The idea behind the Little One series is to have a practical-sized guitar for someone who travels and performs. It is not neck heavy like some SGs. The Red, White and Blue version is a highly customized Little One. They will not make any more. The hardware is top notch!I am reminded of the Gibson "Zoot Suit" SG which employed similar dyed laminates in its construction.
The wood is the amazing part of this story. It is similar to maple in density but more water resistant. It is used in high end firearm stocks, archery bows, and for some military applications. Thin slices were soaked in vats of dye until the color filled the wood. The slices were then glued together. The laminate block was then cut at an angle to give the striped appearance. The neck itself consists of over 30 laminates. Note in the control cavity that the dye is completely through the wood.
There is no finish on the wood. It is impervious to water. Heritage recommends applying furniture polish to it twice a year. The neck is stronger than maple and should never crack.The tone is bright and is full spectrum with great lows and highs. The sound is amazingly good and is NOT a compromise.
Check out the guitar in this video.Zaniboni is a French singer. I love her guitar - so small and well-designed. A cute little acoustic. Plus she's a great singer and guitarist. I have no idea what she's singing! Thanks for the help!Tone Deaf Radio!
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| Tommy Castro with his Rambler |
Strobel GuitarsThanks to Russ Strobel for this info.
Rambler™ Travel Electric Guitar
Want to jam when you get there? Practice in the hotel? Jump on stage and play? Take along a Strobel Rambler™ Travel Electric Guitar - a full scale professional instrument that breaks down to fit in a briefcase or computer bag in minutes. This is a great sounding, great playing instrument perfected for the traveling musician. The Rambler™ offers unsurpassed quality, playability and resonance.
The Rambler™ travel guitar features locking tuners located on the bottom of the guitar with the strings loaded from the top of the neck through the patented StringKeeper™. Dual humbucking pickups are switchable from neck to bridge (or both) to provide a fat full sound and excellent tone. Separate tone and volume controls provide a wide range of equalization. Intonation and string action is set with a fully adjustable Tuneomatic bridge. The adjustable nut (a unique feature of the Rambler™ portable travel guitar), allows adjustment of the string action at the top of the neck.
Weighing in at less than five pounds (and with an assembled length of about 30”), the Rambler™ is a very portable guitar. The Rambler™ Classic comes with a nicely padded embroidered gig bag, fitting nicely in the overhead bin when traveling by air. The neck is 17-1/2” and the body measures just over 15” when disassembled, so they fit in most all computer bags. Scale length is a standard 24-1/2” Gibson scale with 20-21 frets. The nut is 1-5/8” wide and the neck profile is a thin “C” shape.
Travelers typically take the Rambler™ Professional Electric Travel Guitar apart and place the separated neck and body in their carry on luggage. To take the guitar apart, simply loosen the single thumbwheel on the top of the neck and remove the StringKeeper™. Wrap the strings around the body through the StringCatcher™, tucking the StringKeeper™ between the middle tuners. Then take off the neck by loosening the four body thumbwheels. Simply reverse the process to assemble the guitar.
While playing and sounding like a full size electric guitar, the Rambler™ portable guitar has a sonic advantage due to the absence of a headstock. The string energy (normally wasted as the vibrations pass over the nut) is channeled back into the neck, providing superior resonance and sustain. Neck relief is adjustable with the dual action truss rod, allowing more or less relief as desired. The Rambler™ Classic has a solid Maple body, in either Tobacco or Cherry Sunburst. To order a Rambler™, please log on to www.StrobelGuitars.com.
Strobel Guitars also offers the Rambler™ Custom Travel Guitar, with choice of tone woods, neck shape, fretboard, inlay initials and a full line of custom colors. Some of the many custom options include gold hardware, quilted AAA maple tops, coil tapping, on board pre-amp, custom inlay, Piezo bridge, etc. You can also check out the new Rambler Custom Bass Travel Guitar at www.StrobelGuitars.com.
