GAS Sufferers anonymous

raz · Post by **raz** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 10:53 am

My name is raz and I am a GASaholic

Look what just turned up. Made somewhere between 1920 and 1938, a Harmony Cremona II, H1302 - unfortunately it is pretty distressed and needs some serious attention, and it's currently in another town, I got my mate to run down and buy it for me when he told me about it. Can't wait to get my mitts on this puppy.

ash · Post by **ash** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 1:09 pm

Now that could be a nice find in any condition. A perfect chance to hone your skills, but make sure you enquire about the possibility of enhancing or damaging its vintage value before restoring it...

Post by **GrantB** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 8:31 pm

dude, well done, that is a beauty. I concure with Ash regarding restoration work. If it requires fixing to ake it playable make sur someone reputable does it for you. Most vintage guitars, if playable but just badly aged, are worth more left au natural!

raz · Post by **raz** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 10:34 pm

Don't worry - I have no intenbtion of refinishing it in flourescent pink.

As I mentioned I haven't got hold of it yet, but I'll replace the tuners with some Gotoh kluson clones that don't require enlarging the holes, fix any cracks, polish it up, new strings and away we go. Whatever happens I'll keep it straight and save the old bits.

I'll suss out its historical value. Actually I've already checked with some of the Harmony collectors on the Internet.

I'm pretty stoked with the find though.

Post by **GrantB** » Mon Mar 07, 2005 8:38 am

Now where "exactly" was this find...

B45-12 · Post by **B45-12** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 12:45 pm

I'll take a punt and say somewhere like Whangarei? I reckon on this - it has to be a non Uni city (student music would pounce on that sort of thing), decent size, not badly off in the past and with a few junk/music shops.

Of course you can never predict - there's a 1930's Gibson down in the deep south of the SI and my 'own 1890's SS Stewart Banjo turned up on trademe of all places.

But if I went a-hunting, I'd try places like Oamaru, Levin etc. The other possiblities are the music warehouses - there was one in Dunedin that used to import Gibsons and no doubt there are umpteen in Auckland - yep they'll know what 'classics' they have but some of the older stuff/less well known brands may escape their radar.

raz · Post by **raz** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 5:50 pm

Believe it or not, it was found in Christchurch. I have a mate who scours junk shops and he pounced on it for me.

I should have it in my hands in the next couple of days. I'm looking forward to it.

Will post some more when it arrives.
raz

darkness · Post by **darkness** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 6:20 pm

I got my gas fix today.

My Digitech "Weapon" arrived. Disturbed signature pedal.

some settings sound very evil

B45-12 · Post by **B45-12** » Tue Mar 15, 2005 9:11 am

raz wrote:Believe it or not, it was found in Christchurch. I have a mate who scours junk shops and he pounced on it for me.
raz

Yep there used to be some good ones down there - north of the square on colombo street over the railway bridge plus one of my good places was up by Shirley - single stand alone shop near the shopping centre before you come to Shirley Boys High (not the one with the mega stores in it but the older one just up from the avon with the St Vincents de Paul op shop on the other side of the road).

Smelly, tatty old place (60's furniture in bits etc) with a smelly, tatty, old owner (last washed I reckon about 1964) but he'd have the odd interesting guitar from time to time - Commadores etc.

Might still be there, but I doubt it. LOL.

raz · Post by **raz** » Tue Mar 15, 2005 1:06 pm

She's had a hard life, looks like she's played "10 guitars" too many times, needs some serious TLC, and there's been some half arsed crack repairs done already that need redoing, but she's got tone, mellow but still bright even on the 1000 year old strings, and mojo to burn. Gaze and weep.

ash · Post by **ash** » Tue Mar 15, 2005 1:47 pm

Can you tell if its solid or ply construction front and back? Either wouldn't surprise me as the laminate methods weren't widespread until sometime around that '20-'38 period.

raz · Post by **raz** » Tue Mar 15, 2005 2:33 pm

The top is defiitely solid spruce, back is solid and looks like some kind of mahogany. There's some sort of webbing being used as some sort of bracing in the back which is odd. The back looks a lot worse than the front and I think it's going to have to come off to fix up some of these dodgy crack repairs. The neck is a bit bowed, but not warped, but even in this distressed state it's still playable with a high action and sounds like the blues were written on it.

raz

raz · Post by **raz** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 9:09 am

Another harmony. Harmony is famous as a budget brand and made a lot of low cost Sears & Roebuck stuff. In the sixties they decided to have a go at the big guys with the H75, H76, H77 and H78. Not much between em except choice of colour and whether thay had a bigsby or not. This is an H75, Curly maple body, 3 DeArmond Gold Foil pickups and seperate switches and tone/volume for all of them. I've wanted one forever, and I managed to find this one for a steal on ebay.

The Scarecrow · Post by **The Scarecrow** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 9:30 am

Now that is pure class. Touche'.

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