Trying to date an s-100 i ordered back in the 90's

ianb

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new guy here - hope it's okay to post this question here..

so, back in the mid 90's i ordered am s-100 from guild through my local dealer and i can't for the life of me remember what year it was. i toured with,loved and just generally played the snot out of that guitar up through college where i had to sell it to buy electricity,ramen and potatoes :)

now,if at all possible, i would like to hunt down another just like it and have yet to see another guitar with the same set of features and was hoping you fine, all knowing guildites could help narrowing it down to a year (or 2).
to the best of my recollection it was somewhere between 94 and 97 when i ordered it and when it showed up it had the following (as far as i can remember):

rounded fingerboard butt
exposed coil duncans
phase reversal switch
fitted case with guild logo
natural finish
standard tuneomatic without the big knurled dials

having scoured reverb and ebay and gbase and whatnot, it seems that the rounded fingerboard end and natural finish are mutually exclusive outside of the 70's guitars (which i don't dig due to neck shape).there wasn't an upcharge for the finish when i ordered it (that i remember) but i have yet to find a year model with those combination of features. it took roughly 8 weeks for me to get the guitar, is it possible it was built to order with whatever parts were on hand or was it just a short lived combination?

love the community you guys have here - seems like a nice friendly place.
 

hansmoust

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so, back in the mid 90's i ordered am s-100 from guild through my local dealer and i can't for the life of me remember what year it was.
to the best of my recollection it was somewhere between 94 and 97 when i ordered it

Hello ianb,

Welcome! Must have been '95 or '96.

Good luck in your search!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl
 
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adorshki

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having scoured reverb and ebay and gbase and whatnot, it seems that the rounded fingerboard end and natural finish are mutually exclusive outside of the 70's guitars (which i don't dig due to neck shape).there wasn't an upcharge for the finish when i ordered it (that i remember) but i have yet to find a year model with those combination of features. it took roughly 8 weeks for me to get the guitar, is it possible it was built to order with whatever parts were on hand or was it just a short lived combination?
Hi Ian, welcome aboard!
Well, in case you haven't realized it yet, Hans is our most reliable source for that kind of info, and I had to laugh when I read his answer.
Normally if you had an s/n he'd be able to nail it down.
Given that it took 8 weeks I suspect a likely scenario is that yes you were waiting until they made another "run" of them to get the exact finish you wanted.
The '97 catalog says "Natural" was a standard color for S-100's, and that they came with rosewood pickups... (One of my favorite catalog glitches, LOL!)
We've also seen many examples of spec variations on Guilds, as well as replaced pickups in particular, so your frustrations may be due to those factors.
The '96 catalog pictures an S-100 with the rounded-end fretboard, the '97 shows the squared-off type, but those catalog pics can be a couple of years old.

love the community you guys have here - seems like a nice friendly place.

Lotta S100 love around here too, likely some other folks'll chime in with advice.
 

ianb

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Hi Ian, welcome aboard!
Well, in case you haven't realized it yet, Hans is our most reliable source for that kind of info, and I had to laugh when I read his answer.
Normally if you had an s/n he'd be able to nail it down.
Given that it took 8 weeks I suspect a likely scenario is that yes you were waiting until they made another "run" of them to get the exact finish you wanted.
The '97 catalog says "Natural" was a standard color for S-100's, and that they came with rosewood pickups... (One of my favorite catalog glitches, LOL!)
We've also seen many examples of spec variations on Guilds, as well as replaced pickups in particular, so your frustrations may be due to those factors.
The '96 catalog pictures an S-100 with the rounded-end fretboard, the '97 shows the squared-off type, but those catalog pics can be a couple of years old.



Lotta S100 love around here too, likely some other folks'll chime in with advice.


Hey Adorshki!!!
Thank you so much for the info (hahaha,rosewood pickups...)- i was doing math in my head the other night trying to figure it out (i got married then,played this show then,had it there...) and narrowed it down to that range and i think with yours and hans' info, i had to have ordered it in February/march of 96. i'm guessing by the distinct lack of natural s100s i'm seeing it must not have been a popular color.

The fretboard thing took me a couple of days of looking at them to catch. i kept looking at them and subconciously thinking mine looked different somewhere around the neck pickup and then it dawned on me "oh,crap!! the end of the fretboard is squared off!!!"
any idea if anything else changed with the necks between the round and square variations or was it a production speed thing?