The Rambler™ Classic Travel Electric Guitar
Spec Sheet
- Fits in a computer case for travel
- Easily breaks down without tools
- Removable interchangeable neck
- Full 24 ½” scale length
- 12” fretboard radius
- 20 medium jumbo frets
- Overall length 30”
- Weight between 4 to 5 lbs.
- Double action truss rod
- Adjustable Nut
- Removable StringKeeper™ for fast assembly
- StringCatcher™ to protect finish
- Patented innovative design
- Dual humbucking pick ups
- Volume and tone controls
- Locking tuners
- Tunomatic bridge
- Solid Canadian Maple body
- Tobacco or Cherry Sunburst finish
- Maple neck with Rosewood fretboard
- Mother of Pearl dot inlays
- Expert, proprietary luthier fabrication
"We want to market this guitar to young girls."I mean, c'mon... Am I the only one that finds this "let's make it pink and cutesy" attitude cloyingly sickening? And isn't it a little bit insulting to women? I'm all for "guitars for girls" but much prefer the designs of Luna Guitars who make guitars suited to the female form that are feminine without being nauseating - some of which appeal to male players too.
"Let's make it pink."
"Yes, good idea. And maybe add a cute cartoon character too."
guitarz.blogspot.com:
Hondo guitars don't have the best of reputations. Those that remember their poorly executed copies of Gibson and Fender designs recall them with a shudder and rarely have a good word to say about them. In the early 1980s Hondo brought in luthier Harry Fleishman as a design consultant, and together they came up with this, the Hondo Flash Bass.
It has the appearance of being all neck. Indeed, the fretboard sports 30 frets (unless I miscounted) and I think you can safely say that access to the upper frets is unhindered. The volume and tone controls are mounted on the upper edge (reminiscent of the LaBaye 2x4) and the Hondo/Fleishman team have come up with quite an elegant solution to the problem of where to locate the tuners. The bass has a single J-style pickup and allegedly a piezo pickup system too.
The seller keeps referring to it as a "travel guitar", but you'll see in the photo of it next to a Jazz-esque Bass that it's about the same length. The length subtracted from the head has simply been added behind the bridge. However, if you're talking body mass, then yes, it's a lot smaller but it's still going to have to fit inside a lengthy case or gig bag.
G L Wilson
Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!
guitarz.blogspot.com:
Silver Street Guitars were small American manufacturer from the mid 1980s. The model pictured here is the small-bodied Silver Street Taxi. The Taxi would appear to be a cut-down version of the larger triangular-bodied Cobra guitar from the same manufacturer. Another model was co-designed by Styx guitarist Tommy Shaw.
For more information on these guitars and lots more photographs please refer to www.silverstreetguitars.com
G L Wilson
NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!
guitarz.blogspot.com:
We've seen one of Mike Oldfield's guitars up for auction previously on Guitarz. On that occasion it was his ex-Marc Bolan Telecaster which was the main lead guitar used on his now legendary Tubular Bells album.
This time, it's a one-off travel guitar with integral amp and speaker which was presented to Oldfield by the German arm of his record company, Virgin. The guitar appears to be modelled along the lines of a Hofner Shorty (possibly it is a customized Hofner Shorty) and bears Oldfield's name on the pickguard and has a Tubular Bells logo on the trussrod cover.
I remember seeing Mike Oldfield demonstrate this very guitar on a Breakfast TV show back in 1983 (or thereabouts) during an item in which he was showing off part of his guitar collection. I've tried and cannot find this clip on YouTube. I believe he mentioned taking it with him on aircraft flights. I couldn't say if it was ever used on any of his records; I suspect that it was purely a practice guitar.
G L Wilson
NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!
Originally designed as a travel guitar, the J-Walker from March Guitars of Montréal is a high-class compact guitar that can hold its own against the best guitars on the market in terms of sound and sustain. With a 24 3/4 inch scale, it has a headless design set-neck on a compact mahogany body with a choice of lacewood, curly or birds eye maple top. The guitar is equipped with two Seymour Duncan humbuckers with volume and tone controls, each with push/pull function to select single-coil mode and coil tap, making for a versatile instrument in a small package.
