Starfire Humbuckers/Brackets

[coastie99]

Yea thats them coastie with brackets in all, unfortunately I'm pretty sure the whole site is stuck in some rift in the time space continuum. They do/did seem to do some pretty good restorative work too.

Hey do you know of any really good luthiers/refinishers in Chch or at least the south island? Ive heard a lot of good things about Ash guitars in Auckland,not so good that it can take forever if you can even manage to get a spot in the line that is. I know theres a fella in Lyttleton but heard he's more of an acoustic guy. Dont know if you read my predicament regards having to fill portions of the pick up cavities?

Hello Wink.

Yes, I've been following the drama !

I've heard about the joker in Lyttleton........ pretty much the same story as Ash by all accounts.

Try this bloke (he's in Christchurch)......... Alan Farrow......... nagent@paradise.net.nz

VERY highly recommended ! He does the work for pretty much every guitar shop / guitarist in the district. And he's spent a bit of time on Guilds.

Dunno if he can do re-finishing work, but he'd be able to point you in the right direction.

Did you see my link to the p/u on Ebay ?

 

[coastie99]

Yea thats them coastie with brackets in all, unfortunately I'm pretty sure the whole site is stuck in some rift in the time space continuum. They do/did seem to do some pretty good restorative work too.

Hey do you know of any really good luthiers/refinishers in Chch or at least the south island? Ive heard a lot of good things about Ash guitars in Auckland,not so good that it can take forever if you can even manage to get a spot in the line that is. I know theres a fella in Lyttleton but heard he's more of an acoustic guy. Dont know if you read my predicament regards having to fill portions of the pick up cavities?

Hello Wink.

Yes, I've been following the drama !

I've heard about the joker in Lyttleton........ pretty much the same story as Ash by all accounts.

Try this bloke (he's in Christchurch)......... Alan Farrow......... nagent@paradise.net.nz

VERY highly recommended ! He does the work for pretty much every guitar shop / guitarist in the district. And he's spent a bit of time on Guilds.

Dunno if he can do re-finishing work, but he'd be able to point you in the right direction.

Did you see my link to the p/u on Ebay ?

 

[Wink]

Ah cool, thanks coastie I'll get in touch with Alan and see what he has to say about this. Thats cool he's familiar with Guilds. Yea, I did see that e bay link, cheers. I think I really should wait for a set though and I also need the brackets, though i am getting crazy ideas of fashioning or making do with some other bracket solution.

 

[Wink]

Ah cool, thanks coastie I'll get in touch with Alan and see what he has to say about this. Thats cool he's familiar with Guilds. Yea, I did see that e bay link, cheers. I think I really should wait for a set though and I also need the brackets, though i am getting crazy ideas of fashioning or making do with some other bracket solution.

 

[jp]

Guild HB-1s on eBay with surrounds/brackets. Go get'em tiger!

 

[Wink]

Oh my gosh. Cheers J.P!

 

[jp]

Hope you get them Wink!

I could'nt find any inscriptions on the pick ups that are currently installed. Does anyone know what they could be?

I also forgot to comment on these pickups. They look like the Hofner ""shark fin" pickups found on early 70s, non-Selmer distributed guitars. The thing is, there were so many German companies (Klira, Lang, Hoyer, Hopf, etc.) copying Hofner, and each other, that it could be a copy. Here's a pic of a Hofner with these installed, from Steve Russell's excellent Hofner site. The Euro-Guildies are definitely much more accustomed to seeing these than we are.

 

[Wink]

Thanks man. Didnt know Hofner made guitars with on board effects? Ive got a vox with all that stuff. Fun. And yea, good spotting regards pick ups its the strongest 'lead' Ive had yet. I'll try and read up on how to identify those german clones vs originals. Cheers

 

[jp]

If it was a true Hofner pickup, it would probably be from the 80s, because it doesn't have the Hofner logo engraved on it like the earlier ones.

Just like these ones. http://www.vintagehofner.co.uk/gallery/solids/sol19.html

Here are some deconstructed pics of a bass version of the PU. http://www.vintagehofner.co.uk/hofnerfs/pickups/513.html

 

[gilded]

JP,

I saw that stuff last night, including the deconstructed pictures. Very interesting.

The Hofner site talks about the pickups being made by a company (or person) called Franz Pix. I didn't have much luck finding anything on Franz Pix, except an address in Bavaria for some business of the same name.

The only issue for me is that I still have this ancient, 30-plus year old memory of the exact pickups in Wink's guitar being 'Schaller' pickups, not Hofners or Franz Pix pickups. I know that Schaller made pickups, as early as the '50s, for Framus Guitars (I got that from the Framus Museum website, plus I have a '65 Framus Sorella with a Schaller pickup). I know from personal experience that Schaller marketed pickups (as well as guitar tuners and other musical products) in the USA in the '70's.

So, I did some more 'googling' and came up with the Schaller factory site. There is a vintage history section that includes Catalogues. Here are some pics from a circa 1970 Schaller Electronics Catalogue:

Recognize Wink's pickups?? From the top, it's the second row on the right. Note the double pickup adjustment screws, just like
Wink's pickups.

