D55 Laquer?

[Crafty Fox]

Hi everyone, Great forum. I'm a new member and here's my first posting:
What type of laquer did Guild use on their early acoustics?
I have an old Guild D55 which I bought 2nd hand, about 25 years ago. Serial# I12984 stamped on the rear of the headstock but more like 112984 pencilled on the internal label. My D55 (natural top) differs from the few others that I've examined in that it has a padauk neck and I wonder if it may been made in the late 60's prior to the model becoming a regular production item.
The laquer is very much affected by sweat when I play during hot weather, as it is now. I don't think it's a nitro finish as none of my NC guitars are affected. Did Guild use spirit varnish or shellac/french polish? I believe it's all original. It's a beautiful instrument, though quite heavy, which plays & sounds wonderful.

 

[hansmoust]

What type of laquer did Guild use on their early acoustics?
I have an old Guild D55 which I bought 2nd hand, about 25 years ago. Serial# I12984 stamped on the rear of the headstock but more like 112984 pencilled on the internal label.

Hello Crafty Fox,

Welcome! Your D-55 is from 1975 and it is finished with Nitro Cellulose lacquer.

My D55 (natural top) differs from the few others that I've examined in that it has a padauk neck and I wonder if it may been made in the late 60's prior to the model becoming a regular production item.

The 'padouk' neck was introduced on the D-55 ( and a couple of other models) around 1973.

The laquer is very much affected by sweat when I play during hot weather, as it is now. I don't think it's a nitro finish as none of my NC guitars are affected. Did Guild use spirit varnish or shellac/french polish? I believe it's all original.

I assume that most of the 'wear' you're referring to is on the neck. This might have been caused by the 'padouk' neck. This wood species is quite oily by nature, which makes it harder to get a good finish adhesion. The wood also seemed to interact with the nitro cellulose, causing it to not harden out in the usual way, which was one of the reasons that Guild stopped using it. Of course your sweat, warm weather and the times may have taken their toll as well, but the finish problem with 'padouk' necks is well documented.

Here's a photo of another D-55 that shows what can happen to a 'padouk' neck over time:

Maybe you can show us a photo of the wear on your guitar?

It's a beautiful instrument, though quite heavy, which plays & sounds wonderful.

Guild D-55s from the '70s are not the lightest instruments to begin with; the use of 'padouk' for the neck doesn't help in that respect. These guitars can sound fantastic though!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl

 

[killdeer43]

Welcome to the only forum you'll ever need, Crafty.
Pretty cool that the first response to your first post came from our very own Guild guru.
It's a good omen! 8)

Enjoy yourself here and stay in tune,
Joe

 

[evenkeel]

Welcome to LTG land :!:

 

[hansmoust]

Serial# I12984 stamped on the rear of the headstock but more like 112984 pencilled on the internal label.

Here's some more trivia that you might find interesting. You mentioned that the stamped serial number on the back of the peghead looked like # I12984. Actually that's kind of unusual.
All the ones from that period that I've seen so far had the 'I' as the second digit.

Here are some photos of several others from around that same period:

From what I've researched so far it looks like Guild was 1 number digit number short when they went from 5-digit serial numbers to 6-digit numbers and for a while they improvised by using an 'I' instead of a '1'.

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl

 

[poser]

Fascinating. I love Guild trivia.

Welcome to the board, Crafty. And Hans, thanks for the trivia.

 

[learnintoplay62]

Welcome aboard Crafty. Pictures are always welcome

 

[GardMan]

From what I've researched so far it looks like Guild was 1 number digit number short when they went from 5-digit serial numbers to 6-digit numbers and for a while they improvised by using an 'I' instead of a '1'.
Sincerely,
Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl

As soon as I saw your post, I went and looked at the headstock SN of my '74 D-25 (top date of Aug 1974), and sure enough, it is stamped "1l0XXX," with an "l" used for a "1." I never noticed that before!

