Buying old, vintage Guilds

adorshki

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Of my two '90s Guilds, the saddle to pins spacing is a bit wider, but both have excellent neck angles & tons of remaining saddle, and I've seen many more from this era that sport ideal neck angles - twenty five or so years after leaving the factory.

My '96 D25 fits that category, always strung with factory spec lights, always stored in case and indoors when not in my lap, and has over 1300 hours of playtime on it now.
And 2 complete refrets 'cause I like the feel and height of factory fresh frets.
@ J: When I got mine, neck reset was never specified as a warranteed repair, but I was sure that quality of materials and workmanship would be analyzed on a claim that seemed unreasonably premature, and did see 2 warranty resets performed for that reason during the New Hartford period under Fender ownership.
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That Cordoba would issue a blanket exclusion, rather than reserving the right to make case-by-case determinations, I find disheartening as well.
The Martin 20-year warranty is a relatively recent development, I think. I remember being surprised to hear that it was part of their lifetime warranty a few years back, but have seen reports otherwise since then.
Edit I see TommyM addressed both those concerns, thanks Tommy!.
 
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adorshki

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So like it or not, spend $900 on the right D 25 and be happy for the next however many years. What else is better?
Paying $700.00 brand new and another $400.00 for refrets on a guitar with a warranty (my D25), that one has the pleasure of growing old with for 20 years?
(Sorry, couldn't resist)
 
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MancJonny

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Just a quick (if slightly bitter) reminder to any UK subscribers to LTG.

If you're thinking of buying an old Guild from the US, and the guitar is constructed in part of rosewood (and that's about 90% of them), then forget it. The CITES protocol will mean that the guitar will be stopped dead in its tracks en route.

My recent experience:
http://www.letstalkguild.com/ltg/showthread.php?193503-1975-Guild-G212-new-acquisition

You might just have a chance of successfully taking delivery of a guitar from the US that is maple back and sides / ebony boards and bridge, but that's about it.

You should, however, be able to find something in Blighty, though your choice / options will be much more restricted - not to say expensive - than that of our American cousins!
 

jmascis

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My '96 D25 fits that category, always strung with factory spec lights, always stored in case and indoors when not in my lap, and has over 1300 hours of playtime on it now.
And 2 complete refrets 'cause I like the feel and height of factory fresh frets.
@ J: When I got mine, neck reset was never specified as a warranteed repair, but I was sure that quality of materials and workmanship would be analyzed on a claim that seemed unreasonably premature, and did see 2 warranty resets performed for that reason during the New Hartford period under Fender ownership.
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That Cordoba would issue a blanket exclusion, rather than reserving the right to make case-by-case determinations, I find disheartening as well.
The Martin 20-year warranty is a relatively recent development, I think. I remember being surprised to hear that it was part of their lifetime warranty a few years back, but have seen reports otherwise since then.
Edit I see TommyM addressed both those concerns, thanks Tommy!.

I will paste their entire response to be completely fair. I read this as they won't cover a reset, but maybe you read it differently:

Thank you for your interest in Guild Guitars!



All of our Guild guitars come with a limited lifetime warranty which covers the guitar against any manufacturing defects for the life of the guitar. As long as the problem is a direct result of a manufacturing defect, we should be able to cover any repairs. That said, neck resets are typically not covered under warranty but there's a reason for this.



When an acoustic guitar is made, it is designed and constructed such that the guitar’s string height or action is round about where it should be to ensure a comfortable and buzz-free playing experience. Everything will be fine for a while but, as time goes on, the wood that the guitar is made from alters very slowly. The tension of the strings (which is considerable), over the years, pulls the bridge up and, often, pushes the upper bouts of the soundboard down.



This happens to pretty much all steel string acoustic guitars eventually. How quickly it occurs, and the degree to which the soundboard shifts can vary considerably due to factors like timber variables and environmental variables. So then, the long and short of it, if you’ve got an acoustic that’s worth keeping, chances are it’s going to need a neck set at least once in its life. One of the best things you can do is properly maintain it at the right humidity and to try and extend the life of it!


So I wrote back and told them I meticulously case all my guitars, and gave a hypothetical that even in doing this after 2 years if it needed a reset, would you cover that, and they didn't respond.
Of course we all know and agree strings put tension that might lead to a reset. If it happened 20 years down the road, I get it. But if it happens sooner I think they should have something in place for that, because the only explanation was improper wood if the owner treats the guitar well.
 

jedzep

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Another good reason to tune 'em down and mind your string gauge. I don't have any tuned to standard anymore. Nicer on the paws too.
 

jmascis

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Another good reason to tune 'em down and mind your string gauge. I don't have any tuned to standard anymore. Nicer on the paws too.

Amen.
How do you tune? For years I've tuned a half step flat. It's just a pain when playing with someone in standard. Right now my lone acoustic is so bad I have to tune it down one full step to play it. I like .13, but I've begrudgingly gone to .12s on my acoustic.
 

adorshki

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Just a quick (if slightly bitter) reminder to any UK subscribers to LTG.

