The Electra Forums

If you like the way it plays... its a gem!

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Electra Guitar Videos ===> http://www.youtube.com/user/mjm33mjm?feature=watch

I keep wonder who this Tom Presley guy is that you all keep talking about....I bet he's just some old, balding, greyhaired, goofball living in Southern Indiana and wondering what year it is . . .

That's the guy!!!!!

RCSBlues

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RCSBlues

Welcome and thanks for checking us out.

Welcome to the Electra Forums and I would like to thank you for all your work and input into these wonderfull guitars. I enjoy the various models that I have and play them on a daily basis. The design and quality have stood the test of time and continue to rock on. Thanks again for all the hard work and we are always looking for additional knowledge so feel free to comment. Thanks

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Always give thanks for everyday, It may be your last so Rock On Semper Fi!!

Alright!
That's great!

I would like to thank you as well! I don't think we can all really thank you enough, though!

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Addicted to Matsumoku.

I want to thank you all for the kind words and appreciation of the Electras. It is really gratifying to know that the work done by so many people, so many years ago is being recognized today!

There are many rumors and mis-conceptions about where the Electras were made, what happened to the brand, and the transitions of models from the Electra to Phoenix to Westone.

I'll be happy to clear up and move some of the rumors to reality as I know them. We began to answer some of the open topics over at Westone and there is a definite link in the brands, but the vast majority of the designs began with Electra and the SLM team. Michael Wright interviewed me several times for his publication and has a pretty good record of the events but as with any interview, there were many elements ot the design parameters that were not discussed. Also, there was an issue of intellectual property protection that could not be discussed at that time. Tim Harman, a long time associate and buddy of mine has a ton of knowledge about the SLM guitar years and has documented some of it.

So, rather than my simply "writing a book" about the instruments and brand, if there is an interest, let me know and give me some specific info that you'd find useful and I'll attempt to dig up the memory, or records, and we can clear up some of the mistery!

So I saw in your other post that the plywood topped instruments were made by Kasuga? So does that include all the MPC typed LP-shaped instruments or the set neck 335 instruments of the late 70s/early 80s (for instance my X330 with the wave headstock)? Or was that the instruments prior to this era? I guess it shouldn't matter because I really like those instruments no matter what company made them, but I don't want to tell someone they are Matsumoku if they are not. But, I am curious. I had Aria instruments and possibly Univox instruments with a similar build (although, I would say the Univoxes were a little inferior to the Aria and Electras).

Looking at the 330 design, it has the hollow plywood top - and I actually have had a number of guitars from several mfgs. from that era and I really like the tone. It does add a tiny bit of "semi-hollow" feel and tone to the instrument in my opinion. I figured this was a cost thing, but I found some of them sound better than the LPs (certainly some of the ones of that era).

The bridge assembly - the large brass base insert into the body - I assume that was done because of the hollow top and the MPC route underneath it (a depth and strength kind of thing)?

Regardless, I think it sounds good too. I do change the bridges because after MANY years of use they seize up and also the saddles get sharp, and I generally like the newer metric ones and they fit perfectly, don't cost much, and offer a bit more saddle travel - so those I replace (if it is an instrument I will be playing and not collecting).

Actually, that is what I always liked about Electras - they were cheap enough used I could afford to collect them and I really liked playing them. They still are, although they are starting to rise a little bit in value.

Also, do you know what the purpose was behind the "square" pole pickup coils in the super magniflux pickups in the bridge of the X330 and similar gutiars? Was there a reason or was it just to have something different? I am betting there was a reason.

Thanks in advance for your answers.

Thorny

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Thorny

Thorny,

Kasuga made MOST of the Electra instruments prior to the MPC AND produced many of the MPC models. I tried my best to keep a specific model at a specific factory. I moved MPC production to Matsumoku for a couple of reasons, production capacity was one. Kasuga made many of our Alvarez and we were stretching their production capacity and some of the features that I wanted to tool were not available at Kasuga. Matsumoku had the alliance with Japan Steel as well as other hardware manufacturing capability.

I'll document the factory details at the end of this post but will answer some specifics:

Carved tops vs pressed - Kasuga made both on the LP style. In reality, so did Matsumoku but by the time we were engaged in Matsumoku production, most of the Mid-Priced models (Omega and Up) were being made with solid tops anyway. Our earliest production models were pressed. MPCs in later production were carved.

