Westone Concord DX

Hey Guys

i have this old guitar, and i dont know anything about it, cant find any info or anything. its a Westone Concord DX. i found alot info about concord though, but nothing about the DX model, found concord, I,I,II and SX, but DX seems to be a mystery for me.

might be hard to tell me anything about the guitar with the tiny info i provided, but what i wanna know if its worth anything and year of production if possible.

Thanks.
Toby

Hello Newbie and welcome.
Others more knowledgeable than I will no doubt chime in, but I'm not familiar with a Concord DX either...there is a Spectrum DX however.
If you haven't already seen the information site you can go here for more information on the Concord line as we currently know it and get some idea of how yours may differ: INFO

As to the date of manufacture, the first number of the serial will indicate the year (e.g. "1" = 1981). Matsumoku sometimes "experimented" with different configurations before releasing them as part of the lineup for the production year, so it's possible you may have something like that. Meantime, we'd really need to see some pictures in order to try and figure it all out!

Pics pics pics!

Updated with pics, not the best pics though, used my mobile phone.
and as you can tell from the pictures, the guitar could use some work, but i didnt abuse the guitar, i promise! got it like this.

ive been searching everywhere about information about the guitar, but it seems to be a ghost. there is a serial number on the guitar, and i belive its the original guitar case aswell.

thanks for all the help, much appreciated

Ahh, much better! Thanks.
Now then, this is interesting to me at least. What I'm seeing here is a Spectrum DX with Concord branding. Most likely a transitional marketing name, but definitely not part of what we normally know to be the Concord line, which is a completely different configuration.
You haven't given us the serial number. That may help determine things a bit more accurately.

You've got a great guitar there Toby! And the case is a bonus!
I personally love the Spectrums and have 3 of them. Not too much wrong with yours that can't be repaired. Looks like the usual assortment of dings and scratches plus a nasty finish crack or two, probably exposed to some severe humidity or heat change during its lifetime. These can all be made right again and there is lots of information in these forums to guide you and always someone around to offer help if you get stuck.

The only thing that's obviously amiss are the knobs which are not original (too bad). I'd get rid of those after-market Strat versions as soon as possible. You won't find originals to replace them though, unless you kill someone for them...even then you'll have to stand in line!

But I recently used ribbed-style speed knobs on one of mine and they look very nice. And you can get them in white, colours, or good 'ole black.
Do you have the trem (whammy) bar?

Oh cool, a mystery guitar!

Jesus wept - what the hell is that?! What a beauty - the Concord SX might well be the closest living relative to this, but note the bridge.... looks like the bridge on my GT BUT.. it has fine tuners!! Could be an FT bridge BUT... it has no string lock!
Barry points the way to the Spectrum DX and I tend to agree BUT... that bridge and the way the nomenclature is written on the headstock sort of leads one towards some kind of transition model or dare I say it... a prototype!!

Umm, Toby... we NEED to know what p'ups you have on board there, matey; next string change.. or earlier! - would you take 'em out and have look at the baseplate and tell us what's written there, please?!

Yeah... the strat knobs gotta go, sorry ... and then you can join the ever widening hunt for the Westone tapered knobs; they're about as common as chicken's lips!! Barry's ribbed speed knobs on his GT do indeed look good and if you can get 'em in white... woo hoo!!

The dings and nicks are just part of the guitars mojo, Toby - don't worry about them unless they're structural or unless you really want to re-finish it!

Bloody good guitar, there, bro... but then I'm well biased towards Spectrums, and their American cousins the Phoenixes!!

But Corsair, I live in the US and have seen far more Spectrums than Phoenixes! And both were made in Japan and designed by Tom Presley! What makes one more American?

Yep, bad case of strat-knobs there, don't worry apart from a little localised itching it is curable.

Appears the gurus on here are taking a keen interest in this one. Don't be in too much of a hurry to rip it apart, if it's been like that for a few years no need to rush in with the screwdriver.

norfolkngood wrote:...bad case of strat-knobs there...

Had that once in High School.
...but...I...digress!

Appears the gurus on here are taking a keen interest in this one.

"Guru"? Did I get promoted?
Musta missed the memo.

Warrn wrote:But Corsair, I live in the US and have seen far more Spectrums than Phoenixes! And both were made in Japan and designed by Tom Presley! What makes one more American?

I know, I know.... and the 2 aren't interchangeable, ie you won't find any of the Phoenixes with a Bendmaster bridge - don't ask me why! - they were and are peculiar to Westone! But apart from that they are pretty much identical although I would be prepared to bet that the Westone finish is a little better than the Electra; my Spectrum ST - the base model - has a finish that is very thick indeed whereas my Phoenix X195 has a finish that is quite a lot 'thinner'?!

I suppose I think of the Electras as "American" because you will not see any outside the CONUS unless owners have taken them overseas, ie they were only available through SLM in St Louis, or PCM on the West Coast. Odd, eh!

You're right about seeing more Spectrums than Phoenixes, too - I follow them pretty closely on eBay and CL; can't explain that, my friend, unless there were simply less of them made?

