Playing in a little used Guild JF30-12?

[maxr]

I'm picking up a Westerley R.I. built (per the label), blonde '93 JF30-12 next week, once the store sets it up the way I'd like. This guitar feels like the previous owner bought it new, kept it in the house and hardly played it - no pickup, original bridge pins, no marks that I can see (even on the scratch plate), very little fret wear, and a dusty but pretty much unworn Guild case. Back and neck are medium flame maple, sides are figured but not flamed maple with interior reinforcement. The back appears to have the outer and inner laminations carefully position matched, as discussed in another thread here. It's done well enough that the shop thought it was solid wood - that seems unlikely 'cos it's steam pressed by the shape of it, with no back struts. Neck angle seems pretty good, with a straight edge coming just above the bridge top treble/ just on it bass, and I can't see any belly or bridge lifting.

Playing it has things in common with a Guild D-style 6 string I had when new in '83. It has a great basic sound, but it's really tight, like either it was never played in, or hasn't been played for enough time that it's sulking. When I bought the D 6 string, informal advice from a well known guitar shop was "Fit the heaviest strings it's happy with and beat the s*** out of it for about a year, man" - that worked. Would you do that with a 12? I'm tuning it DADGAD, and they'll fit 12-54s unless I suggest otherwise. Any recommendations on playing in to loosen it up would be appreciated.

Also, the thick fingerboard could be rosewood or maybe stripey ebony - fairly wide straight almost black and dark brown streaks running the length of the board. Which do you think more likely?

Thanks, Max

 

[GGJaguar]

Just set it up as you normally would do to your liking (action, strings, etc) and then play it. A lot.

 

[wileypickett]

Welcome! A Westerly JF30-12 was my first Guild, my "gateway drug," so to speak. Great guitars!

I use D'Addario Medium / Heavys on mine but I tune WAY WAY down, and only play in open tunings. The guitar sounds great in lower tunings, IMO.

I believe that at the time these guitars were built, most guitar makers were dyeing any streaked ebony so it looked uniform. For that reason I suspect your fretboard is rosewood, not ebony. (Mine is rosewood.) Guild typically saved ebony for their top-of-the-line gutars.

We love pics BTW!

 

[Cougar]

I'm picking up a Westerley R.I. built (per the label), blonde '93 JF30-12 next week

Major congrats! JF30-12 was my first Guild, too, and I absolutely love it. Mine was built in Corona and has a gorgeous ebony fretboard. I'm not sure if the Corona-builts are the only ones with ebony fretboards or not. I also had a WoodGrain Blue JF30-12 out of Westerly, rosewood fretboard, but it just couldn't compete with my Corona, so I unloaded it.

...informal advice from a well known guitar shop was "Fit the heaviest strings it's happy with and beat the s*** out of it for about a year, man" - that worked. Would you do that with a 12?

I only run 10s on all my 12ers, tuned to concert pitch. A reasonably stiff pick will make 'em sing!

 

[adorshki]

Back and neck are medium flame maple, sides are figured but not flamed maple with interior reinforcement. The back appears to have the outer and inner laminations carefully position matched, as discussed in another thread here. It's done well enough that the shop thought it was solid wood - that seems unlikely 'cos it's steam pressed by the shape of it, with no back struts.

Hi, welcome aboard Max. Yep definitely laminated. Except for Artist Awards (and maybe other jazz guitars at times) all the Guild arched backs (and a lot of the arched tops) are laminated. In fact the press that pressed that back is still in use in Oxnard.

When I bought the D 6 string, informal advice from a well known guitar shop was "Fit the heaviest strings it's happy with and beat the s***
Would you do that with a 12? I'm tuning it DADGAD, and they'll fit 12-54s unless I suggest otherwise. Any recommendations on playing in to loosen it up would be appreciated.

I wouldn't go 12-54 on a 12 unless it was gonna be tuned down at least a whole step. They were designed and shipped with .010-.047's and DADGAD wouldn't reduce total set tension enough to use mediums.

While there are members here who've run mediums and even heavies on their 12's for years with no problems, I wouldn't recommend it for that vintage. Since Guild designed and braced the tops for the strings they were gonna run, it's possible mediums will put too much preload on the top and not let it resonate to its full potential.

Final benefit is that you'll prolong the life of the neck-set significantly by using spec tension strings.

Playing time is absolutely the way to open 'er up. My 3 Guilds built between '96 and '04 all took around 200 hours.

Also, the thick fingerboard could be rosewood or maybe stripey ebony - fairly wide straight almost black and dark brown streaks running the length of the board. Which do you think more likely?

It's rosewood, per '92 catalog:

 

[Cougar]

I wouldn't go 12-54 on a 12 unless it was gonna be tuned down at least a whole step. They were designed and shipped with .010-.047's and DADGAD wouldn't reduce total set tension enough to use mediums.

I wasn't sure whether to recommend against putting 12-54s on her, so I'm glad you did!