Thanks again for the warm welcome and info!!!
 

adorshki

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any idea if anything else changed with the necks between the round and square variations or was it a production speed thing?
I'm not as much into the electrics as I am acoustics but I can't remember any comments about neck changes on 'em, so I suspect it was just a little detail that saved 'em some time on the fretboards, not having to radius the ends.
I'm with you though, I like the rounded look better.
Something that surprises a lot of folks though is the amount of variation in neck profiles. In Westerly every single neck was given final shaping by hand on a spindle/belt sander.
So while they may be "close", no 2 necks are identical as they would be if the shaping were done with NC machines.
Just a way of letting you know that if you don't like the neck on a given instrument, don't write 'em all off.
I think (Late Westerly) S-100 necks tended to be on the skinny side but we get lots of reports of Bluesbird necks being fat, so they may have tried to give certain profiles to certain models as well.
Thanks again for the warm welcome and info!!!

's what we do, 'round here.
:friendly_wink:
 

ianb

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I'm not as much into the electrics as I am acoustics but I can't remember any comments about neck changes on 'em, so I suspect it was just a little detail that saved 'em some time on the fretboards, not having to radius the ends.
I'm with you though, I like the rounded look better.
Something that surprises a lot of folks though is the amount of variation in neck profiles. In Westerly every single neck was given final shaping by hand on a spindle/belt sander.
So while they may be "close", no 2 necks are identical as they would be if the shaping were done with NC machines.
Just a way of letting you know that if you don't like the neck on a given instrument, don't write 'em all off.
I think (Late Westerly) S-100 necks tended to be on the skinny side but we get lots of reports of Bluesbird necks being fat, so they may have tried to give certain profiles to certain models as well.


's what we do, 'round here.
:friendly_wink:

aaaah - i figured as much on the radius.probably saved em a fair amount of time shaping and scraping binding as well. i've played a couple of bluesbirds and they all just felt like a better built,modern necked les paul sort of affair..

it's funny you should mention the acoustics - i apprenticed under an amp guy at a vintage store and so luckily got to have a bunch of vintage guitars in my hands over the years (the electric guilds invariably got treated like red headed step children compared to a nice d-35 or what ever was in the store at the time for some reason ) and I do like some gibson necks but all the westerly guilds i've ever played just felt right to me.

some of the 70's guitars were a bit on the skinny side but they were all playable and fast (i've been kicking myself for years over a particularly good 73 d25 i passed on due to a lifted bridge......) but,being mostly acquainted with the pre 80's models i wasn't sure how the later reissue solidbody necks varied (as i've only played 3 of the 90's s-100's and they were all really close) so, once again, thanks for the info :)

i actually picked up a westerly sf-3 the other day for a steal (should be here in a few days) and felt safe enough with their necks to buy it without playing it first.i guess the danger of trying to hunt down a specific model on the daily is all the OTHER models you run across. looks like i'll be sticking around these parts for a while.
 

S100

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I don’t know if this helps, but my 2 (what I believe are) ‘96s both have the squared off fretboard.
 

ianb

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I don’t know if this helps, but my 2 (what I believe are) ‘96s both have the squared off fretboard.

really???
wonder if they changed mid year or something?
thanks for the input!!
 

ianb

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Hans,
i guess it's more interest than anything else. i actually talked to the guy that ordered the guitar for me last week (he was the guild contact guy for the store it was ordered though that has since folded) and he had some interesting input into things. He said that for the first couple of years they were set up with guild that when they would call to order things, that he got the impression they were making things up in batches and they just sort of sat on a shelf waiting to be finished and ordered.
He thought that my guitar was one of these that was already made up and suggested that it could have been made as early as 94 or 95 as the other guitars they were receiving at that time (and particularly in that shipment)were a couple of years behind when compared with their dealer catalogs. he also mentioned that the hardshells,pickups and various small finishing pieces varied pretty wildly from guitar to guitar between shipments until the big f took over..
i guess i had an image in mind of guild being a bigger operation than what they were in reality and hearing about timeline oddities in their output is just fascinating.
 

