What do we have here??? unknown, but not unseen

this one just sold today on ebay, dirt cheap.
here is a pair of pics screen-grabbed from the ebay listing (left) side by side with the pic from westone.info (right)

Interesting Mike.
Nearly identical with minor variations, and the head stock looks to be better finished with has a routed edge, not flat like the Unknown sample.

Any idea what that sticker says just above the nut? Looks like "Made in ...."

The string tree, nut, and what I see of the fret markers match my 1965 Guyatone. Likewise the tuners are the same as the G's originals.

Similar here
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-60s-Kent-Las-Vegas-510-Guyatone-Electric-Guitar-Westone-1960s-/272044975438?hash=item3f5724e54e:g:DVoAAOSwIwhWRf82

They were crap guitars back then and still are.

Way to poo on the parade Damian.

Yeah; Damian's the 'Department for keeping it real', eh!

And let's be very real here; they weren't a particularly good instrument - they only interest us here because of the name on the headstock, and that's pretty tenuous at best!

I've owned a played a couple of these old things and I do recall moving them on pretty quickly...

I can only speak for the neck (and I won't say a lot of good things about the trussrod, 'cos I don't think there is one), but I've found the profile quite good for relaxed jazz-style playing, and it's stayed good and straight for me,

corsair wrote:Yeah; Damian's the 'Department for keeping it real', eh!

And let's be very real here; they weren't a particularly good instrument - they only interest us here because of the name on the headstock, and that's pretty tenuous at best!

I've owned a played a couple of these old things and I do recall moving them on pretty quickly...

Indeed, you can't polish a turd...

Westbone wrote:
Indeed, you can't polish a turd...

Well, actually, you can. You get yourself a coprolite - fossilised dinosaur crap - and polish away to yer hearts content!!

You cannot, however, turn a sows ear into a silk purse!

I like this game!! 

More, more!!!

So that's what you do in the outback....... must be bored.

Westbone wrote:So that's what you do in the outback....... must be bored.

We went to Winton in north western Qld 2 years back to see dinosaur fossils, and I did indeed see polished turds!

It's only a figure of speech not to be taken literally.

No matter what you do it always remains a turd!

We gold plate ours, its more convinxing.

Barry wrote:Interesting Mike.
Nearly identical with minor variations, and the head stock looks to be better finished with has a routed edge, not flat like the Unknown sample.

Any idea what that sticker says just above the nut? Looks like "Made in ...."

the sticker says, " steel neck rein forced "


  




go back to sleep...
more later, maybe...

you may not be able to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse, but…
...
sometimes you might find a diamond in the rough 

and i do believe this is one ->

  oh yes i did!    

this baby sounds amazing!
blazing hot single coil pickups measure 10.95 k-ohms each, ceramic bar magnets
a couple squirts to clean the electronics and some polish and it is good to go!

i found two different statements on the US Patent Office website. one stated trademark given in 1975 (which likely was for the specific style logo indicated on that page), and the other one stated first use in commerce was 1970.

the 1975 Westone trademark was given to Matsumoku of Japan.
the statement about first use in 1970 was from many years later and the trademark was no longer in use, where another party was going to use the Westone name with no specific style of text or color. so i think research for this trademark application determined the name may have been used with "no differentiated script" (trademark terminology) for a while (70 - 75), until Matsumoku developed a specific script to use and claim for their own.

i've had a lot of japanese guitars from this era and this is a good quality build for it's time period. the solid wood body appears to be mahogany, as is the neck. the pickups are exceptionally good, the tone switching is very good, with good capacitor values that give solid useful tone control. there are no missing pieces aside from the whammy bar, which tells me the guitar was well built to start with. 
the quality of the guitar build is about as good the the technology allowed in those days, the electronics are first rate as well. and when you look very closely at the headstock label, the gold leaf lettering has the same quality of shiny as the 80's westone guitars. look at this label from my '82 Thunder

i believe this guitar is a very early Westone made by Matsumoku

Nice!!

the first trademark was actually granted in 1976.
it was for the Westone logo script found on "unidentified" models 1,2,5,7,9,11.
USPTO Matsumoku trademark, 1976 (with pic of script)
USPTO SLM trademark, 1984 (with pic of script)
SLM had another trademark in 87
all these trademarks are listed as: DEAD.

there is also a listing for the time when board member Sarcaster (Pat) began the process to gain the rights to the name Westone for guitars and basses (application abandoned)
there is the company that makes in-ear earphones etc using the name westone
there are several other non-music related uses listed.

Interesting to see that Ben Chafin applied as well.  Ben had resurrect Electra, seems like he had plans to use some Westone somehow.