Picked up a Bluesbird

telemike

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Just picked this up. Love the light weight compared to a Gibson. The SD pickups sound great, although the JB is on the hot side. Just love the feel and play-ability.

rAgwA87.jpg

12aOrIj.jpg
 

mavuser

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nice, welcome! they did a great job with those- enjoy!
 

shihan

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That’s a beauty! Thanks for the pictures. Enjoy it!
 

Mr. Lumbergh

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I have her sister over here at Initech and it was my entry into the Guild guild as well.
It is pretty sweet, isn't it?
I agree that the JB is a little hot, but it's also the first bucker I've spent any time with that I think sounds good in parallel. Does yours have the series/parallel switching on the tone knobs?
 
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F312

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Very clean example. I want one to go with my Blues 90.

Ralph
 

telemike

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I have the push-pull tone pots. I think it's coil tapping?
 

Quantum Strummer

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If your guitar hums in the lower output setting with your amp at good volume, it's a coil split. Otherwise it's likely a parallel humbucking config.

-Dave-
 

amnicon

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When shopping for these, is is possible to tell which ones are coil-tapped? Are there external clues?
 
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The very early NS Bluesbirds did feature pull-switches on the pickup tone controls that split each humbucker independently. I reviewed one, in Iced Tea, for Guitarist magazine here in the UK and observed, “the coil-splits were a surprise – they’re not mentioned on Guild’s info page – and voice the slug single coils.” A second, in Antique Burst, was loaned to me to carry out pickup and hardware swaps for a column I write on the culture of modding.

Typically, I investigate the insides of review guitars but for whatever reason, probably a fast approcaching deadline, I didn’t. However, on that second Bluesbird, one of its first mods was a pickup swap; that’s when I noticed the bridge pickup wasn’t a SD JB but a SH-16 59/Custom hybrid. It uses the screw coil from a 59 and the slug coil from the higher output Custom (with a measured DC resistance of 7k ohms) and it’s that one that’s voiced with a standard split.

I did ask Naomi Con at Cordoba/Guild whether anyone could shed any light on the off-spec features but didn’t get very far. “We had a few issues come up with the first run of these including the coil split that you mentioned before (that feature is not spec) so maybe this guitar was part of that first run”.

Great forum! Keep up all the informative work.
 

telemike

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Hmm.. Next string change I'll pull the bridge pickup and see what model SD it is.
 

D30Man

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Very nice. Assuming that is Newark Street series.. those are really well-done..
 

GAD

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The answer I got about the push/pull coil split from Guild when I did my review of the NS Bluesbird:

The split coil feature was only used on our very first pilot run to test the full potential of the Seymour Duncan pickups. Unfortunately some of the pilot run guitars did make their way into circulation. However in keeping true to the traditional vintage spec, this feature was not intended for our current production. These pickups are capable of accommodating this push/pull feature but this modification would need to be performed by an outside experienced technician.
 

telemike

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The answer I got about the push/pull coil split from Guild when I did my review of the NS Bluesbird:

The split coil feature was only used on our very first pilot run to test the full potential of the Seymour Duncan pickups. Unfortunately some of the pilot run guitars did make their way into circulation. However in keeping true to the traditional vintage spec, this feature was not intended for our current production. These pickups are capable of accommodating this push/pull feature but this modification would need to be performed by an outside experienced technician.

So, I have a pilot production Bluesbird. It is stamped Used on back of headstock and has a new serial number.
 

adorshki

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So, I have a pilot production Bluesbird. It is stamped Used on back of headstock and has a new serial number.

Typically with Guild that's a sign they were routed through Musical Instrument Reclamation Corporation, an outfit they had a long-standing relationship with.
Many instruments they processed over the years for Guild had no discernible flaws but were simply being liquidated through a channel that would ensure no unjustified warranty claims could be made gainst 'em, notably after mill closures.
Maybe that's why the Guild rep said "Unfortunately some of the pilot run guitars did make their way into circulation."
Sounds like they were all intended to be branded as "used" for whatever reason, perhaps simply because they weren't what was actually finally approved for production.
 
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This is a really nice guitar . What years were they made and what factory was it made in ?
Thanks in advance
 

SFIV1967

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What years were they made and what factory was it made in ?
telemike's guitar was one of some pilot production guitars for the current Newark St. solidbody Bluesbird model. The production model is made at WMI (World Musical Instrument Co. Ltd. ) in Incheon/Korea.
The production model has Seymour Duncan '59 SH-1 at the neck position and a JB SH-4 at the bridge.

https://guildguitars.com/g/bluesbird-in-black/

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/BluesbirdBK--guild-bluesbird-black

Ralf
 
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