1970 was a very weird year for Guild Basses

fronobulax

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Many of the unusual PU and features combinations on the Starfire, M-85, and JS seem to date to 1970. We have double Bisonics, a Bisonic and the thin little Hagstrom, I think a Humbucker and little Hagstrom and dual Humbuckers. We have not always seen suck or deep/hard switches for pickups that had them earlier, or later.

1970 was the end of the transition from Hoboken to Westerly. Is my speculation that these things might be related feasible? I can kind of imagine trying to fill orders for Starfires and hollow M-85's from the parts on hand and prototyping the JS, for example.
 

adorshki

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1970 was the end of the transition from Hoboken to Westerly. Is my speculation that these things might be related feasible? I can kind of imagine trying to fill orders for Starfires and hollow M-85's from the parts on hand and prototyping the JS, for example.
You know I always love a good hypothesis.
:friendly_wink:
My gut reaction is that you're on to something.
So I try to think of factors that could contribute to the "frugality" issue:
IIRC, Avnet Corp bought Guild in '66. (S&P 500 was down almost 10% on the year, too, so perhaps that made Guild look particularly attractive, when Al Dronge may have been feeling a bit pinched?)
The Westerly relocation may have cost 'em more than they'd bargained for when they bought the company.
Avnet was pretty big in electronics, btw.
They also acquired an independant LA components distributor, Hamilton Electronics, and built a nationwide industry-dominating chain around it by the late '70's when I went to work for 'em.
So I've always suspected they saw a synergistic opportunity to provide Guild with components at advantageous "corporate" costs during the amp/electric guitar boom of the mid-late '60's.
Then a couple of things happen:
The S&P 500 shows good performance in '67 & '68 and tanks again in '69, right when Avnet's probably looking for Guild to get to get profitable again, with "the move" completed.
There were shareholders to think about, after all.
(I feel like I've heard this story somewhere before....)
Toss in Al Dronge's well-known refusal to let no good part get thrown away, and they probably shared a frugality sentiment in 1970.
Now lets take a look at s/n charts to see if they yield a clue about production volume.
For the sake of this exercise we'll accept that the raw range of numbers shown for that period is accurate:
1970: 46696-50978, or 4282 pieces (?)
1971: 50979-61436, or 10,484 pieces. (Wow, if that's correct, that's a hell of a 1 year spike)
1972: 61464-75602 or 14380 pieces. (Wow again!)
Ok, enough there.
I wonder if all the "experimentation" of 1970 was paying off in increased sales in '71 and '72 and the relatively low output might in fact have been related to parts shortages in the face of unanticipated demand?
I'm also pretty sure that the '71 numbers were probably also beefed up by the new increase in acoustic guitar demand, as well.
What about other consumer electronics?
Was there something else going on that may have been contributing to a parts shortage , as opposed to simple cost-management efforts by Guild?
A couple of other potential factors occur to me, that as "Arena" shows became the industry standard, electric players were probably gaining new levels of sophistication themselves and perhaps "experimentation" was an effort to keep that market engaged with the brand.
"IIRC" The Grateful Dead visited the factory in '69, or at least '70, but either way their special orders may have been seen as a sign of the times for Guild.
In fact there's also that factor that Guild itself was so flexible about accepting special orders so I have to ask if these "oddball" configurations are positively ID'd as "production" or is it possible some of the examples actually were special orders that can no longer be ID'd as such?
(I'm willing to accept that 3 or more examples of a given configuration is enough to identify a "production variant")
Anyway to sum up, I normally believe there's at least 2 or 3 reasons needed for corporations to do anything and they're usually all about lowering costs or increasing market share, so I'm simply suggesting potential reasons that could support your hypothesis.
Maybe it'll inspire others to do a little digging themselves and/or feed back with personal knowledge of specific instrument production or other issues mentioned.
The charts s/n from '67-'69 are pretty fascinating themselves, when one sees no cut in D40 production for example, or D25 production, either.
http://guildguitars.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/history_of_your_guild.pdf
What's the significance of continuous production of all Starfire models and SF Basses, (and all the archtops, in fact), but breaks in production of the solid/chambered bodies?(M65/75/85 and S50/100/200)
I'm assuming those are actual production hiatuses, but I'm not well-versed enough about electric production to be sure.
In fact I suspect those charts are yielding clues about which models may have been "dropped" while the move was occurring, and which ones may have been put into production in Westerly "ASAP", as for example a lot of the core acoustics, F20, F30, D40, F47, D50 appear to have been.
And how about the special order D55? Do you think those were being built in Hoboken in '68, or Westerly?
Same question with the F412 and 512.
I can't recall ever seeing a 512 with a Hoboken label actually being attributed to Hoboken, even though '68, when all the guitars still got Hoboken labels, shows as first year of production.
And would it make sense to start building a new model in a location that was shutting down?
I can accept that probably some of those "dropped" may have been still being built in Hoboken as it was shutting down, but it'd surprise me greatly if actual "dual" production occurred on a given model, and I'm guessing that acoustic production was ramped up in Westerly while electrics were still being built in Hoboken and were the last to "leave"there..by the end of 1969 at the latest, no matter how you interpret Hans comment that all production had moved to Westerly "by 1969".
So even that fact could tend to support your hypothesis that in 1970 perhaps they were just having a hard time finding the parts that got moved over from Hoboken.
 
