach to my phone and took some pictures of the inside. You can see the bracing and the fact that it’s hollow. You can also see that the work is pretty rough.
The back and sides are very thin. The pickups screw into the top braces via four small screws. The factory had installed a spruce shim on the top of the braces to bring the pickup height up. So I carefully chiseled that mostly away, lowering the pickup by 1/8 inch or so. Much better for my purposes, but if you wanted to raise the pickup back up you could put spacers/shims back in.
I replaced the stock floating tune-o-matic bridge with a rosewood bridge, using the same bridge feet. The TOM bridge—the kind with the wire screw retainer—was prone to rattling and buzzing. I kept the two round bridge “feet” and just put the rosewood bridge on, after recutting the slots to match the old bridge. This makes it more inline with the original M-75 Aristocrats. I don’t notice a huge tone difference, but I changed the strings when I did it. It’s strung with flat wounds with a 12 on the top.
It still rattles though, and I think it’s maybe the pickup covers. I have a plan to deal with this next time I change strings
I wanted to make it more like the originals, which had plastic tuner buttons. This guitar came with excellent Grover open back Sta-Tite tuners in gold, so I pried the gold buttons off and replaced them with cream colored plastic buttons. There's a great tutorial on this on the web:
I made the little jig he shows out of some scrap 2x4 and it was easy, the buttons popped off with a little pressure from the claw end of a framing hammer. StewMac sells replacement plastic buttons that press fit on to the Sta-Tites, although I had to press them on with a clamp as he shows in the video. I didn’t add any glue or epoxy—we’ll see if they stay on. I love the way they look.
IMHO this is a fantastic guitar except for the rattling and the pickup height non-adjustment. Also the only way to access the pots and switch, jack etc is through the pickup holes, which is awkward. But you get this unique guitar, a hollow body in the size and shape of an LP. The guitar has a wide range of tones from snappy twang to jazz box blues, and it has the distinctive attack of an archtop without the bulk.
The guitar has the excellent fit and finish quality typical of a high end Korean made guitar. The nut was extremely well cut and the frets were level and well polished, with some wear on a few below the fifth fret. The downside is like a lot of Asian made instruments it has a thickish poly finish which kind of pools in the corners. Neck is on the thinner side but very comfortable, even though I usually prefer fat necks. I'm here to report yes it's a fully hollow guitar, with a relatively shallow arched spruce top. Interior photos show it has bent sides and a back plate. but it takes some effort to confirm it.
The Franz reproduction pickups are great—basically to me they sound like underwound p-90s, so they are brighter with less output and less midrange, but still have the fatter quality of p-90s. I’m guessing the tone pots are 500K, because I like to have the tone knob backed down a bit.
Changes made:
I took the pick guard off. I don’t like the shape of the stock guard or the fact that it says “guild” on it. II put round headed brass escutcheon pins in the screw holes. I found some knobs very similar to the ones on some of the 1950s M75s yellow Acrylic and I painted the undersides gold. I like these better than the apron knobs irt came with
The pickups on this guitar aren’t height adjustable. The bridge pickup was high enough that I couldn’t lower the action to where I wanted it without the strings hitting the pickup.
I borrowed a gooseneck camera to attach to my phone and took some pictures of the inside. You can see the bracing and the fact that it’s hollow. You can also see that the work is pretty rough.
The back and sides are very thin. The pickups screw into the top braces via four small screws. The factory had installed a spruce shim on the top of the braces to bring the pickup height up. So I carefully chiseled that mostly away, lowering the pickup by 1/8 inch or so. Much better for my purposes, but if you wanted to raise the pickup back up you could put spacers/shims back in.
I replaced the stock floating tune-o-matic bridge with a rosewood bridge, using the same bridge feet. The TOM bridge—the kind with the wire screw retainer—was prone to rattling and buzzing. I kept the two round bridge “feet” and just put the rosewood bridge on, after recutting the slots to match the old bridge. This makes it more inline with the original M-75 Aristocrats. I don’t notice a huge tone difference, but I changed the strings when I did it. It’s strung with flat wounds with a 12 on the top.
It still rattles though, and I think it’s maybe the pickup covers. I have a plan to deal with this next time I change strings
I wanted to make it more like the originals, which had plastic tuner buttons. This guitar came with excellent Grover open back Sta-Tite tuners in gold, so I pried the gold buttons off and replaced them with cream colored plastic buttons. There's a great tutorial on this on the web:
I made the little jig he shows out of some scrap 2x4 and it was easy, the buttons popped off with a little pressure from the claw end of a framing hammer. StewMac sells replacement plastic buttons that press fit on to the Sta-Tites, although I had to press them on with a clamp as he shows in the video. I didn’t add any glue or epoxy—we’ll see if they stay on. I love the way they look.
IMHO this is a fantastic guitar except for the rattling and the pickup height non-adjustment. Also the only way to access the pots and switch, jack etc is through the pickup holes, which is awkward. But you get this unique guitar, a hollow body in the size and shape of an LP. The guitar has a wide range of tones from snappy twang to jazz box blues, and it has the distinctive attack of an archtop without the bulk.
