What year was my Guild Starfire III made?

Hi. I am trying to determine what year my Guild Starfire III was made? It is a U.S.A. Westerly R.I. model in a blonde/natural finish, with serial number AG001417.
(I corrected the serial number)****
Thanks

Guild Guy said:

Hi. I am trying to determine what year my Guild Starfire III was made? It is a U.S.A. Westerly R.I. model in a blonde/natural finish, with serial number AG001472.

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Hello Guild Guy,

Welcome! Not sure if you've made a mistake typing down the model designation or that Guild made a mistake stamping/writing the serial number, but that particular serial number belongs to a Guild Starfire 4.

Is that what you have?

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

Hans- the correct serial number on the Guild Starfire III is AG001417.

Guild Guy said:

Hi. I am trying to determine what year my Guild Starfire III was made? It is a U.S.A. Westerly R.I. model in a blonde/natural finish, with serial number AG001417.
(I corrected the serial number)****
Thanks

Click to expand...

Guild Guy,

You did not answer my question! Even your corrected serial number, #AG001417, is a number for a Starfire 4.

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

Sorry Hans. The guitar is a Starfire III. Thin hollow body with the single Florentine cutaway. Natural/Blonde finish. Maybe somebody at the factory got the stickers mixed-up with a Starfire 4. I just don't know. It's a mystery to me too. I'm just reporting what it says on the sticker inside the f-hole.

Guild Guy, the Starfire III has a single cut-away, where the Starfire IV has a double cut-away. Which one do you have ?

My guitar is a Guild Starfire III. It is a SINGLE cutaway (Florentine). This guitar is NOT a Starfire IV. A member of this forum tells me that my guitar's serial number belongs to a Starfire IV. This has a created a lot of confusion. Either the Westerly factory made a mistake, or some of the Guild reference material is incorrect.

Guild Guy said:

My guitar is a Guild Starfire III. It is a SINGLE cutaway (Florentine). This guitar is NOT a Starfire IV. A member of this forum tells me that my guitar's serial number belongs to a Starfire IV. This has a created a lot of confusion. Either the Westerly factory made a mistake, or some of the Guild reference material is incorrect.

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Hans Moust has the factory information. He wrote the Guild Guitar book, referred to as "the bible".

Guild Guy said:

Sorry Hans. The guitar is a Starfire III. Thin hollow body with the single Florentine cutaway. Natural/Blonde finish. Maybe somebody at the factory got the stickers mixed-up with a Starfire 4. I just don't know. It's a mystery to me too. I'm just reporting what it says on the sticker inside the f-hole.

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OK, that's what I needed to know. No, I don't think that the stickers were mixed up. It's not important what's written on the label; what's important is what's stamped into the back of the headstock!

If the serial number on the back of the headstock is also # AG001417, then there are 2 possibilities for the date of manufacture:

Or the guitar is from 1998 or the guitar is from the year 2000. Show me a photo of the front of the instrument and I should be able to tell you what year it was completed.

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

If you think about it, there are 3 strokes of the pen to make a roman numeral 3 or 4 ( III or IV ) . A sloppy day could get the bottom of the V to not touch and be a bit too straight and it could look like a III.

Guild Guy said:

My guitar is a Guild Starfire III. It is a SINGLE cutaway (Florentine). This guitar is NOT a Starfire IV.
Maybe somebody at the factory got the stickers mixed-up with a Starfire 4. I just don't know. It's a mystery to me too. I'm just reporting what it says on the sticker inside the f-hole.

Click to expand...

hansmoust said:

OK, that's what I needed to know. No, I don't think that the stickers were mixed up. It's not important what's written on the label; what's important is what's stamped into the back of the headstock!
If the serial number on the back of the headstock is also # AG001417, then there are 2 possibilities for the date of manufacture:
Or the guitar is from 1998 or the guitar is from the year 2000. Show me a photo of the front of the instrument and I should be able to tell you what year it was completed.

Click to expand...

Hello Guild Guy,

What you should know about Guild serial numbers is that during that period Guild used a designated group of serial numbers for each individual model. Starfire 4 /IV serial numbers started with AG00xxxx, while the Starfire 3 /III serial numbers started with AG30xxxx.

Since the serial number of your Starfire III starts with AG00xxxx it means that a mistake was made somewhere during the stamping process.

