1964 T100D

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Hi, I'm a long term vintage guitar player and collector in South Australia. I recently added a nice Guild to the collection, so I thought I'd join the forum! My 'new' guitar is a 1964 T100D with a B3 Bigsby fitted. The Grover StaTite tuners on the guitar look to be original, as is pickguard, knobs etc. The bridge loks to be a Gibson style. I don't have a full history of this instrument, other than that it was bought new in South Australia. The serial number is 34482 on the back of the headstock and on the internal label; interestingly the label has the 'second variant' small USA letters at the bottom. Now that I have done some setting up it's a very smooth and enjoyable guitar to play. The build quality is excellent, the 1-11/16" nut width and full C neck profile with no volute feels great, like a late 50s Gibson but with a more radiused fretboard, and the lively resonant nature of the guitar makes it very engaging to play.

I do have a couple of questions and am hoping that forum members might have some comments.... This guitar has the wide single coil pickups with chrome plated cover and 6 adjustable pole pieces. (In the quickly taken photo below the pickup tops look black from a reflection but they are in fact all silver). According to Mr Moust's excellent book, these were used by Guild between '62 and '66. Both of these pickups sound strong but on this guitar they are out of phase when both are selected together. I wonder whether that is how they were designed to be in a T100D, or has this one had a wire swapped around at some time? I'm also wondering if any definitive information has come forward as to what company made this particular pickup? Inspecting the underneath of the pickups reveals no markings or codes. . Finally, the guitar came in a generic old dreadnought case. I happen to have a 1970s era made in Japan thinline case that fits the guitar quite well, but I was wondering if anyone knows which company made the cases that had the Guild logo on them back in the day?
Slim.jpg
 

Brad Little

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Welcome to LTG! Can't help with the case, but I can tell you I had one (without Bigsby) from around the same era, wish I had never let it go, but needed money for tuition and it was expendable.
 

GGJaguar

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I think Ess & Ess made some cases for Guild.
 

Jeff Haddad

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Welcome! That’s a lovely guitar. I have a’59 CE 100D and the pickups are out of phase when both are selected. I have not yet gotten around to wiring it properly. None of my other two pickup Guilds behave this way, I think it may be a factory error.
 
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Thanks guys, that's good info, much appreciated. The two tone pots are not delivering alot of variation so I'm going to do a bit of internal investigation of that and also sort out the out of phase issue soon, will report. Looking forward to getting out and about with the Guild once our local live gig scene starts to open up again. Cheers!
 

Gbart14

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Reference the T-100D case, I bought a 1965 "under the bed" T-100D in about year 2000 from Guitar Center in their vintage dept up in San Jose, CA. It is stunning and it came in the case shown. Admittedly, the case is just a bit oversize for it but it is what came with it when I bought it. It may not be original. On the other hand, I have a 1960 X-175 and its original case is also a bit sloppy inside.

My guitar has never been apart. How would I know if the pickups are out of phase? Also, I lived in a dry area vs where I bought it and the headstock overlay came loose over time. I had it fixed but I still am conscious of it working loose again.

Funny story - My wife has a photo of a guy playing a very similar T-100D in her basement in Ohio on her 16th birthday party about 1967 or so.

20200926_090436.jpgGuild T100D 1965 (2).jpgGuild T100D 1965 45301.jpg
 

mushroom

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Hello ianstello.

I have a 62 T100D which came with a case that fits it very nicely..
The inside of that case has a little sticker on the bright yellow / orange plush lining.

Victoria Luggage Co.

case sticker.jpg


I'm only guessing this is the original case and others with way more knowledge than I do may correct me.

Hope this info helps.
 

johnreardon

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I used to have a Slim Jim in the 60s and also bought an old one again around 2003. Could never remember the pickups being out of phase. I can't remember what the cases were like, but they both fitted perfectly and didn't look like your one

This is the 60s one I used. I removed the cherry finish

waterfield06.jpg


The other one I had for a while in 2003 is to the left of the Tele in this pic. I think that one was a 64, serial No 33591

collection2.jpg
 

ClaytonS15

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My 1959 T-100D’d pickups are wire in phase, but my 1968 X-500 is wire out of phase. Consistency??? Apparently not at the Guild factory. I love them both anyway!
 
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Hi all, I agree the grey case with raised textured pattern a few posts back from Gbart14 definitely looks to be a Gretsch case. The red 64 T100D serial 33591 in John Reardon's cool group photo above might have been made at Hoboken just a few weeks away from my one, serial 34482! Just to comment on out of phase sound for anyone who hasn't experienced it, it's easy to hear... the combined tone of the two pickups has a noticeably reduced volume and sounds a bit 'nasal' as certain frequencies are cancelled out. I should add that I'm really enjoying the versatile options of playing the T100D unplugged at home or plugged in to the old '65 Princeton Reverb!
 

