The Guitar Gallery Forums - The Guitar Legacy of Matsumoku

Hi! First post here. I thought I would share some pic's from my Aria Pro 2 Ts 400 (Not to sure about the 400 part, but please correct my if i'm wrong)

The guitar has been in my possession for about 10 years or so. I discovered it standing in the house of the father from a friend of mine with only 3 strings on it. Legend had it he got it for free when he purchased a guitar case in the mid to late 80's... Since I was playing guitar, he loaned it to me, without ever wanting it back.

If you are a real Marsumoku nut you might want to skip this part.

The guitar was in horrible shape. The bridge was terrible and strings would break really fast so I put the cheapest strat like bridge on it that I could find. The tuners were so bad that it was laughable. It never stayed in tune and sometime stuff would fall off. One time I arrived at band practice and my G string machine head fell out of it's socket. I swooped the original tuners out and changed them for cheap Grovers. The pick ups still sound kinda bad. I am still saving up money to change them. There is a switch for humbuck to single coil. I always play humbuck because the single coils have almost no output.

Because the guitar had a long history of missing strings the neck is slightly bolted. The high E and B in open tuning tend to ring.

Even though this guitar has been abused and neglected by several owners, it is still an awesome guitar to play on. It looks good, it feels nice, and still plays pretty well!

And here are a few more pic's. Enjoy!

She sure is purty.

And ya gotta love a good story behind a favoured guitar. If you gotta change parts to keep her in business, I'm all for it. As much as I can appreciate an all-original vintage, one that's constantly played no matter what kind of band-aid is required is even better. That's what they were built for in the first place.

Two thumbs up from me.

-Alex

Nice guitar. I think it is a TS 300 (or a variation). The 400 is a set neck.

Hey, Just a bit more info on whats already been said regarding the model.
Early Transition TS models had slightly different specs than the later 79/80 models we are used to seeing.
TS-600's were a set neck, not through neck like the later models.
TS-500's were a detatchable neck, not set like the later models
TS-400's were also detatchable neck .

As far as I can tell,the main difference between the 500 & 400 models, was,
Gold hardware for the 500 & silver for the 400.
Proto 1's for the 600 & 500, proto 2's for the 400.

TS-300's dont appear till the new model line up late 79 when all of the Model specs changed.
Hope this helps.
Cheers.

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My Guitars- http://matsumokuguitars.com/

My TS 350 has a SN starting with 7 and a six in line headstock. I am pretty sure it is not an '87.

So I assume its a Tri Sound Series Then?
Is it a "steel adjustable neck" marked plate, or a plain "made in Japan", not an AP2 marked plate?
Obviously not an 87, c'mon.
Heaps of these neck plates start with 05 like the one above. AP2, Vantage etc., & also other random numbers like yours.
These old neck plates are not datable by serial.
I'd say late 79 early 80

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My Guitars- http://matsumokuguitars.com/

Thanks for all the replies everybody!

The neck is is not set and the original hardware was not golden but silver.
when i look at http://www.matsumoku.org/models/ariaproii/ts/ts.html I don't see the the model. They all have allot of switches where as mine only has a single coil/humbucker switch and a 3 way pick up switch.

http://www.matsumoku.org/models/ariaproii/ts/ts.html
Look a bit further down the page and you will see the Transion Models

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You can never have too many guitars

Mine says "Matsumoku" then "L77####" then "Made in Japan"

It is a Thor Sound