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Location: SoCal | I'm surprised that nobody here has bid on the Glen Campbell Bluebird that is up for sale on ebay. It looks to be in good shape. But it also brings up a question.
It has the same humbucking pickups as the Deacan and Preacher, but no panel on the back for the battery. Does that mean that the pickups can be used in a non-active manner? Anybody know about these? |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Pickups are non active. The electronics are active. The early 6 strings must have had passive electronics. later when we used the preecher deluxe electronics they were active. These have a larger pickguard. The early ones have just about the same shape as the Viper, Sound right to you? Is that what the ebay one looks like? |
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Location: Scotland | Paul, I bought a Breadwinner about a year ago, it was in poor shape but it was cheap. It's fully restored now. Anyway it turned out that the neck pickup had a cheap shitty single coil under the Ovation chrome cover. I sent the neck pickup cover & the intact bridge pickup to Kent Armstrong's company in Wales (son of the legendary Dan Armstrong), who manufactured a replica. He did a great job. I suggested to him that the pickup may have been a low impedance design but he said not. I could be wrong but it would appear that the Breadwinner, Deacon & Preacher have the same pickup. It's the circuitry that makes the difference, the pickups will work with or without the actives. Maybe Bill could confirm. Whoops, he already has!!!
[ May 20, 2002: Message edited by: Paul Templeman ] |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | already did. Yes it was the same pickup on all three (the breadwinner started with something different) |
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Location: Scotland | Paul, as for bidding on that guitar, I think the price is going to put off all but diehard GC fans. It's a shame to think that a guitar like that will probably go to a non-player. I'd love to own one but a $2K starting price for what is essentially a Viper with a fancy finish doesn't tempt me.
Paul |
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Location: SoCal | In response to Bill, the pickups are the same that I've seen on all Bluebirds. They appear to be interchangable with the Viper pickups. |
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Location: Nova Scotia, Canada | I'm no expert on the Bluebird guitars but I have a couple so here is what I do know:
Any 6-string Bluebirds I have seen or seen in pictures, video, etc., have appeared to have non-active electronics. Mine, and the one on Ebay now, has the Preacher type pickups although it has the large, 12-string type guard. It also has dual input jacks (one is stereo) and a coil tap switch. The Roger Winfield owned Bluebird on Ebay a few months ago had UK2 pickups, which the seller claimed to be original, as well as the viper size pickguard.
The six-string Bluebird that most Campbell fans have seen (on the video 'Live at the Royal Festival Hall, London') had a preacher pickup in the neck position but a VIPER pickup in the bridge. I do believe it also had the larger guard.
My 12-string 'bird has the large guard, an active electronics system identical to the Deacons and Preacher Deluxes, with the notch filter, out-of-phase setting. All other BB 12's I have seen had the same configuration.
As for the 'bird currently on Ebay, it has sustained some in-flight damage due to improper decompression of the cargo hold (?) at one time, which may be holding back some bidders. According to the owner it is just a finish crack that runs from the 'burst to the bridge, over the bird decal, but it looks fairly obvious in the picture, almost like a brownish line.
And don't assume someone can't play because they're a Campbell fan . . . he inspired many a young 'un to pick up a guitar (Ovation's!) and some of us, er, I mean them, are doing OK!
Wayne |
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Location: SoCal | Wayne:
That was real interesting regarding the pickups on Campbell's Bluebird that he played at Festival Hall in 77. I'll have to take a look at the album and look at the pickups.
I have seen him play two other BB 12's. One only had a pickup in the bridge position. The other I only remember had a plain neck, no fancy inlays or binding.
By the way, do I owe you two videos from a year ago?
Paul |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | One point that folks seem to overlook about these guitars is that the body is NOT wood like the Viper, but the same polysomething as the UKII. I think this is actually the most important point about the guitar, but what do I know.
I think the UKII pickups would be more desirable than the Preacher pickups by a long shot. I have been waffling back'n forth in my head on this guitar and also the previous one, and I keep coming up with it's a cool Viper. Based on the body construction, and the rare paint, I still can't seem to get much past $500 worth of justification. Anything more is for the leftover Glen-sweat that might be on it.
I hope I don't insult anyone but here are some comparison questions running through my head..
- Is a Viper shaped guitar with a poly body, preacher pickups and a cool paintjob worth more than a Viper 12, Preacher 12, Deacon 12 or Hurricane?
- Is a Viper shaped guitar with a poly body, preacher pickups and a cool paintjob worth more than a set neck PF-22 or Ultra GP?
- Does the fact that Glen Campbell played the guitar (if he indeed did play this one) add $1,500.00-$2,000.00 to its value?
