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Location: Nahant, MA | Arrived today...and I'm already enjoying it. I seem to have an electrical issue where one switch setting does nothing, but both pups are working in the center position so I'll have the tech take a look at it when it goes in for a setup (I don't know anything about electrics, this being my first one.
Sone lacquer checking on the front, two checks on the back, but you really have to look for them. The case looks original but smells like the basement...Needs a good cleaning and airing out.
Anyway, take a look. Any string recommendations?
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Location: Flahdaw | Love it...want one. |
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Location: Utah | That's a beauty!
100% nickel strings do sound better to me. Warm and sweet, not harsh. Gibson, D'Addario, and GHS brand strings have all been good on my Hamer semi-hollow with vintage humbuckers and on the Ovation Viper with single coils. Light gauge, .010 first string. If you want to avoid finger squeek, the Elixirs are pretty good, too, though not my favorite. |
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Location: Texas | Beautiful guitar Carol, congratulations! (Nice photos, too.)
Cool choice for your first electric, what amp are you playing it through?
Like many of our other beloved Ovations, Tornados seem to be either unknown or under-appreciated in the "outside world." (In a way that's a good thing, have you ever checked prices on a 335 of that vintage and condition? Yikes!)
Yours appears to be a later model (like mine) with the neck repositioned to allow access higher up the fretboard. Thanks to the sage advice of many of our resident gurus on THIS THREAD mine now plays and sounds amazing.
Enjoy it! |
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Location: SoCal | Beautiful guitar! From the mounting point of the neck, it's probably a 71 or 72? Never seen a blonde Tornado before.
If you're used to playing acoustics, don't go too light on the strings. You'll find that you push electric strings around too easily with light strings. Try an electric 11 or 12 set first. Remember that you want good tone from the strings, not just ease of play.
Good luck.... |
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Location: Flahdaw | Originally posted by standing:
Like many of our other beloved Ovations, Tornados seem to be either unknown or under-appreciated in the "outside world." (In a way that's a good thing, have you ever checked prices on a 335 of that vintage and condition? Yikes!) How does a Tornado compare "soundwise" to a vintage 335? |
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Location: Nahant, MA | From the "H" in the serial number I'm guessing it's a '71. I'd not seen any references to a blonde Tornado so this was a little bit of a surprise. It does appear to be all original with minimal wear on the frets. Now if I can get the case to stop smelling like the basement after a flood...
standing, I'm currently playing thru my Roland AC-90 and AC-33. Only amps I have and no budget left. That guitar of yours was one of the things that pushed me over the edge on this one. The fretboards are much darker on ours than on some of the others I've seen...are they stained rosewood or ebony?
The pickguard is very high with those two wooden blocks underneath. Not sure if I'm going to change that or not...maybe I'll just get used to it first.
As far as strings, I thought I might go with the Gibson BB King set just as a starting point. I've also heard a lot about BeBops...has anybody tried those? This is all so different for me.
It would be interesting to compare a 335 to the Tornado/Thunderhead with same strings. There's no way I could touch a similar Gibson. The shop where I bought this (I love the internet) is a big vintage Gibson shop. The owner said this is the best "clone" he's come across and a great guitar in its own right. It had been hanging on the wall for a long time and nobody seemed to know much if anything about it. No respect! |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | Very nice! |
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Location: closely held secret | That's a very nice one, Carol. Congratulations. |
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Location: GA USA | That's nice. I'm so jealous. |
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Location: Jet City | Gorgeous! I love me some sweet Tornado tones. |
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Location: Germany, where delicious wine is growing (Rheinh) | Congrats, Carol! That a real nice one. Enjoy it.
