1959 Guyatone "Star" LG-60

[MattK]

Driving my daughter back from her uni accommodation with a car full of stuff. Stopped at an antique store on a freezing morning passing through the middle of Tasmania. There behind the counter is a rough looking 1959 Guyatone LG-60.

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I think the dealer saw my eyes light up and he got more than I should have paid out of me, but still pretty cheap for that model. Lots of work to do.

[MattK]

Here are the "before" shots.

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Unfortunately it's clearly been refinished with a paintbrush, which I didn't spot at the time. Not sure what to do about it because the red is clearly so right for the guitar, I think I'll try to buff it a bit smoother as long as it doesn't change the colour.

[MattK]

Restoration begins - here we see my expert skills in slackening off one of the strings, AARGH.

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[Nick]

Very cool!

[sunshiner]

She's a beauty. That tremolo unit was at some point installed on some of the Rickenbacker guitars. I believe it was made by Teisco

[NickD]

That looks great, what a find.

The plastics of that era had a habit of crumbling, so replacing the tuners with something appropriate but modern is probably the best solution.

[Gavin]

Nice. Like you say, that old red really suits it. Outside of the paintbrush strokes they seem to have done a good job staying off the binding etc.

[Doog]

I love those old Guyatones, this one is no exception; great score!

I find the red quite fetching, amateur refin or not.

[MattK]

Yeah I just need to polish it out, clearly - would lose its spark if I repainted it.

[MattK]

Chipping away at this and my god, every single part needs stripping, removal of splashed-on red paint, cleaning, etc etc. It's a HUGE task. I've been taking photos but it's kind of overwhelming so I will focus on one thing at a time.
Today it's the tuners - they are the closest thing to done. Originally rusted and corroded, with buttons crumbling to dust.

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On removal and a little wire-brushing:

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Soaked them in WD40 overnight to penetrate the rust (which had locked some of them solid) and wire-brushed them. Buttons perished, of course:

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Reassembled and worked through a full rotation to get them mobile - they are all tight and in surprisingly good shape:

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I have a set of buttons pulled from a junked acoustic - they came off with a little heating and I plan to use heat to get them on the restored tuners.

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They didn't fit the hole spacing - I would have been tempted to put on the two three-plates instead.

[Ankhanu]

What a job!

[paul_]

Sweet! The red looks pretty good despite the brushstrokes.

I love my old Guyatone-made Kent Polaris I, obviously not as cool as yours. Good luck with the resto!

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[MattK]

Oh man, that one looks awesome. I love the old sunburst Kents, part of my Velvet Underground fixation no doubt.
I've stripped and cleaned all the parts of this one, and wetsanded the paint much flatter, but for some reason I am uptight about buffing it and putting it back together. No doubt I will make it happen soon. Got to figure out if the tuner holes need to be doweled and re-drilled, they sure are ragged. Might involve skim-coating and repainting the headstock tho - where would I find a paint so red, I wonder? It's probably full of mercury or lead.
Also - would I straighten the tuners? The screw holes look original but could have been painted over I guess.

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[NickS]

Sweet! The red looks pretty good despite the brushstrokes.

I love my old Guyatone-made Kent Polaris I, obviously not as cool as yours. Good luck with the resto!

Possibly the bridge is designed to be the other way round with a wound G?

[paul_]

+1 looks like it, don’t know how I didn’t spot that. I have wound G sets but don’t like using a wound G on electrics.

[NickS]

+1 looks like it, don’t know how I didn’t spot that. I have wound G sets but don’t like using a wound G on electrics.

Me neither, but I've always used very light sets. I see that these days a lot of (most?) third-party cast/wrap-around bridges are compensated for a plain G.

[paul_]

Yeah, they put those on LP Juniors now too. I think I have one on my old Melody Maker but have an SG with the “SG Junior” compensated bridge, which is made for a wound G.
My recording teacher referred to intonation mismatches as “Rolling Stones outta tune,” which he meant as negligible for most purposes. I have a couple of 3-saddle Tele bridges so I’m not too fussed with perfect intonation, clearly. My Jag, Strat and TOM-equipped guitars are all nicely dialed in if I run into any noticeable issues.

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[Dave]

Damnit I cant see the pics in my country. I love my LG 60, buts its been out if service ever since I sent the one surviving puckup cover to a guy on Offset to do a 3d model and print a replacement. Never happened. That musta been 15+ years ago. At some point I need to figure out what to do. Ideally I'd like the original style pickup covers with brass fronts, but thats probably going to be hard to find.

[Bacchus]

On that note, I've a new thread to make...

[MattK]

Damnit I cant see the pics in my country. I love my LG 60, buts its been out if service ever since I sent the one surviving puckup cover to a guy on Offset to do a 3d model and print a replacement. Never happened. That musta been 15+ years ago. At some point I need to figure out what to do. Ideally I'd like the original style pickup covers with brass fronts, but thats probably going to be hard to find.

Sorry Dave - I will try uploading the pics direct when I get time. I am happy to take photos and/or scan the pickup covers at any level of detail you need, it’s still in pieces because I kind of lost confidence about fixing up some issues with the headstock.