The collection has changed a lot since I last featured an item on my own guitars on this blog. Here is the collection as it currently stands after having sold a few guitars recently (warning BIG pictures):
Fender Japan Blue Flower 70s style Strat circa 1988. Bought approx over one year ago - it had one lady owner previously who had played it once then put it away in its case for years, so it's in mint condition. Not to be confused with the more recent inferior re-issues.
Fender Japan candy apple red 12-string Strat
Feline Holy Panther - built by Feline guitars of Croydon using an original 1970s Fender body. Inspired by Russ Ballard's guitar.
DiMarzio one-off "Red Beauty" built for 1984 NAMM trade show. Read more here.
Sanox Sound Creator plexiglass bodied Strat-type guitar. Made in Japan in the 1970s.
Fernandes Pink Plexiglass Sustainer Guitar. Totally unique. One-off guitar made for the trade shows. VERY heavy. Has far more sustain than other Fernandes guitars I have played.
Ovation Celebrity acoustic. I can't remember the model number off the top of my head. Names are always much easier to remember. Nice sound and the built-in tuner is a god-send, but the action's a little high for my tastes.
Ovation Breadwinner - circa 1976. A true classic - the first truly ergonomically designed guitar - first production guitar with active electronics and 24-fret neck. Note glossy black finish and small scratchplate.
Gibson Flying V Faded Cherry, circa 2004.
Mania Fretless Bass. Bought to replace my Mexican-made Fender Jazz Bass fretless which I never got on with. Thru-neck, lovely woods, lovely sounds... (with roundwound strings, btw. I know a lot of people put flatwounds on a fretless because they are scared of marking the fingerboard but they sound like crap. Use roundwounds and the bass literally sings.)
Short-scale EB0-bass, probably Japanese, early 70s. No, it wasn't me who painted and decorated it. Cheesy-looking but nice sound - particularly from neck pickup.
Kay K45 Travel Guitar. Thru-neck construction, DiMarzio designed pickups, brass hardware. Circa 1980s.
Traveler Pro Series travel guitar. Features magnetic single-coil pickup, piezo pickup under bridge for acoustic sound, plus "stethophones" which pick up sound from internal diaphram under bridge which lets you privately practice totally acoustically. Made in USA.
Yup! It's only got 4 strings. (No - it's NOT a bass). It's a tenor guitar. Very limited edition in Telecaster styling from Soares'y Guitars.
Guitbass. Three-stringed guitar as used by The Presidents of the United States of America. I built this from parts from an old Japanese Strat copy, Epiphone humbucker, plus various other bits and pieces that I had in my box of bits. The three strings are tuned C#, G# and C# (octave higher than the low C#). Looks like sh*t but sounds great.
Yamaha EZ-EG. Not really a guitar at all, but a guitar-shaped synth-controller. Has on-board sounds and can connect to other synths via MIDI. The right-hand has picking "strings" and the left hand has buttons laid out for each of the strings at 12 fret positions, so you can indeed play it like a guitar.
Countryman 6-string banjo. Banjo players would call it a guitar and guitar players would call it a banjo! It's a banjo, but with six strings so that a guitarist can use regular guitar tuning and get a banjo sound. Very loud.
My ukuleles. Greg Bennett baritone ukulele on the left and Mahalo soprano on the right. The soprano is a bit small for my large fingers, but I love playing the baritone.
Yamaha Pacifica. Bought in pieces, refinished and re-assembled my me. The striped "deckchair" look was an experiment with three different colour oil finishes and some tape! It's far from perfect but I quite like it. There is no tone control because I prefer it that way. (OK, truth be told, it fell off when I was removing the electrics from one broken pickguard to a second pickguard, and I couldn't be arsed re-soldering it on, but as I never use passive tone controls anyway this was no big deal). This guitar is actually a really nice player. It intones well and has a nice action. Perhaps it would benefit from some hotter pickups but they would cost me way more than the rest of the guitar. This is the guitar that I keep at my parents' house in Wales and which largely makes the travel guitars redundant. I also have the body and neck of another Pacifica which needs re-building. (An unfinished project - or perhaps that should say an unstarted project?)