I think the person who answers the third question with a "YES" will own the guitar, and probably no one else. |
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Location: Scotland | No offence, I was not suggesting that GC fans can't play, I would consider myself a minor GC fan & have made most of my living over the last 20-od years as a guitarist. I meant that at that price the guitar will be of more interest to a collector of GC memorabilia or a serious Ovation collector rather than someone who needs a working tool, in which case a standard Ovation production solid wil do the job admirably.
Paul
[ May 21, 2002: Message edited by: Paul Templeman ] |
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Location: Nova Scotia, Canada | No offence taken, Paul T!
A a utility instrument, there isn't any difference between a Bluebird 12 and say, a Deacon 12, but to me, they are one of the coolest guitars I've ever seen/played. Another thing is, of course, the rareity . . . no reasonable likelyhood of anyone walking in the door at the Thursday night blues jam with one! Anyone who, like myself, who has dabbled in collecting vintage Fender guitars has seen things like a few months difference in age, or Firemist Gold color as opposed to standard sunburst can make the difference of thousands in price.
Glen, whether one loves or hates him, is an undeniable chapter in early Ovation history, the fact that they would produce an exclusive model for him underlines that fact.
Wayne |
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Location: NJ | I think the problem is that until people start paying in the thousands of dollars for ovation solid body guitars ( and it has happened on a minor scale) it will be damn difficult to justify paying say 5K for the bluebird.
Part of the strength of a product line lies in the resale of their older instruments. Fender sell many new guitars and "relics" because players cannot afford to buy a 50's or 60's instrument and if they can they do not want to take it out to play.
Ovation solidbodies are affordable and most acoustics too aside from the Adamas line and that makes this purchase a most difficult one.
We talked about the possibility of a Deacon reissue. Well if most of the deacons/breadwinnes/limiteds sellin the 450-600 range you would have to make the guitar in korea to sell a new one at that pricepoint. Sure you can have Hamer tool up and make them for Ovation but they you are talking a list of sy 2.5K and so would you pay triple for a reissue of a guitar you could get an original for? probably not.
Strength in the market often depends on the resale of your past product. Ovation is getting there but there were so many guitars made that it will take some time. |
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Location: SoCal | As long as this thread deals (somewhat) with pickups, would anybody out there have some Ovation humbucking p/u's they would be willing to sell? |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | That is the million dollar question MoodyPI.
I'd settle for ANY pickups!! I have a couple of NOS sets of Eclipse pickups, but as far as I know, all the pickups are gone from CT. I've been searching parts bins at pawn shops, and contacting folks who I have seen sell Ovations on eBay with replaced pickups, trying to locate what they did this the originals.
Miles |
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Location: NJ | HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH'
(evil laugh) |
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Location: SoCal | Miles:
I came real close to buying some last year on ebay, and the seller was only 12 miles away. I had to be away from the computer at the end of the auction on work and was outbid. Damn.
Paul |
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Location: Scotland | I bought an absolutely mint Ovation humbucker on ebay about 3 weeks ago for £15. Still haven't decided what to do with it, but as my 2 pickup Viper has a factory rout for a third pickup I might make a new pickguard & put it on that. I've been hunting for parts in the UK for almost 10 years, this was the first result.
Paul
[ May 21, 2002: Message edited by: Paul Templeman ] |
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Location: Scotland | Hey, my next post will be number 200!!! I really need to get out more!!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
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Location: SoCal | Paul:
What you ought to do is send that pickup to your evil twin brother, Paul, here in the states, who can put it on his Viper in the neck position. Just a thought.
Al: What do you know that you aren't telling us? I'm a trained detective and that evil laugh makes me think that you have some of these pickups.
Lastly, back to Paul. If you notice, on this thread, all your postings say number 199. Is it possible that new postings only count on different threads? Al? Miles?
Sincerely,
Your Evil Stateside Twin,
Paul |
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Location: Scotland | Paul, I actually bought it with the intention of installing it in the bridge position on my Tornado, but the Tornado pickups are bigger. if I get around to making a new pickup surround I'll do it, in which case they'll be a Tornado pickup available, if not it's yours for what I paid. This must be post 200.....I promise to shut the f*** up for a while.
Paul
[ May 21, 2002: Message edited by: Paul Templeman ] |
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Location: SoCal | It is post #200 for you. Congrats. It also must be after midnite. Do people really stay up that late? I have small kids and hit the hay early. Never know when bad dreams, potty accidents, or illness or going to get me up. Sleep when you can.
Hope you have a horrible time with the Tornado situation and can't use the humbucker pickup. I will buy it. Hope my mom doesn't see that last. Sounds like what it is... selfish.
[ May 21, 2002: Message edited by: moodypi ] |
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Location: Scotland | Yeah it's well after midnight, but I was teaching till 9 & didn't get home till after 10, so I'm having a beer or two & chilling in front of the PC. Day off tomorrow, thankfully. I'll keep you posted about the Tornado/Viper project. With the amount of Ovations around with Dimarzios or whatever there must be a lot of original pickups sitting around doing nothing.