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fronobulax

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AFAIK the weird combinations were factory and a most of them were seen in more than one instrument. I recall no discussion of anything other than an expected serial number so they used a production serial number even if they were a one-of or prototype.
 

katthestar

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One thing I've noticed about Guilds in general is that NOTHING was ever wasted, things were always reused if possible. When I showed my luthier my X-702, we both noticed that there is a fret marker at the end of the board. It appears that the fret board was made for another bass, but they cut it to fit the X-702, so as not to waste the boards. I imagine that is a lot of what happened in 1970. With the move, I would imagine they found all kinds of different parts that had been lying around, unused and tried to use them. There was a lot of creativity at Guild as well, considering all the different kinds of basses I've seen. Granted, I'm thinking of the 80's ones like the X-702 or the SB-203 or the Flying Star (I think that's what it's called, I know it's been on Reverb for a while now). I've always thought of Guild as a company that tried many different ways of looking at things, especially with basses, which I find really refreshing. So many basses look like Fenders, it gets monotonous after a while.
 

mellowgerman

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See I always thought I'd never owned a Westerly Guild, but I guess that my 1970 SFB was a Westerly into which went a leftover Hoboken label? Cool! And good to know. The things I noticed about that bass that were different from other starfires i've owned/played/worked-on is that the headstock profile is the bigger one. Also the thumb rests and pickup mounting ring were all made of solid molded black plastic, as opposed to the black-finished wood ones like my other, earlier Starfires have had.
Regardless, this one's my baby. It's really special how it feels and resonates. Right now it doesn't have pickups (as we await the Novak set) and I still can't put it down. My hands almost crave it, if that makes any sense. Plus it just sounds nice unplugged/acoustic too, though obviously a little quiet.
 

adorshki

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See I always thought I'd never owned a Westerly Guild, but I guess that my 1970 SFB was a Westerly into which went a leftover Hoboken label?
Absolutely yes, if it's actually a '70 (and was built in '70 and not one of the "bodies waiting to be finished", but I guess technically if it was finished in Westerly I'd call it a Westerly, but there's another interesting question..... :glee: ).
On reflection, I think your detail difference notes provide the clues, there.
 

Minnesota Flats

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"I still can't put it down. My hands almost crave it, if that makes any sense."

Ah, yes: "Starfire Bass Syndrome". An affliction you may share with more people around here than you realize...
 

mavuser

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seems to me the big push for Hoboken was 1967.

even the end of 67, into 68 and 69...lots of those serial numbers were all completed at Westerly in 1970. even some unfinished things from 1966, the paint job matches Westerly instruments from 1970- nothing from Hoboken
 
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