NGD: 1964 M-65 Freshman, Full Scale

[rbrcbr]

Howdy everyone!

Saw this one pop up on facebook marketplace last week, not long after giving up on finding one. Funny how that goes, huh.

Total player grade piece, I'll add more photos once I'm home tonight - it has a repaired headstock break, repaired heel break as well, it's missing the truss rod cover, non original knobs, extremely shaved down non original bridge, tuners have been replaced like 3 times just based on the excess of mounting holes, and the headstock overlay appears to have been painted black all over, everywhere but the Guild logo. I hoping that'll buff out with enough elbow grease and the right polish. Thankfully the truss rod is functional and binding is intact. It's quite resonant and I'm stoked that it's full scale. So far it's checking the boxes I'd hoped for with getting a smaller form factor that responds/feels similar to my '62 Starfire III that I can bring along to gigs for alternate tunings.

Overall, it really needs some love. The set up is awful. The extremely low bridge was fully bottomed out, like "thumbwheels not even on the bridge and did not come with the guitar" bottomed out - it appears that it's gonna need a neck reset sooner rather than later. Could use a refret while I'm at it, and I'm curious to see if getting a good heel repair reinforcement is worthwhile while it's out for repair.

This has no binding on the back, so the neck joint is attached the same way as my Starfire, joining along the back of the guitar, which seems to be an especially difficult neck set job for a Guild. Does anyone know if Tom Jacobs has done neck sets on these before?

The other thing that I'm curious about is whether the neck angle could be reset to provide enough bridge height to use a non tension bar bigsby? I know these came from the factory with a poor neck angle to begin with, and am curious if it's possible to correct it so that it sits more like a Starfire with a good neck angle, good bridge height with room for adjustment and enough break angle that I could use a B6 Guildsby. Tempted to throw a pair of vintage DeArmond 2000s in it as well, but that will likely come long down the line as I want to see if I like this pickup enough to hang onto it. It'll be hard to find an original bridge for it, but depending on the bigsby potential, I may just hold out and get a bigsby bridge.

Any thoughts?

Here's a photo with my Starfire:

 

[GGJaguar]

Very cool guitar, congrats!

 

[Boneman]

Happy New Guitar day! Looks fun, and that Starfire is also gorgeous, nice pairing

 

[BradHK]

Welcome! I love M-65s and that one looks great! On the bridge, reach out to Cordoba and buy the metal “feet” that they use on the new Aristocrats with floating bridge. They are much lower profile than that rosewood base and should provide room to lower the bridge. I also think you will love that pickup. I have a Freshman with one and it sounds amazing. Whatever you do, don’t get rid of that pickup as they are difficult to find for sale if you want to bring back to original.

 

[walrus]

Excellent! Congratulations!

walrus

 

[hearth_man]

Very nice! The M-65 with that pickup is a great combination. I bet the mahogany top sounds great. M-65s are such nice players.

 

[rbrcbr]

The action measures 6/64” on the low e 12th fret, and 7/64” on the high e we’ll have to see how it turns out if I can get those bridge cups mentioned above, otherwise I'll have to remove the treble side thumbwheel and see if that works.

Couple more pics:

 

[hearth_man]

I agree. I think the metal base feet may help with getting the action where you want it. My 64 M-65 has them and the action can be set fairly low(assuming no neck issues). That wood base also looks like it may not be fitted as well as it could be to the contours of the top. Which would make sense if it was not original.

 

[hearth_man]

Here is the bridge for the '64 M-65.

 

[SFIV1967]

You can always file some wood away from the bottom of the saddle:



To fit the wooden base perfectly to the guitar top radius:
Fix a strip of sandpaper with low tack tape (not to damage the top) to the top where the bridge needs to be located (you need to intonate the guitar first to see the rough location) and carefully sand the base to achieve the desired radius. Afterwards intonate again when having found the perfect action.

And I always tell people to always adjust the truss rod first before they change the action at the bridge as a truss rod does not adjust action (as some still believe...)
A good simple guideline for Truss rod adjustment is given by Taylor Guitars, see PDF attached.