hansmoust

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Hans,
i guess it's more interest than anything else. i actually talked to the guy that ordered the guitar for me last week (he was the guild contact guy for the store it was ordered though that has since folded) and he had some interesting input into things. He said that for the first couple of years they were set up with guild that when they would call to order things, that he got the impression they were making things up in batches and they just sort of sat on a shelf waiting to be finished and ordered.
He thought that my guitar was one of these that was already made up and suggested that it could have been made as early as 94 or 95 as the other guitars they were receiving at that time (and particularly in that shipment)were a couple of years behind when compared with their dealer catalogs. he also mentioned that the hardshells,pickups and various small finishing pieces varied pretty wildly from guitar to guitar between shipments until the big f took over..
i guess i had an image in mind of guild being a bigger operation than what they were in reality and hearing about timeline oddities in their output is just fascinating.

Hello ianb,

Your source of information is partly right, but not entirely. I understand that you're a fairly new member, so here's a little write up that I posted many years ago and that most members have seen before:

Guild guitars were made in batches of 6, 12 or 24 etc. From a manufacturing standpoint it was easier to make them in batches because of the change of tooling necessary to produce the different models. When the superstructures were completed they were serial numbered, which took place in the 'finishing' dept. After that the finish was applied and the guitars were hung to dry. After sufficient drying they would be buffed and placed in racks, where they would stay till an order came in. Obviously, if they started production they already had orders, but not always for the complete batch. Only the guitars they had orders for (plus the guitars that could be put in inventory because they were ordered on a regular basis) would be taken to 'final assembly', where the superstructure would get all the necessary parts to become a musical instrument and where it would be set up. Now the order in which they were taken from the racks was random, so it was possible for a higher serial number to come through 'final assembly' before a lower number. A lower serial number could stay on the racks for a very long time while a later serial number would already be hanging on a dealer's wall. I have several instruments in my collection that have serial numbers of which I know they were applied in a specific year; I also know that some of the hardware on these instruments was introduced years later, which shows that these instruments stayed on the racks for a very long time before they came through 'final assembly'. This usually happened with instruments that were not very popular during a specific period or with instruments that were already discontinued.

So the serial number on a guitar doesn't automatically tell you when a guitar was completed and in some cases this explains some of the quirky stuff you might come across.


Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl
 

ianb

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Hello ianb,

Your source of information is partly right, but not entirely. I understand that you're a fairly new member, so here's a little write up that I posted many years ago and that most members have seen before:

Guild guitars were made in batches of 6, 12 or 24 etc. From a manufacturing standpoint it was easier to make them in batches because of the change of tooling necessary to produce the different models. When the superstructures were completed they were serial numbered, which took place in the 'finishing' dept. After that the finish was applied and the guitars were hung to dry. After sufficient drying they would be buffed and placed in racks, where they would stay till an order came in. Obviously, if they started production they already had orders, but not always for the complete batch. Only the guitars they had orders for (plus the guitars that could be put in inventory because they were ordered on a regular basis) would be taken to 'final assembly', where the superstructure would get all the necessary parts to become a musical instrument and where it would be set up. Now the order in which they were taken from the racks was random, so it was possible for a higher serial number to come through 'final assembly' before a lower number. A lower serial number could stay on the racks for a very long time while a later serial number would already be hanging on a dealer's wall. I have several instruments in my collection that have serial numbers of which I know they were applied in a specific year; I also know that some of the hardware on these instruments was introduced years later, which shows that these instruments stayed on the racks for a very long time before they came through 'final assembly'. This usually happened with instruments that were not very popular during a specific period or with instruments that were already discontinued.

So the serial number on a guitar doesn't automatically tell you when a guitar was completed and in some cases this explains some of the quirky stuff you might come across.


Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl



Thanks for that Hans. that explains a lot actually. so when trying to hunt down a specific set of features it's best to look for a range of years and just filter through until you find what you're looking for as opposed to shopping by specific year like you would with a fender or gibson or whatever.
Thank a ton, man.that clears up a bunch of stuff.
 

fronobulax

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shopping by specific year

That is never going to work with Guilds. Specs changed, catalogs didn't, model numbers changed and, as you have just learned, serial numbers do not always correspond chronologically to when a guitar was finished. Best bet, as you may have discovered, is to post your must have specs and ask questions.
 
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