S284 Aviator with EMGs Review

GAD

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I'n on vacation but I'm up because I can't sleep so I figured I'd finish up another review.

Today's pile of words is devoted to the S284 Aviator with EMG pickups. Actually I suppose that should be Aviator S284 as opposed to S284 Aviator, but they're my words and I have the best words and holy crap I need to go to bed.

http://www.gad.net/Blog/2017/08/03/guild-s284-aviator/

Twofer pic!

Guild-1985-S284-TopFullNew.jpg


Guild-S284-Aviator-Blue-TopFull.jpg
 

GAD

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As always feel free to PM me with errors or typos or if you're lonely and just want to talk.
 

Guildadelphia

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Thanks for another in-depth review with great pictures. It's really amazing how deeply Guild got into the whole Super Strat/shredder guitar thing during that era. What's even more amazing is that Brian Setzer was an endorser but instead of having a retro hollowbody archtop variation on a classic Guild design he was actually playing these shred guitars with locking Kahler Vibratos and all manner of high output pu's. I can bare witness to this as I saw him perform live in '86 at the Troc Theater in Philly in support of the "Knife Feels Like Justice" solo record and he actually played a bunch of super strat shredder Guilds including the shredder version of the Bluesbird in pink. Ironically (and not surprisingly) he still sounded like Brian Setzer.....only louder. Who woulda thunk it.
 

GAD

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Thanks! I love Brian Setzer and there's a review of a Setzer Bluesbird coming soon!
 

The Guilds of Grot

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"You may notice is the pics of the Black S284 that the bridge pickup has a bit of an angle to it. I’ve straightened it out since taking these pictures."

Should the "is" be "in"?
 

walrus

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Great review as usual! These are cool guitars!

walrus
 

walrus

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FYI - right above the back of headstock photo - "blood read"...

walrus
 

Telechamp

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Nice review, GAD. These S284's are in the ballpark of my "mystery Guild" shredder (that you all are getting tired of hearing about by now... :wink:)...

K47wrCJ.jpg
 

txbumper57

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AcornHouse

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In the last sentence of the first paragraph of the "Finish" section: "Its possible That Guild did the...."

In the second paragraph on sound, there should be a comma after " having owned over 100 guitars (yikes!)"
 
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Telechamp

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Thanks for the Guild book link, txbumper57 - that was fun scrolling through!

The S282 looks pretty different from mine - I think mine looks closer to the S281..

The S281 is just about the closest I've seen to mine, but it's not exactly the same.. There are subtle differences - mainly the slightly different body shape, and the knob layout. Maybe mine is a variation of the S281? I just don't know...

I couldn't seem to find a pic of the Starling, although I'm still looking..

Here's another pic of mine:

Fu3oAId.jpg
 
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txbumper57

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Now that I see the neck is a bolt on couldn't it be a Detonator I or II with an earlier Headstock? For some reason I thought yours was a Set Neck but it is not.

TX
 

JohnW63

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I would get one of those, if it showed up at a reasonable price. Just a simple no fuss, guitar with nice smooth lines.
 

Default

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I have a black guitar very similar to the one in question, s/n HC101392. It has the same shape and switchplate but it was gutted and the trem and pups were replaced. It had a Kahler Flyer trem on it, but intonation was not possible. I suspect that it had a Mueller trem on it originally and had the Kahler fulcrum added later. It also had emgs that were obviously removed from another guitar. Now it has a couple of virtual vintage strat pup and a Distortion+ in there.
 
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matsickma

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I have an early Detonator with a similar body. It has EMG SSH, Kahler, Vol, Tone and individual toggle switches for each pup and is JH000164 and it has a '86 Liberty plate securing the neck.

I have a cream one like Darryls recent GAS with SN JH000481 in a standard Detonator body and a blue Detonator with EMG SSH, Floyd Rose trem in standard Detonator body and SN000517. Also owned a highend Detonator years ago with EMG HSH pups, Floyd Rose, gold hardware and a standard Detonator body.

The odd ball seems to the use of a Liberator type body on early Detonators.

Hard to know if the neck was stock or swapped along the way.

M
 
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