Ralf

 

[hearth_man]

As Ralf said you can remove some material from the under side of the saddle. In cases where the saddle does not have much thickness it may be better to remove material from the top of the bridge base. I have seen bridge saddles that have cracked when the strings are brought to full tension. If you remove the threaded studs from the bridge base first it very simple to sand the top as it is already flat.

 

[rbrcbr]

Thanks for the insight y'all. I called Guild yesterday but ended up leaving a voicemail - I'm not sure those parts are going to be available since the unpinned bridge is no longer a thing with the modern Aristocrats?

Unfortunately the bridge itself is super thin as is, I don't know that shaving it is the right move. But, if I were to do so, I'd shave the underside of the saddle. The foot already is thin enough that the threaded studs are coming through the underside and marring the finish. But yeah, seems like if I can get my hands on those bridge cups it would help lower the action enough for now.

I'm curious if anyone here ever had a neck set done on an M-65/M-75 and where the final neck angle ended up.

 

[BradHK]

Here is the part number for the gold bridge feet from Cordoba if that helps:

 

[hearth_man]

Thanks for the insight y'all. I called Guild yesterday but ended up leaving a voicemail - I'm not sure those parts are going to be available since the unpinned bridge is no longer a thing with the modern Aristocrats?

Unfortunately the bridge itself is super thin as is, I don't know that shaving it is the right move. But, if I were to do so, I'd shave the underside of the saddle. The foot already is thin enough that the threaded studs are coming through the underside and marring the finish. But yeah, seems like if I can get my hands on those bridge cups it would help lower the action enough for now.

I'm curious if anyone here ever had a neck set done on an M-65/M-75 and where the final neck angle ended up.

The neck angle question is one I've always had for the Guild thin hollow bodied archtops and semi hollow bodied archtops from the 60's. I've have and had had a number of Guild's from that period and they all seem to have a fairly shallow neck angle. I have and have had a number of Guild archtops from the 70's and none of them had that shallow of a neck angle.

Could they all be due to aging or were they built that way to begin with in the 60's?

 

[rbrcbr]

The neck angle question is one I've always had for the Guild thin hollow bodied archtops and semi hollow bodied archtops from the 60's. I've have and had had a number of Guild's from that period and they all seem to have a fairly shallow neck angle. I have and have had a number of Guild archtops from the 70's and none of them had that shallow of a neck angle.

Could they all be due to aging or were they built that way to begin with in the 60's?

My impression just based off the people I've discussed this with is that they came from the factory with an incredibly shallow neck angle. Just one of the things Guild seemingly got wrong. Every Aristocrat I've handled has had this shallow neck angle too. I'm sure the metal cups for feet instead of a tall bridge base means you can get away with lowering the bridge more than you'd usually be able to get away with.

But yeah, even the reissues copied this shallow neck angle.

 

[rbrcbr]

Here is the part number for the gold bridge feet from Cordoba if that helps:

Ah sick, thanks so much dude. That's super helpful.

 

[Walter Broes]

The shallow neck angle on m65's and m75's is designed that way, and there's no disadvantage to it with the original bridge hardware.
Except the one thing : non-tension-bar Bigsby - forget about it, not going to work.

 

[rbrcbr]

I want to preface this by saying that none of what I'm about to say is meant to sound combative or condescending - I know tone can come across weird over text. Just communicating my subjective experience, playing preferences, and how handling guitars for a living has affected my opinion with regards to this. Anyway:

The shallow neck angle on m65's and m75's is designed that way, and there's no disadvantage to it with the original bridge hardware.
Except the one thing : non-tension-bar Bigsby - forget about it, not going to work.