I also looked at my '74 G-37 (top date Apr 1974)... and it is correctly stamped "101XXX," with two correct "1" digits. Perhaps Guild wasn't missing the digit... but it was misplaced later in '74, or someone else was using it (whomever stamped my D-25 didn't have two 1s at the time), or occasionally the l was used out of haste (or just poor eyesight?). My '76 D-50 SN is also correctly stamped "1351XX" (two "1" digits).

Fun little obscure fact...
Dave

 

[fab467]

Fascinating. I love Guild trivia.
Welcome to the board, Crafty. And Hans, thanks for the trivia.

+1 Very cool info Hans, thanks for the enlightenment!

And welcome Crafty.

 

[Crafty Fox]

Many thanks for your welcomes and quick, informative responses. On closer inspection I agree that 1 is before the I on the serial number.
The lacquer has settled down again. It goes milky white where my under-arm makes contact with the top/rim at the lower bout. It doesn't do it on other guitars, only the Guild. I tried to photograph but no good. The neck is pretty good with only some loss of laquer around the 6 to 8th frets made with thumb contact probably. The finish doesn't trouble me too much since it mostly happens during very hot sweaty weather. I can play something else. It just seems odd. We are currently "enjoying" record breaking conditions here in Perth, Aust; so far it's 58 consecutive days above 30deg C. I could sure enjoy a Grolsch in Rotterdam, Hans. It's been many years since I was in your country.
Cheers, Crafty

 

[hansmoust]

I also looked at my '74 G-37 (top date Apr 1974)... and it is correctly stamped "101XXX," with two correct "1" digits. Perhaps Guild wasn't missing the digit... but it was misplaced later in '74, or someone else was using it (whomever stamped my D-25 didn't have two 1s at the time), or occasionally the l was used out of haste (or just poor eyesight?). My '76 D-50 SN is also correctly stamped "1351XX" (two "1" digits).

Hello GardMan,

Apparently you didn't understand what I was trying to explain.
It's not that Guild didn't have two '1' digits. They had plenty of them, but not at the right spot.

When they went from 5-digit serial numbers to 6-digit serial numbers they needed an extra digit, which they didn't have. They only had 5 series of numbers going from 0 ( zero) to 9 (nine).

So they borrowed the '1' from the first series (of the 5-digit serial numbers) and replaced it with an 'I'. The '1' was used for the first digit of the 6-digit serial numbers and the 'I' became the second digit and those stayed in place while they numbered more than 7 thousand guitars, until they got an extra number '1'.

Do you get it?

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl

 

[cjd-player]

It's not that Guild didn't have two '1' digits. They had plenty of them, but not at the right spot.
... They only had 5 series of numbers going from 0 ( zero) to 9 (nine) ...
the 'I' became the second digit and those stayed in place while they numbered more than 7 thousand guitars, until they got an extra number '1'.

Do you get it?

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl

That was a long wait for another number '1' stamp.
They must have really been short of cash. :mrgreen:

 

[hansmoust]

That was a long wait for another number '1' stamp.
They must have really been short of cash.

Or they didn't consider it a big deal. After all, it was only a temporary problem; 4 maybe 5 months tops!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl

 

[chazmo]

Hey, Hans,

Speaking of trivia... were you correcting Crafty Fox when you were putting "padouk" in quotes? I actually thought the correct spelling was "padauk," as he wrote it originally. I think people pronounce this wood "puh-duke," but I wouldn't swear to that either. What do you think?

Love that little piece of trivia about the odometer rolling over to 11xxxx. Or should I say 1lxxxx?

 

[hansmoust]

Hey, Hans,

Speaking of trivia... were you correcting Crafty Fox when you were putting "padouk" in quotes? I actually thought the correct spelling was "padauk," as he wrote it originally. I think people pronounce this wood "puh-duke," but I wouldn't swear to that either. What do you think?

No, I wasn't! I usually write it as 'padouk' but I've seen it as 'padauk' and 'paduak' and over here in the Netherlands it goes by the name 'padoek'. They all seem to be correct!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
http://www.guitarsgalore.nl