The Guitar Gallery Forums - The Guitar Legacy of Matsumoku

Hello Folks,

i´m new to this board and i´m an Aria fan since 1986.

Last week i bought a Aria SG, but i had no luck so far to identify this model.

Do you have any idea ? On the main matsumoku page i thought to read
that guitars with those mini humbuckers have been made produced between mid/end of the 60s.

Hmm, I'm gonna guess early 70's. Either way, she looks nice and Welcome!

1960s very few if any Aria guitars had humbuckers.

With those humbuckers it would probably date to around around 72-75.

Which main matsumoku page was this?

Hi,
i meant the matsumoku.org page.

I´m sorry, my english is not the best, but from this words (taken from matsumoku.org)
"Single coil trapezoid face = mid to late 1960s, P-90 sized single and dual coil pickups = early 1970s, normal humbuckers and more strat like singles = early to mid 1970s."
I thought this is matching, because my sg´s humbuckers have the P-90 size.

I went through the catalogues from vintaxe.com and all sg models had normal sized humbuckers.

Ok, i got it seems an early 70s.

Another old guitar - Aria Diamond 1802

Is that the SG from Ebay Germany that I was outbid on ?!?

Congratulations if it is the one, it was a bargain price !



Oliver !

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Axes of the 80´s - Click here

I'd be prepared to bet those pickups aren't humbuckers - I suspect you'll find the screws are the pole pieces for a single coil, and the bars are part of a plain steel plate in the other side of the pickup case.

My first bass - a medium-scale jazz style which I had new in 1978 - had the same type of pickup, apart from having only 4 poles. These are, aesthetically, at least, copies of the Hofner "staple" pickup from the 60s, and the guitar unit is probably derived from the same basic design.

I don't know for certain where my old bass was from (it was branded Grant, a UK importer) but it did have the "Steel Adjustable Neck" type plate, which is often identified with Matsumoku.

Jon.

If it were another label by another manufacturer I might believe this. I've dipped about 14 sets of them and every one with the lug/screw arrangement was a humbucker.

There was a single coil version of these with just six screws which disappeared completely by 1974 or possibly a little earler.

Some early Japanese guitars did have covered pickups that appeared to be humbuckers but underneath were only a single coil in one side of the pickup.

By 1978 Aria had given way to Aria Pro II in regards to solid body electrics. None of these used the old style soapbar humbuckers but the more traditional Gibson style humbuckers.

I did run across one Conrad that had those pickups which had only one coil in each cover. I found out later that the owner had tried to take them apart to dip them not knowing how frail they are and damaged a coil in each.

"Steel adjustable neck" also appeared on guitars known to be made by Kasuga. It is not an indicator a guitar was made by Matsumoku.

Informative as ever, Crusty - thanks. I'm only going on my own experience, and have only encountered the single coil variant of this style of pickup before.

I've also seen plenty of the single coil in humbucker case type pickups, mostly on lower-end instruments, but not always. Recently I ran across some in a set neck, carved top LP copy, branded as CSL. CSLs were Fujigen, and generally very high quality, presumably this was a cost-cutting decision by the importer. The tuners were also quite "budget" considering the standard of the rest of the instrument.

Kasuga's a brand I have a particular interest in - I have a lovely & quite unique Rickenbacker 4001 copy & have always been curious about the brand. All the bolt-neck instruments which I've seen branded as Kasuga have had plain neckplates, no S/N and a sticker for the country of origin. This may have been the practice for their own-brand instruments but not for other brands. Crusty - which others do we know to be from Kasuga?


Jon.

The are some models in this catalog are mirrors of those offered under the Kasuga label at the same time. Note some of the pickups on the first two pages as well as truss covers. Not a lot like those on other Arias in other series.

I believe Shiro Co. was contracting several manufacturers early on depending on price point and ability to deliver.

Then look as some of the other models dating to the same period or a little later and you'll notice differences.

The neckplates with nomenclature stamped on them were not specific to Arias, but also found on other labels at that time.