If you're thinking of buying an old Guild from the US, and the guitar is constructed in part of rosewood (and that's about 90% of them), then forget it. The CITES protocol will mean that the guitar will be stopped dead in its tracks en route.

My recent experience:
http://www.letstalkguild.com/ltg/showthread.php?193503-1975-Guild-G212-new-acquisition

Jonny I'm pretty sure the real reason was lack of documentation of the source and/or age of the rosewood.

You might just have a chance of successfully taking delivery of a guitar from the US that is maple back and sides / ebony boards and bridge, but that's about it.
Madagascar Ebony was CITES listed in 2011 so it was already under the same restrictions that the remaining unlisted rosewood species just became subject to in January:
https://www.fws.gov/international/plants/current-cites-listings-of-tree-species.html.
They're all "Appendix II" meaning they require an export permit from country of origin and possibly an import certificate issued by the destination country.
From Wikipedia's "CITES" page:
"International trade in specimens of Appendix II species may be authorized by the granting of an export permit or re-export certificate. In practice, many hundreds of thousands of Appendix II animals are traded annually.[16] No import permit is necessary for these species under CITES, although some Parties do require import permits as part of their stricter domestic measures"
The process of obtaining the certificates is where the hurdle really is.
And to be fair we have heard that countries in the EU have stricter import regs than the US.
 
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Neal

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Another good reason to tune 'em down and mind your string gauge. I don't have any tuned to standard anymore. Nicer on the paws too.

I respectfully disagree. Guilds were designed to be tuned to standard pitch. The tops were designed, planed and braced to respond best at standard pitch. IMO, they sound best when tuned to standard pitch.

If, say, 20 years down the road, that means that they need work, and let's say that work involves a $500 neck reset, that is only $25/year, pro-rated over 20 years, to have your guitar sound its very best.

A small price to pay, in my book.

Now, I realize that some people like the sound of dropped tunings and open tunings, and that's fine, too. But I think you should go for the sound you want, and not make tuning decisions based on the "damage" that string tension is doing at standard pitch.
 

adorshki

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I will paste their entire response to be completely fair. I read this as they won't cover a reset, but maybe you read it differently:

Thank you for your interest in Guild Guitars!



All of our Guild guitars come with a limited lifetime warranty which covers the guitar against any manufacturing defects for the life of the guitar. As long as the problem is a direct result of a manufacturing defect, we should be able to cover any repairs. That said, neck resets are typically not covered under warranty but there's a reason for this.


Hi "J", I'll focus on that one word , "typically" as leaving the door open for them to make evaluations on case-by-case basis which has been their norm since at least '08.
I think if they really wanted to exclude resets, period, they'd be very clear about it.
Another factor which may or may not come into play is who evaluates the instrument.
When I got mine, there was a specific list of authorized repair centers who performed evaluations of warranty claims and submitted their findings to Guild, in order to obtain authorization to perform the work on Guild's dollar.
Knowing that Cordoba has contracted at least 2 authorized service centers, I'm willing to bet that system is still in place and will be expanded.
(For balance, I do recall at least one instance when a west coast resident member here was advised to send their guitar to Oxnard for claim evaluation. Understandable when the other 2 locations are on the east coast.)
Of course it's possible the claim could still be denied, but at least you're dealing through a dedicated service provider as opposed to Guild itself.
The assumption is that Guild trusts the evaluations of their Authorized service providers, after all, they have to perform service that will preserve the warranty and not cause other claims related to improper service.
In an ideal world, that's all I'm sayin'.
:friendly_wink:
 
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jedzep

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I generally agree, Neal, however I think there is enough wiggle room to experiment for comfort and tone. For instance, I can hear a drop off in tone when my F20 is slack tuned a full step. It comes back to life with 12's at half step. Though not scientific, it really sings at full step lower with 13's. For me, it's all about the old stiff hands.

A reset is indeed a small price to pay per guitar over time.
 
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Neal

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I generally agree, Neal, however I think there is enough wiggle room to experiment for comfort and tone. For instance, I can hear a drop off in tone when my F20 is slack tuned a full step. It comes back to life with 12's at half step. Though not scientific, it really sings at full step lower with 13's. For me, it's all about the old stiff hands.

A reset is indeed a small price to pay per guitar over time.

I'm hip to that! I have gone to shorter-scale guitars for the most part. Less string tension, easier reach, wider nut.

Too bad there are so few Guilds that fit that description.
 

fronobulax

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This happens to pretty much all steel string acoustic guitars eventually.

We have often debated whether a reset is inevitable. It sounds like Guild believes it is. Thus it makes sense that a reset would most likely to be covered if it were the result of defects in workmanship and materials.
 

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All this talk of expensive neck resets was making me pretty nervous...so I checked the neck angle on my 38 year old F40 just now. Relief is a bit under .010", action is about .090 at the lo E and .070 at the hi E, I've got a little under 1/8" saddle left and a straight-edge laying on the frets runs exactly flush with the top of the bridge. This old gal may still need a reset someday...but not likely in my lifetime. BTW- I can't even remember the last time I made a truss-rod adjustment and this guitar stays in tune better than most of my others. I'm not sure you could ask for any better stability in a guitar neck! Maybe I just got lucky with this one...?
 