With what I know about the procedure of stamping serial numbers there are 2 possibilities where it could have gone wrong:

1) The guy who stamped the numbers forgot to change the 3rd digit from a 0 to a 3, while going from a batch of Starfire 4s to a batch of Starfire 3s, in which case the serial number should have read AG301417. That serial would date the guitar to 1998.

or

2) While stamping a batch of Starfire 4s, the worker grabbed the next guitar from the rack, not noticing it was a Starfire 3, and erroneously stamped the instrument with the next Starfire 4 number in the line, which was AG001417. If that was the case the guitar was stamped during the year 2000.

Depending on whether the worker noticed his mistake or not, there might be other guitars with the same mistake, but until we come across some others we will not know. In the ‘Guild manufacturing world’ a mistake like that would not mean much. The instrument would be lacquered and by the time it would be completed, the worker in ‘final assembly’ would simply copy the number from the back of the headstock to the label and that would be it. In the ‘Guild fanatics world’ there will be a problem though, because the guitar cannot be dated to an exact year without looking at the guitar itself.

But lucky for us we now have a photo of your guitar …….



…… and from the specs of the guitar I can tell you that it’s a Starfire III from the year 2000.

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

..and with 2 bridge pickups?

krysh said:

..and with 2 bridge pickups?

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No, not necessarely! The 2 / 1 height adjustment screws can be reversed (when turning the mounting ring around) without actually turning the pickup around.

I hope I'm making myself clear!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

I think what Hans is saying is that the Fender HB1 pickups used around 2000 have three holes on either side and can be mounted easily in either direction.

I've had many a Guild from this time period where the adjustment screws weren't "normal".





Hell, my X170T has the neck pickup mounted backwards, though of course I can't say if that was done by someone after it left the plant.

Actually, wouldn't the pickups help to date the guitar? My '98 Guilds have DS1s in them and my 2000s have Fender pickups. Certainly it's a gamble using a replaceable part to date a guitar, but it could be a clue, no?

GAD said:

Actually, wouldn't the pickups help to date the guitar? My '98 Guilds have DS1s in them and my 2000s have Fender pickups. Certainly it's a gamble using a replaceable part to date a guitar, but it could be a clue, no?

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If you go to my earlier post, you will read that the guitar has already been dated by specs; the pickups are just one of them!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

hansmoust said:

Hello Guild Guy,

What you should know about Guild serial numbers is that during that period Guild used a designated group of serial numbers for each individual model. Starfire 4 /IV serial numbers started with AG00xxxx, while the Starfire 3 /III serial numbers started with AG30xxxx.

Since the serial number of your Starfire III starts with AG00xxxx it means that a mistake was made somewhere during the stamping process.

With what I know about the procedure of stamping serial numbers there are 2 possibilities where it could have gone wrong:

1) The guy who stamped the numbers forgot to change the 3rd digit from a 0 to a 3, while going from a batch of Starfire 4s to a batch of Starfire 3s, in which case the serial number should have read AG301417. That serial would date the guitar to 1998.

or

2) While stamping a batch of Starfire 4s, the worker grabbed the next guitar from the rack, not noticing it was a Starfire 3, and erroneously stamped the instrument with the next Starfire 4 number in the line, which was AG001417. If that was the case the guitar was stamped during the year 2000.

Depending on whether the worker noticed his mistake or not, there might be other guitars with the same mistake, but until we come across some others we will not know. In the ‘Guild manufacturing world’ a mistake like that would not mean much. The instrument would be lacquered and by the time it would be completed, the worker in ‘final assembly’ would simply copy the number from the back of the headstock to the label and that would be it. In the ‘Guild fanatics world’ there will be a problem though, because the guitar cannot be dated to an exact year without looking at the guitar itself.

But lucky for us we now have a photo of your guitar …….

…… and from the specs of the guitar I can tell you that it’s a Starfire III from the year 2000.

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

Click to expand...

Pulled out my capnjuan Starfire III. It's number is AG302017 and it is identical to the one above.

Default said:

Pulled out my capnjuan Starfire III. It's number is AG302017 and it is identical to the one above.

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Yes, because they were built just a couple of months apart!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

hansmoust said:

If you go to my earlier post, you will read that the guitar has already been dated by specs; the pickups are just one of them!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl

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Sorry. I'm a writer not a reader. :topsy_turvy:

Really beautiful guitar.