Other guitars that I have owned and sold on include:
Vox Standard 25
Vox Clubman II guitar (later converted to fretless)
Westone Thunder I-A fretless bass
Eko Ranger XII 12-string acoustic
Eko mando-guitar
Aria Elecord FET-DLX electro-acoustic
Aria Legend Plexiglass Jazzmaster
Fender Japan Stratocaster pink paisley (circa 1988)
Fender Japan Telecaster pink paisley (early 1980s)
Fender Japan Stratocaster Antigua re-issue
Squier Stagemaster 7-string
Fernandes Revolver Pro with Sustainer
Fernandes Native Pro with Sustainer
Bass built with parts from Brandoni guitars
Sakai EB0-style shortscale bass
Avon EB0-style shortscale bass
Fender Jazz Bass Fretless (Made in Mexico)
Two or three Strat-a-likes self-built from spare parts
Top 20 (Woolworths) guitar complete with vibrato arm
Cheap but nice Telecaster copy
Tele-style guitar self-built from spare parts
Silvertone (Harmony?) Archtop acoustic
Unidentifiable Archtop acoustic
Washburn Idol WI64
Epiphone Les Paul Junior
Teisco MJ2
Danelectro Convertible
Danelectro 56'U2
Danelectro 12+6 doubleneck
...plus a couple of other cheapies that I didn't keep for very long.
This Kay-branded travel guitar, the K45 is currently for sale on eBay, and looks to be a pretty clean example. In the USA this guitar was known as the Austin Hatchet. Built in the early 80s, this guitar features a laminated through-neck construction, and has nut, bridge and fingerboard dot inlays all made of brass. The humbucking pickups are "DiMarzio designed" and the controls include a coil tap. The strap is integral to the design and doubles as a carrying strap when the guitar is cased up.
I own one of these guitars, although mine appears to have been very well used (and abused) over the years (not by me, I hasten to add - it was an eBay purchase last year). It also lacks the case. The construction is incredibly solid; the neck is like a baseball bat with a deep V shape in section. However, it needs some work doing to it. The electrics aren't great and it needs a good set-up. One of these days I'm going to get around to sorting it out properly.
As I write this, this small handmade acoustic has just 3 and a half hours before its auction finishes on eBay, and bidding is currently at £15.
The seller rather curiously descibes it as a "Handmade Lapsteel Guitar". I can't see why he thinks it might be a lapsteel guitar as it has a round-backed neck and it has FRETS. Perhaps, he's an estate agent and used to trying to turn negatives into positives, so that when he says it's a lapsteel what he really means is that the action is horrendously high. (He does mention that the bridge has lifted).
It also appears to be strung left-handed.
It's a pity the photos aren't better, as it looks to be quite nicely made, despite the dodgy bridge.
Edit: Sold for just £15. Someone got a bargain. Perhaps.
Brad Fisher of Williamsburg, VA has designed his own acoustic travel guitar, the prototype being up for sale on eBay right now. Looking something like a boat paddle, this guitar's body seems proportionally bigger and hopefully more resonant than that sported by some travel guitars, e.g. the minimalist Martin Backpacker, but its shorter than usual scale length requires a higher tuning. (Unfortuantely he doesn't give us the scale length or tell us what tuning he's used. I wonder if it could use standard tuning if strung with heavier gauge strings?)
The seller tells us that "...the tuners are in the back of the body instead of the head, that way you could stick the neck end in a back-pack or bag without messing up the tuning." I'm not quite sure why this is an advantage, because surely by chucking it in a backpack you could just as easily mess up the tuning at the other end instead? Or is that end supposed to be sticking out of your backback? Also, it wouldn't be a guitar for standing upright as you wouldn't want to stand it on the tuners.
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