Sure, I don't think that changes the fact that it's a bad design with regards to guitar geometry/potentially the result of a design oversight, but whether it's a disadvantage or not seems to be subjective, right? Every tech/guitar professional I've talked to about these has said "yeah the neck angles were bad straight from the factory". Considering that it was a student model and not intended for serious use, I know longevity was not a concern so straight out of the factory these were likely fine in terms of playability (probably a missed opportunity on Guild's end to have further developed it into a "professional guitar" since it's such a unique design). Generally, none of these companies building guitars in the 50s and 60s could have anticipated these things would survive 60+ years, so we have to give them that. I'd assume that these were probably intended to be an offering alongside the Les Paul and Duo Jets of the era (much less pro level though) just based on the body design, so maybe the low neck angle "design" was an exploration of optimal low action and playability for children that wanted to learn. But even Les Pauls and Duo Jets have a fundamentally taller neck angle, reminiscent of the archtop guitars they were emulating.

Neck angles drift, and you could for sure argue that there is a disadvantage to it in the sense that it needs to corrected sooner rather than later compared to a normal archtop neck angle. This is also means having to lower the pickup even more when setting it up to avoid the strings bottoming out on the pickup casing - adjustability varies from guitar to guitar, and this is all hypothetical but certainly something you have to consider depending on pickup combinations, string size, desired action etc.

Also, functionally, such a shallow neck angle drastically affects resonance right? Less break angle over the bridge means less activation of the top. This means a quieter and less full range acoustic tone. I'd call that a disadvantage. I know for sure that in my experience, every M75 I've ever played feels incredibly plinky and toylike. It's a damn shame because I know for a fact the majority of these could be incredible playing guitars with greater resonance but most people don't want to pay for or deal with a $500-1500 neckset job on a guitar from the 50s or 60s, at least on those that aren't worth all that much. Perhaps it's for the best as it keeps the prices down for guys like us...but I digress.

I'm sure that didn't matter to Guild since it was a student model so this is a moot point, but I'm sure every guitar player that could have fallen in love with one of these may have overlooked it due to how it handled. On the other hand, I'm positive there are numerous people out there that love how these feel due to the design - I'm sure many of y'all here on the forum likely feel this way as is.

I have to reiterate that of course, all of this is subjective, and entirely just the result of my experience handling guitars and how my preferences influence that. I like hollow body guitars because they respond like acoustic guitars - fingerstyle feels right, they push a bit of air are able to resonate more freely than something like a telecaster. But I realize that I'm also not playing rock and roll/blues guitar that benefits from super low action and would enjoy the way one of these feels with such floppy action/resonance.

I spoke with Tom Jacobs yesterday afternoon and had a nice chat about this thing. He did say that considering the hollow nature and simple build of this thing, there's not much for reinforcement with regards to screwing a bigsby into it. Both in terms of screwing a tension bar bigsby into the top, and screwing the bigsby hinge/endpiece into the side of the guitar. Probably for the best to avoid it. He did say that if he were to do the neck set, he would want to correct it to a proper neck angle, so that's likely what I'll have him do once I've got the money together for it.

 

[Walter Broes]

Sure, I don't think that changes the fact that it's a bad design with regards to guitar geometry/potentially the result of a design oversight, but whether it's a disadvantage or not seems to be subjective, right? Every tech/guitar professional I've talked to about these has said "yeah the neck angles were bad straight from the factory". Considering that it was a student model and not intended for serious use, I know longevity was not a concern so straight out of the factory these were likely fine in terms of playability (probably a missed opportunity on Guild's end to have further developed it into a "professional guitar" since it's such a unique design). Generally, none of these companies building guitars in the 50s and 60s could have anticipated these things would survive 60+ years, so we have to give them that. I'd assume that these were probably intended to be an offering alongside the Les Paul and Duo Jets of the era (much less pro level though) just based on the body design, so maybe the low neck angle "design" was an exploration of optimal low action and playability for children that wanted to learn. But even Les Pauls and Duo Jets have a fundamentally taller neck angle, reminiscent of the archtop guitars they were emulating.

Neck angles drift, and you could for sure argue that there is a disadvantage to it in the sense that it needs to corrected sooner rather than later compared to a normal archtop neck angle. This is also means having to lower the pickup even more when setting it up to avoid the strings bottoming out on the pickup casing - adjustability varies from guitar to guitar, and this is all hypothetical but certainly something you have to consider depending on pickup combinations, string size, desired action etc.

