Washburn Hawk Brothers

Following on from my recent decision of buying only vintage guitars and lost causes in particular, I picked this up last week and it was a dog.

Jack input was chewed up and had been covered with a Les Paul style plate. The whole guitar had been badly sprayed with matt black paint.

I stripped it back, carried out repairs and managed to save its original trans black finish.

This one was made by Yamaki and is through neck and carved top.

In the last picture you will see how it compares with my flat top Matsumoku version.











I am pleased with the transformation after a couple of days work.

Hoax

Truly beautiful shape, why do people paint over such nice finishes?

nice score hoaxy

Why indeed. It is to weep, especially a Yamaki of all guitars.
Fortunately, there's always a little Hoax around to coax it back to life.

Beautiful.

nice score an safe Hoax mate...
Always loved the hawk an falcons.. Would love a A20 stage or one of the flying v's .....

That is absolutely gorgeous.  To my eyes it has the most perfect symmetry of any guitar.

Which do you prefer - any notable difference between the Yamaki and Mats?

Paul

Yamaki is fairly heavy whereas the Matsumoku one is light as a feather (Swamp Ash)

The Yamaki has PAF style pickups whereas from memory, the Matsumoku has higher gain pickups

Action is better on Matsumoku and it is also brighter and louder unplugged.

Matsumoku has coil taps whereas Yamaki does not

I prefer the Matsumoku guitar as a player.

Hoax

Thanks for that.  *Very* interesting about the weight difference. 

An associated thought - I wonder if the Scavenger basses were made of both?  I had one - I understood it to be a Yamaki built - and it weighed more than one of Jupiter's moons so I moved it on.  Maybe there are some lightweight Mats built Scavenger basses out there somewhere?  Now *that* would be a bass I'd give a body part for.

Paul

Check the link. There is info on Washburn basses

http://www.g3h.be/wings/index.htm

Hoax

Thanks for the link.  I found that and had a read through when I first got my Scavenger bass, but that was a while back  Then I got a Raven to match it.  Then I sold them both!  Be nice to think there may be a lightweight Scavenger.  Or maybe I should just sell all my stuff to finance getting one made to look like it!

Interesting on the differences!  Love these shapes, the necks "look" so comfortable.  Probably are.