The tonality issues were somewhat complex. As you know, ANY movement of string termination that moves, only takes away audio properties because of sympathetic resonance. In some cases, this can be an advantage, because it can dampen certain frequencies via phase cancellation. Sympathetic resonance when not associated with a termination point can actually create a phantom frequency within the audio range. An example of this is the "spring vibration" on a Strat or the audio transmition between the nut and gears.

The acoustic properties of the cavities in the pressed topped LPs were cool but not predictable. The filler gap and body cavity would set up resonance and had an impact. Chart certain models and 1K was exagerated. I never found out the exact reason but suspected that the resonance was actually being trasmitted to the bridge studs since I could never get the pickups to become sympathetic. The damping springs and pickup float cancelled anything we did.

The "sustain block" actually did pull some of the 1K resonance out and tended to eliminate inherent movement of the studs. It also gave us a very consistent point of mounting the bridge that didn't loosen. I had some guys say that the "sustain block" did what it was designed to do . . . "block" sustain. That was never the intent, but in some cases, players enjoyed the 500, 1K and 2K feedback that the LPs had. Yea, sometimes it was uncontrolled and sometimes it was an inner coil vibration on the pickups but the real reason was structural.

I've changed out bridges myself on many. There's something about the saddles that causes them to freeze up. I've had the same issue and after about 20 minutes of soaking, they still were stuck so it was much easier to change out the bridge rather than spend hours attempting the near impossible.

Square poles was an experiment done by others but the idea was sound. The original round pole was an easy thing to make. Little tooling and very clean production. Square poles were tough to make unless you had very specific tooling. The concept is that as the string is bent or moved across the pole, you would have a change in the magnetic property as the string went off center. A wider, more linear response would occur with the squared off pole end. I'm not really sure how much impact on the flux density there was but measuring the gauss within the field did show up. Whether these 2 to 5g changes impacted the audio property or not, I couldn't say. When you are looking at a 59 to 170g range on an iron mass and only a 2 to 5g threshold change, there may not be much audio impact.

Production Post 1972-3

Kasuga - Basic Copies of Strat, LP, SG, Tele - basic solid body and basses

Kasuga - Outlaws, LP, a few Vulcans, Semi Thin MPC, first productions of the LW.

Terada - Semi Thins throughout the Electra Brand except the MPC.

Matsumoku - Vulcan shapes, Phoenix, Leslie West final produciton and the later Westones - Note: There were NO copy instruments made at Matsumoku. The closest thing to a direct copy were the Vulcans and by the time we were positioning the Vulcans, the double cutaway heelless design was far enough away from the basic LP, I wasn't concerned about the identity. I have a few Matsumoku Outlaw prototypes that are MIND KILLERS.

Tom

Kasuga, Matsumoku and Terada were incredible manufacturers. I had prototypes made at Fuji, Chosun and Dyna but could never get deep inside their technology. At the time, they were married to other brands whereas, we were the fundamental design arms at Kasuga and eventually Matsumoku.

awesome information on the manufacturers....

what looked like an Outlaw bass prototype (no MPC parts) sold on eBay a couple of years ago...
I wish I would have grabbed it, but couldn't at the time...

http://www.indysworld.com/guitars/Elect ... w-non-mpc/

thanks,
Mick

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My Electra Pages
I have too many projects!

Wow, amazing info all around.

What about guitars that have 'Hoshino-style' numbering (first digit month, 2nd & 3rd year, like C7712345). I've seen this on at least on LP and also on my Howard Roberts. Sounds like these weren't Fujigen (Matsumoku via Hoshino maybe?)

There are also some really strong resemblances between early Electra and some Elger (Fuji via Hoshino) so I always suspected some of those.

Many Japanese manufacturers used the common numbering scheme of (Letter identifying brand "A""B""C" etc. - Year - Month - RunLot Serial). Though some actually used the Japanese calendar as part of the numbering schema. I'm sorry to say that I don't have all of the serial numbers and production lots at my immediate access. It's a common question and one that I will attempt to uncover. After 30 years and 14 different factories, it's elusive.