Also, functionally, such a shallow neck angle drastically affects resonance right? Less break angle over the bridge means less activation of the top. This means a quieter and less full range acoustic tone. I'd call that a disadvantage. I know for sure that in my experience, every M75 I've ever played feels incredibly plinky and toylike. It's a damn shame because I know for a fact the majority of these could be incredible playing guitars with greater resonance but most people don't want to pay for or deal with a $500-1500 neckset job on a guitar from the 50s or 60s, at least on those that aren't worth all that much. Perhaps it's for the best as it keeps the prices down for guys like us...but I digress.

Well, I beg to differ. Guild (and Gretsch) neck angles being too shallow is a pretty common problem, yes, problem on guitars that have a factory Bigsby. It's pretty common for Starfire III's (or indeed Gretsch 6120's and Tennesseans) to have a neck angle that is too shallow to work properly with a Bigsby B6 or similar. Strung up and tuned to pitch, the strings won't stay put in the bridge saddle because there's hardly any (or no) break angle from the tailpiece to the bridge.
If there's no Bigsby involved though, the guitar plays correctly and the strings say put in the bridge saddle even under heavy strumming.

And the bridge height has a definite effect on sound - and that's where I want to add my two cents : a steep break angle from string to bridge seems like a good idea, but it doesn't always translate into a great sounding guitar. Quite a few vintage Gibson aficionados know this, and purposely look for Les Pauls and 335's with a low-ish neck set/bridge height, because they tend to sound great. It's one of the many things Norlin changed in the 70's - and it's not for the better. There are Norlin 335 type guitars out there with very steep neck sets, very tall bridges, and soundwise....all the charm of a banjo.

guitars with a tailpiece and a tall bridge saddle can have an exaggeratedly agressive attack on the front of the note, so much initial resonance it really cuts into the bloom and sustain of the note that's being plucked. All pick attack and brash upper midrange.

You really notice this on typical 1950's and 1960's German acoustic archtops like Hofners and the many other smaller German makers : an awful lot of them have very tall neck sets and the resulting tall bridges and extreme break angles - and they sound pretty ugly. All brash attack in the front of the note, the pick stroke, and very little anything after. They're great for agressively strummed rhythm that needs to be brash and all upper midrange because it almost functions as a snare or hi-hat in a band setting, but very little else. The ones that have some kind of floating pickup installed are just as bad - not a very attractive or useable sound unplugged OR plugged in.

And yes, hollowbody M75's and M65 sound pretty small and plinky acoustically, but they're not acoustic guitars nor were they designed to be. They tend to sound pretty spectacular plugged in. I just played an acquaintace's 1957 M75 again last week, and when I lifted it out of the case and gave it a strum or two unplugged, I was reminded of how "cigar-box-y" they can be unplugged, but boy....was it ever glorious plugged into an amp. I cursed out loud again, as in "why didn't I get one of these when they were still semi-affordable!?!"

Another thing to keep in mind is that M-75's came out on the heels of Gibson's early "no neck angle" Les Pauls, with the funny trapeze tail with strings that came out from under the bar bridge instead of laying on top of them, making palm muting all but impossible. But now that clever intonated very flat replacement tailpieces for those 52/53 Les Pauls are available, you don't hear anyone complain about how they sound - because they sound great.

About neck angles drifting - it's a very real problem on flattops, but on laminated archtop guitars I'm pretty sure I've seen more guitars with sagging top arches requiring a *taller* bridge over the years as a result than archtops that needed the bridge saddle shaved because the neck angle shifted - the typical Guilds and Gretsches you see with shaved bridge saddles left the factory with an unusually low neck angle - Gretsch is very well known for an almost complete lack of quality control or even luthier skill on a LOT of guitars. Guild wasn't nearly as sloppy, but with neck angles on Starfires there were plenty of misses or near-misses.

 

[Harp Tail]

Congratulations!

I love the finish on both and your Starfire is superb.