Bernie |
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Location: Flahdaw | Bump to the top....
how does a vintage Tornado compare to tonewise to a vintage 335? Anyone know? |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | yes |
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Location: Flahdaw | ARGHHHH!!!!! |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | the 335 had a solid centre so they'll sustain a little more and sound fuller/fatter since they have humbuckers whereass the Ovation has single coils. The Ovations were an all hollow body so they were a little more like a Gibby 350. Personnally I'd go for a 335 but I'm not really into that style since I have neither. A Collings Soco might fit the bill someday.... |
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Location: Flahdaw | THAT'S what I wanted to know. Thanks, Beal. |
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Location: SoCal | I always thought the Thunderhead was Ovation's swing at a Gibson 330 (or an Epi Casino). Hollowbodies with single coil p/u's. I wonder how they'd stack up? |
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Location: Texas | Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that a Tornado vs. a 335 was a direct comparison, I was just commenting on the going rate to obtain a nice 40 year-old hollow-body guitar, here's a few examples:
1974 335 • 1976 335 • 1978 335 • 1968 Tornado
As Beal pointed out, there are major differences in the construction and electronics that make it apples to oranges.
That said, (and IMHO), the Tornado offers a very nice range of distinctive hollow-body tones. I like that I can get a subtle jangle that has a very "sixties" vibe to it when I want it, yet still get a surprisingly warm jazz sound if I need it. It's exactly what I was looking for, ymmv… |
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Location: Scotland | Going rates and market values aside, I think a better comparison for the T-Head is Gretsch rather than Gibson. The Jim Rickard designed pickups on early T-Heads are almost identical in terms of appearance, construction and sound to the Dearmond 2K pickups used by Gretsch in the 50's. The Schaller pickups used on Tornados, Eclipse and later T-Heads are pretty good too, but I hear Filter-Tron and Hilo-Tron rather than P90 or PAF. Note I'm taking just pickups here, because comparing the bolt-on neck construction of the Storms to the set-neck of the Gibson 300's is like comparing apples to trout. |
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Location: Scotland | Carol, It may be that the electronics are not faulty but your guitar has a Thunderhead wiring loom. I've seen 2 or 3 other late model Tornados like this. The toggle switch on a T-head is not on-on-on like a Gibson 2-pickup guitar but is both pickups on (in-phase) both on (out-of-phase) and both off (standby - or if you didn't know, faulty swich)
If the other 2 positions are working then one of the knobs will be a master vol and the other fades between bridge and neck pickups. |
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Location: Jet City | Paul, do you know what the pickups were on the earliest Tornados?
They look like humbuckers in mine, but sound like singles
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Location: Scotland | They were made by Schaller, as was most of the hardware on the storms (tornados had Kluson tuners)
I agree they look like humbuckers, but they definately sound like single coils, I'n terms of tone and noise. |
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Location: Flahdaw | Are they good enough guitars to change out the pups with humbuckers |
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Location: Scotland | The pickups are an odd size, so there would be a little surgery and new pickup surrounds needed. In my opinion, if you change out the stock pickups from the Storms or Ovation solidbodies then you change the character of the guitars completely. Personally I'd leave them be. |
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Location: Nahant, MA | Paul, your theory makes sense given that there were no -4 Tornados listed in the catalog. I've got the strings off it at the moment but I'll try it out tomorrow.
The body was likely wired-up and ready to be a Thunderhead, but ended up being a Tornado by being decked out with chrome and dots rather than gold and diamonds. |
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Location: Scotland | Exactly. At the end of the production run they'd likely just be getting rid of the parts inventory. |
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Location: Nahant, MA | sorta like the early Ford Mustangs :cool: |
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Location: Texas | Originally posted by Carol:
sorta like the early Ford Mustangs :cool: …or Johnny Cash's Cadillac… |
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Location: Nashville TN. | When I went shopping for hollow body I looked at Gibsons Gretch and Guilds (1990 all were used) saw the ovation well I spend $300 of my $2500 budget.
The old Melody Music in WH CT |
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Location: Texas | Originally posted by dark bar:
Are they good enough guitars to change out the pups with humbuckers Since you'd have to modify the guitar, probably to the point-of-no-return beyond its' OEM condition, I wouldn't recommend that. If you want humbuckers in a hollow/semi-hollow body guitar, you'd probably be better off looking for a different model guitar…
…and some of us really like the single-coil Tornados just as they are, they're hard enough to find in good shape as it is, let's not encourage folks to start hacking them up … ;) |
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New (to me) Tornado