Westerly Wood

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All this talk of expensive neck resets was making me pretty nervous...so I checked the neck angle on my 38 year old F40 just now. Relief is a bit under .010", action is about .090 at the lo E and .070 at the hi E, I've got a little under 1/8" saddle left and a straight-edge laying on the frets runs exactly flush with the top of the bridge. This old gal may still need a reset someday...but not likely in my lifetime. BTW- I can't even remember the last time I made a truss-rod adjustment and this guitar stays in tune better than most of my others. I'm not sure you could ask for any better stability in a guitar neck! Maybe I just got lucky with this one...?

I have found most older acoustics will eventually need a neck reset, which is not that expensive at all, especially if you are attached to the guitar. 300-400 bucks depending in most cases. Often, totally worth it. Not that I buy guitars that need a neck reset, but I am just not at all surprised or anxious the day they eventually do.
 

adorshki

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Maybe I just got lucky with this one...?
Doubt it, all 3 of mine are the same way, and lots of reports of 30+ year old guitars here with good neck angle after all the years, even a 12-er.
I really do think it has a lot to do with just stringing 'em up with what they were built for and otherwise treating 'em decently.
Y' know what else I do habitually? I grab 'em at the neck heel when I need to, I never hold 'em by the headstock unless I'm also holding the body of the guitar, just to keep anyunnecessary stress off the neck joint.
But yeah, I think it really will turn out to be a case of "when", not "if", for most of 'em.
 
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Cnivek61

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We don't have enough experience with the new Oxnard Guilds to know when they will need resets, if they will need resets and how difficult they would be. I'd go so far as to speculate that any Oxnard guitar that has needed any work has had it done under warranty at the factory.

With all respect to your luthier, when I was talking to folks in the Mid-Atlantic about getting a Guild neck reset I had a much wider range of responses. The ones who were not interested tended to cite economic factors. They said they did not make as much money resetting Guilds or they didn't want to "work that hard". Some said no problem but wanted some kind of contingency - they were going to exceed the original estimate if certain issues occurred. One did not want to do it unless non-refundable cash was paid up front. If the owner abandoned the instrument and the shop was forced to sell it they did not think they could get the cost of labor back. Finally one person listed all the things that might possibly be a surprise in a reset and said it was not just Guilds that he encountered with those issues. He went to far as to say that anyone who could not deal with those issues regardless of brand, probably ought not to call themselves a luthier.

I am not endorsing or agreeing with all of those opinions but passing them on.

On the more general question, there are differences of opinion as to whether a reset is inevitable or not. There are anecdotes about 5 year old instruments that needed them and 50 year old instruments that have not needed one yet. Anecdotally I think the person who buys a Guild, pays for a reset and then sells it will probably lose money. But the buyer, if they sell, probably will not lose money because they can advertise that the reset has already been done.

Again anecdotally but folks who have a luthier who will reset Guilds would rather buy an instrument at a discount and have their luthier deal with it. Those who don't, spend the effort before the sale to make sure the instrument doesn't need a reset and walk away from those that do.

I'm jumping threads, fronobulax - does this issue apply to 1999 Korean-made DeArmonds, or is it specific to USA Guilds (in other words, inherent in the design or related to variations in build practice)?
 

adorshki

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I'm jumping threads, fronobulax - does this issue apply to 1999 Korean-made DeArmonds, or is it specific to USA Guilds (in other words, inherent in the design or related to variations in build practice)?
Forgive the "butt-insky" but I think the "issues" under discussion are all primarily found in steel-string flattops due to the great mount of stress generated by string tension. There were variations in build practice over time that increased or decreased the difficulty of the reset task.
Electrics in general, have far less tension on the strings and seem to require resets much less frequently than acoustics, although I have seen discussions of archtops needing re-sets here.
Solid bodies are the least likely to need resets, especially bolt-on neck types.
For those it's really just a matter of shimming the neck joint, not very labor-intensive.
A glued neck solid body is also probably less labor intensive than an acoustic.
A final variable there is what kind of glue was used, I don't know what was used in '99 DeArmonds, but generically, if it was actually a "Titebond" type of aliphatic resin woodworking glue, that's supposed to be easier to work with than the hide glue used on all US-built Guild acoustics until New Hartford.
It's supposed to break loose more quickly at a lower temperature than hide glue.
 

Cnivek61

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Forgive the intrusion, I missed the acoustic/electric context or would have refrained. Chalk it up to forum inexperience.
 

kostask

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There are long tenon neck Les Pauls (Gibson) in which it is virtually impossible to do a neck reset. The tenon is part of the neck, and very long, going almost to the neck pickup, with no access. It is true that they don't often need a neck reset, but for those that do, it is a real issue.

Gibson stopped using the long tenon neck in 1969 or so. The neck reset on the shorter tenon necks is still not easy, but much less of a hassle than the long tenon neck Les Pauls.
 
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