Here's a link to the Schaller Vintage Catalogue section. Winks pickups also show up in the 1973 catalogue also listed on this page:
http://schaller-guitarparts.de:80/hp798/Catalogs.htm

Finally, here's a link (in English) to the Schaller web-site in Germany. This is the History section link:

http://schaller-guitarparts.de:80/hp790/History.htm

So, are Wink's pickups made by Hofner, Franz Pix or Schaller. Who knows? Maybe all three!! What do you guys think?

gilded

 

[jp]

I think you nailed it, Harry! The surrounds seem to be the giveaway. It would make total sense if Schaller, being a German company, made those pickups for Hofner and others, like Framus. Brilliant detective work. I'm a member on a Hofner BB too, and I'll pose the question to tap their knowledge.

I'm a big fan of the Framus guitars, especially the Star Bass serires. The Sorellas are really nice guitars--I've played a few before. Super sexy lines .

 

[gilded]

JP,

You're very kind. Honestly, I don't know if anybody but you, me and Wink are interested, but still that's plenty of people!

By all means, let me know what they say over at the Hofner BB. It'll be interesting to see if Franz Pix is part of Schaller, or an
independant assembler using some Schaller pickup parts, or none of the above.

I'm glad you like Framus Sorellas. They are a cool guitar. The Schaller pickups are built into a metal pickguard. The tone and volume controls are covered over underneath the pickguard by a metal pan. As a result, the pickup (even though it's single-pole) is amazingly quiet and clear. Reminds me a lot of a Sunrise pickup; big, clean magnetic sound. My Sorella has the Black Rose finish, like the guitar on the left below, but has the Framus 'mixer' pickguard & pickup, as well as the headstock of this black circa '61 Sorella:

 

[Default]

It's not that I don't find this interesting, it's just I've never seen a Framus, let alone played one.
Cursory googling revealed the Warwick Star Bass II

Looks Starfire-ish, but with a 34" scale. Likely it would be just as cheap to pay a luthier here to build a SF knockoff to spend >4K.

 

[coastie99]

It's not that I don't find this interesting, it's just I've never seen a Framus, let alone played one.
Cursory googling revealed the Warwick Star Bass II

Looks Starfire-ish, but with a 34" scale. Likely it would be just as cheap to pay a luthier here to build a SF knockoff to spend >4K.

Ooh.......... that's nice Default !

Bill Wyman didn't do a bad sort of a job on a Framus bass. I believe their current amplifier range is not too shabby either !

 

[gilded]

Default,

Did you know there is a connection between Framus and Warwick??

Framus (Fraconian Musical Instruments) was started in 1946 by Fred Wilfur. His son, Hans-Peter Wilfur, started Warwick in 1982. Hans-Peter resurrected the Framus Brand in homage to his Dad.

Check out this site, you might like it:

http://www.framus-vintage.de/?katID=11111&cl=EN

 

[Wink]

jp and gilded what super sleuths. Good work on the Hofner vs Schaller investigation. I am interested. Also liked the meandering into Framus territory, Ive been thinking I might like a Strato Deluxe one of these days. At the moment though Im tossing up going for that pair of HB1's or that mini HB with brackets (bridge pu).

 

[gilded]

Wink, you probably need to figure out if the HB-1 w/surround footprint is large enough to cover all of your 'trouble territory' with the pickups you have. As well, the HB-1s look like they came off of an S100 type guitar, because the surround/brackets are flat on the bottom. I don't know if you need curved surrounds for your SF IV or not, but I would think you would. I'll call a buddy and get back to you.

Also, I don't know how HB-1's compare, sound-wise, to the earlier '1st-Gen', 'mini-bucker' pickups. You need to sort that out, too.

Harry aka gilded aka Super-Sleuth

 

[Default]

Thanks for the Warwick/Framus connection information, Harry! Gear lust knows no borders.
Now if we can keep Fender from buying them... :x :lol:


Pretty cool stuff on the website.

 

[jp]

Did you know there is a connection between Framus and Warwick??
Framus (Fraconian Musical Instruments) was started in 1946 by Fred Wilfur. His son, Hans-Peter Wilfur, started Warwick in 1982. Hans-Peter resurrected the Framus Brand in homage to his Dad.

Wow Harry, great factoid! I had no idea. I love that vintage Framus site too. Some of those are real beauties.

Steve,
There were a lot of different Star Bass models. This page on that site lists and shows them. If Mr. Wyman hadn't endorsed them, they probably would've gotten list in pawn shop obscurity.
http://www.framus-vintage.de/modules/modells/modells.php?classID=6&typeID=47&katID=4622&cl=EN
I've always lusted after the 5/149 and 5/152.

Wink,
Strato's are cool--I like the bass version! It sure took Fender a long time to issue a 4-string (love the VIs) Jaguar bass. Still waiting for responses on the Hounds page. Good luck with the HB search. Are you sure the Guild mini-HBs surrounds won't cover the holes in your SF? It sure looks like the might.

 

[Wink]

Hey guys, can I tap your brains again? Theres an HB with brackets which looks like a mini on Ebay though it is described as a 1961 'narrow' humbucker. Seller has quoted model number of applicable guitars as X175??? Is this a mini HB good for my IV Starfire? It sure looks like one.


Cheers.