Paul |
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Location: NJ | If nominated I will not run....if elected I will not serve |
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Location: SoCal | Al: Just because you're acting suspicious doesn't automatically make you a politition. Well, it does come close.
What do you know and when did you know it?
Hillary
p.s. Do you have some Ovation humbuckers laying around? |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | It comes back slowly but it does come back. The 6 strings were all passive. The 12's were all active. The last one or two 6's had the UK pickups. We probably swapped some out for his others. There was one that Glenn had the pickguard changed out in Ca and that became the single pickup one mentioned.
The thing to keep in mind is that there were so few of these made. Less that a dozen total. I think that's right (someone can check the post from many months ago and see if I'm telling the same story! I can't remember but I think that total is right)
One other pickup point, the viper and viper3 had different pickups, although they looked the same. The viper3 middle and bridge pickups had different winds and different wire. They were different from each other too. Something like the following; V3 neck 10K of 42 wire, V3 mid 10K of 40 wire, V3 bridge 5K of 40 wire. The regular Vipers were 10K of 42. I may be slightly off on the guage wire but that's the concept. The V3 got brighter going to the bridge. |
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Location: NJ | it all depends on what your definition of "is" is. |
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Location: SoCal | I know. And you are not a crook.
Do you have any pickups? Now I'm really curious and I'd bet you're grinning like a Cheshire cat! |
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Location: NJ | I have not now nor ever been a member of the communist party. |
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Location: SoCal | And you are still not answering the question. Don't make me come out there and feed you bad beer until you talk!
Let me just say this about that... |
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Location: Nova Scotia, Canada | Another thing I forgot to mention. I saw an old Viper in a used guitar store in Halifax over the weekend and couldn't get over how heavy it was! It may have been just this particular sample but I'm guessing it weighed a good 40% more than my Bluebird 6.
Wayne |
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Location: SoCal | wood vs. polyurethane. |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | I have on occasion seen the Breadwinner style pickups on eBay. Actually picked up one or two complete (although they needed work) pickguard assemblies... The Preacher humbuckers I think most of us can do without. Viper pickups are useful, but as CWK2 pointed out, you need to hit them with a meter to know which ones you have. What I'd love to find is a stash of the UKII pickups. That would be useful. |
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Location: Scotland | Wayne, I've come accross a couple of Vipers with maple bodies, they weighed a ton, had poor acoustic tone & sounded uninspiring plugged in, this may have been what you saw. The spec on the Viper states Alder bodies with maple necks, but I've seen mahogany-necked Vipers also, so who knows?
Paul |
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Location: NJ | To the best of my recollection I cannot recall Mr. Speaker. |
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Location: SoCal | You're not gonna say, are you Al? |
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Location: NJ | I will neither confirm nor deny the allegations |
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Location: SoCal | Al, you are an evil person. I hereby give up trying to get an answer out of you. Your talents are wasted here. You should be in Washington, ducking questions with the best of them. My hat's off to the best! And if I ever get to the east coast, the beer's on me.
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Location: 6 String Ranch | The Vipers were started with an alder body. The quality of the wood was so bad that most of them were used for solid colors. We switched to maple pretty early on. I don't remember mahogony necks on Vipers. |
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Location: SoCal | I'm the first to admit that I don't know my woods (expensive plywoods vs. the cheap stuff). But my Viper looks like mahogany. It could just be the stain. Were any made from mahogany? |
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Location: SoCal | With bidding ending at $1252 (from one of our own), the Bluebird on eBay didn't hit the reserve and sell.
This begs the question of what the open market price for these rare guitars actually is. |
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Location: NJ | paul
celebrity owned instruments are always subjective in price. what complicates this issue is that it is also a custom one of 12 made guitar. I personally have been going back and forth on this one. ultimately as my departed dad would say unless someone pays for it then it is worthless. |
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Location: SoCal | Ultimately Al, in a free market, that's the bottom line. This guitar, in the market in which it was placed, was worth just over $1200.
I've got a house that has a market value which is about 2 1/2 times what I think it's worth. Who's to say?
So, tell me, do you have any Ovation humbucking pickups that you might part with? |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | There were a few that had mahogony bodies but I don't think there were any mahogony necks. Some of the alder bodies had dark brown stain on them, just to confuse the issue |
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Location: SoCal | I have no idea if mine in alder or mahogany. I can't tell one type of wood from another. It comes from trees right? |
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Location: Shelton, Washington, USA | no, Paul, environmentalists come from trees..... wood comes from mills..... |
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Location: Scotland | This just showed up on Ebay. Later Schaller bridge Viper with a mahogany neck, body looks like it could be mahogany or possibly ash or alder with a stain.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=875235086
On a slightly diffent note, just about every Deacon & Preacher I've seen or owned has had the body made from a single piece of very high quality mahogany. You just don't get that on production guitars these days, unless you're prepared to spend thousands. Just shows what exceptional value those old Ovation solids actually are.