As far as Electra manufacturers are concerned, my information is distorted prior to 1974/5, but after that date, I can advise that we didn't use Fuji-gen for our production either for solid bodies nor arch tops. Our Arch tops were made by Kasuga and Terada. Matsumoku did make Arch tops but were only purchased by SLM with the inception of the Electra Phoenix and later Westone brands.

The "Big Secret" of the industry during the early years (up to '75 for SLM) was that, more often than not, distributors were not engaged with factory staff. The instruments were actually provisioned by trading companies. Some of the trading companies did business with many factories, many of whom, were not exclusive agents. As an example; Moridaira's Tak Inoue may work with the Moridaira factory in Tokyo OR others. The T. Kobayashi, represented several, including Kasuga. Nanyo Boeki and Ken Saito may very well work with Moridaira, Iida and others. Hoshino would contract with Fuji-Gen or anyone that they could obtain.

I recall trading company agents coming to SLM for our Bently guitars and simply bringing out catalogs of copied instruments and the Bently Product Manager simply buying guitars from the catalog. The agent would take the orders and book them with what ever factory they could find that would be able to match the production schedule and price. I'd look at some of the products with identical product numbers and they would clearly be coming from different factories.

The agents would travel to the US - usually in summer for the NAMM show, and then travel from distributor to distributor with an order book in hand. Then, in October, the distributor would send representatives to Japan or Korea to inspect the production lots - sometimes only on display at trading agent showrooms.

This began to change in the '70s when factories began to R&D on their own and economic or legal pressures forced the "brands" to establish identity.

My initiation to the business was really to establish the identity of the brands - Alvarez and Electra. Gene Kornblum was a fantastic teacher and had the vision to bring those brands into their own. Don't get me wrong, there was a price as well as transition period which in some instances worked well, while other times it was a train wreck.

By the late '70s, the transitions were well under way and brands like Alvarez, Alvarez Yairi, Washburn, Takamine, Ibanez, Electra, Aria gained market identity.

So, when you see various instruments under different brands, that look almost identical, it could well be that they were "stock" guitars being specified by a trading company and simply contracted to most any factory. By the '90s, I'd been doing it for 20 years and identifying some of the older product was an art form. I've seen guitars that I'd swear were Terada, turned out to be Kasuga, Matsumoto-moku's that were really Fuji-gen. After time, I got pretty good at it but after a bit, I didn't care since they were both really fine. On the other hand, there were factories in Japan that could turn out swill. These were few and far between but if you ended up with a Fuji, Kasuga, Terada, Iida or Matsumoku electric you'd likely get a nice guitar. This is not to say that a Chosun, or Dyna, couldn't make a really nice one but the former were the consistent makers of the day.

Tom

Mr. Presley, I saw your mention of Moridaira. What can you tell me about them? I have A Moridira (spelled like that, only one "a") bass but I cannot gather any info except it could be Korean or Japanese and all I can say is it's a great bass.

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Addicted to Matsumoku.

Another question -

Did the Leslie West X120 MPC ever have lights on it by the MPC on / off switches to reflect when an MPC module was in use?

And if this did exist, was this on any of the Vulcan MPC models as well?

This has been discussed for quite some time;

RCSBlues

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RCSBlues

Moridaira-san owned a trading company in Tokyo. He was an entrepeneaur and a very strong businessman. Though not a musician, as far as I know, he did employ some good musician types and designers. He had a couple of brands, of which one was Morris. I'm not aware of another brand in the Moridira nameplate. His most recemt engagement was a trading partnership with Young Chang in Korea and later, when Tacoma opened on the West Coast, there was a partnership with Young Chang and the Tocoma factory. Equipment was transferred as well as some staff to assist in production setup. The guys at Tacoma were perfectly capable of setting up the factory and I don't think that the guitar collaboration lasted too long. I visited there many times but have little additional info. When Tak Inoue retired 14 or so years ago, the Moridaira trading became less of a world venture and I'm not sure of the transitions.

The Leslie West, nor Vulcans ever were "produced" with lighted toggles. I've seen a bunch of them with replacement switches, powered by the other 9 volt in the MPC cavity. It was an easy change out and small LEDs were common. There actually may have been a couple of prototypes that ended up with the lights and these were likely done in the SLM shop as a custom or an R&D venture. I imagine that if we'd pushed the envelope a bit farther with the MPC, it would have had lights, MIDI, DSPs, Tuner, Wireless and a small electro magnetic generator running on solar cells!