Mojito Joe

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Welcome to the fold. I am in Sydney and very recently bought my 66 Guild t100d from Austin Texas just on a hunch, and I’m wowed by it, so at least there’s 2 of us in oz now. Mine has the Mickey Mouse pickups. No Bigsby, although I have a spare lying around thinking about it. I’ve owned a 71 CE100d for a long time and was just so impressed with the quality build. I eventually took the bigsby off the CE100d and was amazed how better it sounded without it. Even though they’re fun, it sucks a lot of tone from the guitar imho. The sound of both pickups on the t100d is amazing, kinda strat like, so I would be getting the out of phase issue sorted. My only very slight reservation is that the bridge pickup is pretty thin, but has its own beauty, cuts like a razor. Unfortunately when I had mine shipped I chose a new case, much stronger than the original. So there’s an original case probably still at the shop. Enjoy the twang.
 

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Mojito Joe

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Yep, one of the last made in the Hoboken factory
 
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Hi, I'm a long term vintage guitar player and collector in South Australia. I recently added a nice Guild to the collection, so I thought I'd join the forum! My 'new' guitar is a 1964 T100D with a B3 Bigsby fitted. The Grover StaTite tuners on the guitar look to be original, as is pickguard, knobs etc. The bridge loks to be a Gibson style. I don't have a full history of this instrument, other than that it was bought new in South Australia. The serial number is 34482 on the back of the headstock and on the internal label; interestingly the label has the 'second variant' small USA letters at the bottom. Now that I have done some setting up it's a very smooth and enjoyable guitar to play. The build quality is excellent, the 1-11/16" nut width and full C neck profile with no volute feels great, like a late 50s Gibson but with a more radiused fretboard, and the lively resonant nature of the guitar makes it very engaging to play.

I do have a couple of questions and am hoping that forum members might have some comments.... This guitar has the wide single coil pickups with chrome plated cover and 6 adjustable pole pieces. (In the quickly taken photo below the pickup tops look black from a reflection but they are in fact all silver). According to Mr Moust's excellent book, these were used by Guild between '62 and '66. Both of these pickups sound strong but on this guitar they are out of phase when both are selected together. I wonder whether that is how they were designed to be in a T100D, or has this one had a wire swapped around at some time? I'm also wondering if any definitive information has come forward as to what company made this particular pickup? Inspecting the underneath of the pickups reveals no markings or codes. . Finally, the guitar came in a generic old dreadnought case. I happen to have a 1970s era made in Japan thinline case that fits the guitar quite well, but I was wondering if anyone knows which company made the cases that had the Guild logo on them back in the day?
Slim.jpg
Thanks to the hard work of @GAD and his willingness to post great scanned images of vintage price catalogs, the case that would be the "era correct" match for your guitar is Guild Case 3716 (Flanel Lined), 4516 (Plush Lined), or the 18-T (Archkraft brand, basically a affordable padded acoustic guitar case). My 65' came with a Guild Case 2516 (plush lined) from 67', and it fits perfectly. In terms of who made the case, my guess is that it was a local east coast manufacturer who was producing cases for multiple companies, hence the simple Guild sticker inside the accessory drawer instead of a metal badge on the exterior (i assume those are the 4516??). Hopefully somebody on this forum knows more about this, but i have attached images of my case for reference, and the catalog in white is from 1964, the one in yellow is from 1967. This will show you the model numbers. Ess & Ess also made cases for Guild around this time.

As for the pickups, the T100D saw 4 different variations during its life cycle (58'-73'). Franz dogear, single coil chrome (as you have), Mickey Mouse, and HB1 humbucker. The pickups on your guitar were generally reserved for solid-body guitars (Polara, S-50), and from what i can recall, were used during the first two years of the Starfire series before they introduced the Dearmond's to the line sometime in 61'. Guild played around with many combinations of things during the 60's, so it's quite possible that a T100D with DeArmond's is floating around too, but the model because of its affordability was constantly being tweaked. Yours is somewhat rare, as the most common pickup for the T100D is the Mickey Mouse which are on mine. There are even two versions of this, one that is completely plastic (as mine are), and another that has a chrome edge around it. The phase issue is probably a mistake either from the factory or some tech did a crap job at some point, all you have to do is flip one around the other direction and it should solve the problem, generally the wires underneath both should be pointing the same direction and on the same side. There are members on here that affirm that Guild manufactured the pickups, but Hans Moust @hansmoust is not specific and references Todd Electronics, Diamond Coils Inc, and "a company that was run by Aaron Newmann, who had operated the plant that made the Guild amplifiers." Its a bit of a gray area but i'd like to believe that Guild made them, and it may have been Newmann who designed them. More info is definitely desired. Aaron was a fascinating person, check out his obituary.

https://www.schislerfuneralhomes.com/obituary/aaron-newman

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Yes, mm pickups were made at Guild and designed by Aaron and the other staff members. That is what Aaron told me during my phone conversation with him.
Wow that's amazing that you had the chance to chat, and its really good to know more about these pickups! Such a loss though, RIP. Thank you @Default for chiming in, were there any other pickups made by Aaron at the time? Did he have his hand in the design of the HB-1's? Thanks!
 
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