Paul
[ May 23, 2002: Message edited by: Paul Templeman ] |
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Location: SoCal | I gotta find somebody who knows wood who can tell me what the body of my Viper is.
By the by, I'm in the process of putting the preacher deluxe neck (that I bought from Miles) onto the Viper. I'll let everybody know how that goes. |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | I think I need that wood lesson too. I looked at my collection and I see in the database I labled three of my vipers maple, natural, or curly maple. I have both bridge styles of "light wood" Viper and also the Viper III which is just a georgeous piece of lumber. |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Paul T
That sure looks like a maple Viper. Maple neck with an ebony f/b, that was done near the end of production. Probably was plain maple and they gave it a little light stain.
Vipers started out alder and switched to maple. As a rule that's it. I did have a natural mahogony one made and there were a couple out of foam and there could be other one offs.
Now the guitar somebody should unearth is Jimmy Mesinna's Deacon, natural spruce body, maple neck and f/b and a walnut pickguard. |
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Location: puerto vallarta, mexico | hola amigos,
stealing some computer time again---
i have 3 vipers. two have beautiful dark stained wood and are very heavy. both have maplenecks and fbs. very cool guitars at a fraction of what any decent solid body would bring. there are some very good instruments ovation made that are perhaps one of the best bangs for the buck i have run across. my other viper is really one of my coolest and most prized instruments, thanks to cwkII. it is a brownbird 12 string with fantastic action and neck and is major unique. the bird even has a red breast!!! it will be "rockin robin" from now on amongst my growing guitar family. i an a serious ukII afficionado and ''rr'' fit right in.
i also have broken into the adamas world thanks again to bill. the sound is absolutly amazing. when my wife first saw one of them she said ''is that a guitar you can play, or does it have to stay locked up?''. she has commented on the sound every time i pick one up since. one is s/n 862 and is a brown beauty and the other is a blue ss 12 string that was the prototype for the ss ca adamas 12. blows away any acoustic 12 i have ever played even unplugged. thanks for bringing my small working collection up a few notches bill.
my old brown balladeer going to be pissed off when i get home!!!!! really honey, they are just friends. |
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Location: Scotland | Congratulations Russ, post some pics!!!!!!!!!!
Paul |
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Location: SoCal | I agree. Russ, since you didn't call when you were in California, the only way to make up with me is to post pics of these new guitars. Lots of pics.
I don't want to brag, but in going back thru the entire forum, this thread that I started (which has taken an incredible amount of twists and turns, has over 50 posts, the most of any topic. Am I eligable for any kind of award? The RRA? The Roundback Rasberry Award? |
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Location: puerto vallarta, mexico | sorry paul. the manana syndrome catches up once you cross the border. i wound up doing a relatives sandwich on work bread. we were in torrence on mothersday and guess who would have had his high e tuned an octave higher if he chose guitars over family.
i'll get some pictures posted if i can figure this macintosh computer out. in the mean time in the ovation book, larry corriel (sp) is playing a similar 6 string in the color section. his looks more green than mine. all i need now is a wig, some big glasses and some talent and look out ----cover of the rolling stone. or at least a six pack of rolling rock. (that's an american brew paul t.)
my fingers haven't been this sore for years with all of my new choices. i feel like a fly in a barn; what next!!!!! |
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Location: SoCal | No sweat Russ. I was incredibly busy that week as I was flying out to Kansaa City to play backup guitar for a buddy (wow, sounds like I can actually play doesn't it.... how's that D chord go again?). As my mother always said "As long as you feel guilty, it's alright".
I would, however, love to see pics of what you picked up. Sounds like you made a major quantum leap upward in the quality of your Ovations. I speak for us all when I say that we want a full report.
Protect that E string! |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Brown Birds always have to have red breasts. Nick threw that touch in with a felt tip pen before clear coat because it looked too plain without it. |
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Location: puerto vallarta, mexico | the neck on that brownbird is probably it's most outstanding quality. i find it as easy to play as most 6 strings out there. i have been switching between the 2 adamai and the bird since i got them and picked up a very nice deep bowl balladeer this morning for a change. well, i think i am spoiled for life. there is no comparison in the quality of sound, or playability. it's too bad it took me 37 years to finally own such awesome instruments. it is just what the doctor ordered. i know they will help me get the most out of these well used fingers. thanks again bill and to all of my ofc amigos for the encouraging help i get from this site. in fact i am going to look up that guitar string site sir paul reccommended so i can stock up on strings while i am here.
take care of that finger al. i regularly cut muself fishing and filleting the catch. doesn't seem to get me a day off at the club. i just take a pocketfull of bandaids and try not to drip on the guitar. |
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Glen Campbell Bluebird