Toby,

Your Concord DX looks like a close version of my Spectrum DX... note the fine tuners. John what is the precise model of this bridge? It sure looks like that on Toby's mystery axe:


Here's the string-lock set up on mine:


The pickups look a lot like MMK45's but are unmarked and not as "warm" (as those I have ID'ed on the Vantage Entertainer):


This pearly white Spectrum has really nice knobs (ah yes, knob references), I like 'em. Its a 1985 model by the serial number:




I couldn't but wonder at the similarity between these axes. What year is the Concord - what do you guys think about the bridge... I think they're the same animal.

That's a Bendmaster FT bridge and stringlock set up you have on that fine, fine guitar, there my friend! Very nice indeed - look after those locknuts pal; they're buggers for getting lost and don't overtighten the lockbolts - you'll wind up stripping the threads in the alloy insert and that's just a whole new world of hurt...

The p'ups I'd've thought to be MMK 45's and marked so underneath, but hmmm... there's a whole lot not known about Matsumoku p'ups - there's a thread here... which deals with the MMK range. Westone MMK's in the UBC range will be a different beast to other 'normal' MMKs, so if you can put a meter across yours and get a resistance figure, we'd be obliged!!

Have a peek in here to see a little more on the wonderful Spectrum range of guitars...


http://www.westone.info/indexspectrum.html

Great stuff John. So... it looks like those pups are Magnaflux I UBC pups - they are very different from the MMK 45's in sound, I assure you. I will definitely measure the resistance across the windings when I do a string change on the Spectrum.


Nice thread on the pups!!! I should to get over to the guitar gallery (Mats) a bit more often.

Hey Ian. I'm interested in that pic of yer PUPs.
In a recent post I was overhauling my Spectrum ST and doing a general cleanup of the Spectrum S (both '85's). I didn't take pix of the S but I did take out the pups to have a look see.

When I checked the pups there were no markings on them other than "A" for the neck and "B" for the bridge. The bottoms were black plastic, quite different from the ST's which is metal. That left me, John and others scratching heads as to why the same guitars, same year had apparently different pups.

Do yours have those A B markings? As you say, they're definitely not 45's.

Did you put a meter across yours when you had 'em out, Barry?

No I didn't check the resistance because:
a) It's not something I'd normally do, so it didn't occur to me
b) At the time I had no idea where my old meter was anyway; haven't used it since Corsair was a toddler.

It's since been found, but no batteries. It's an older style with analogue dial readout and takes both a 9 volt and a 1.5 AA.
I've made a mental note to check the pups electrics on all my Mats guitars on the next string change. K?

Hi Barry,

That rings a bell, and yes these are black plastic backed pups. I will confirm "A B" markings when I change strings.

Ian

Frenchy wrote:

Barry wrote:I've made a mental note to check the pups electrics on all my Mats guitars on the next string change. K?

Beauty, mate!!!

Well, basically i also have this "old guitar" that i was looking to possibly sell. I attempted to look up some info on the westone concord dx model and was coming up short. And of course i stumbled across this topic on this forum and am now quite interested in what i have here. Looks identical to Tobys and would really like to dig deeper on the subject and research what ive got here. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks. i checked the serial number and it's 4091338, is thats any help....and also a picture ill add. ill try to take more, and of better quality.

Looks like a Spectrum ST, with the tremolo of a Spectrum SX.

H.

Without seeing the name on the headstock, I'd've said a '84 Spectrum DX....

http://www.westone.info/spectrumdx.html

You're very wise to ask... and welcome here! It sounds like you have a fair idea about how to approach the dismantling process - I would suggest taking loads of relevant photos as a back-up, eh! Just take it slowly and you'll be fine...

The bridge; it should be a Bendmaster FT, with the appropriate string lock behind the nut and I'm not sure I understand yor question; are the posts that the bridge pivots on starting to come out of the body of the guitar?

The cracks; the one by the neck pocket MIGHT just be a stress crack in the lacquer - you'll see when the neck comes out... talking of which, lift the neck out of the pocket, don't slide it out in the headstock direction as there is a slight taper on the neck and pocket. I can't see any cracks in the pics so maybe you should take a few and post 'em...

The stringlock, you might be lucky to get what you need here....

http://www.westone.info/spares/index.html

.... but he has none of the baseplates left. Once again, take a picture of what you have and we'll go from there...

The strap peg, well, I take the OEM ones off and whack straplocks on 'em anyway so that's not too much of a problem.

Mate, just take some good pix of the beast and post in the members Westones section... we live to perve at other peoples guitars, and I'm a huge Spectrum fan anyway, so bring it on!

I have a Cocorde DX as well. Its nice to find that there are at least a couple of these around. Mine has some interesting modifications and I'm not sure if they were pre or post sale. It has an extra tuning knob where the original jack input was and the jack input was relocated on the bottom edge like the Spectrums. My guitar has ibanez F2 and F4 doublecoils. It sounds ok although a little tinny. If the whammy is used, it will not stay in tune even with the locks (too much distance between the locks and nut I suspect.
Troy