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Location: Buffalo,NY | On a hunch I took a chance and bought one of these from an ebay auction that went unbid. I should have it in a few days. Is there any thing that you can tell me about this guitar,its sound and playability ? Did I make a big mistake ?
Regards,
Tom
ELECTRICS : [LIST] 2006 PRS CU 22 12 String Ch. Sunburst; 2004 PRS Hollowbody II McCart Sunburst; 2005 PRS Modern Eagle 20th Ann. Charcoal, 2005 PRS CU24 20th Ann.Artist Blue Matteo,; 1997 PRS Santana 1 ,Sunburst ; 1965 SG Special - White ; 1963 Fender Strat- sunburst ; 1964 Gretsch Country Gent-dark walnut ; 1998 Gretsch Country Classic Jr. ; 2001 Gibson ES-335 - natural ; 2004 Gibson Firebird - white ; 1966 Fender Electric XII ; 1989 Fender Strat Plus Deluxe - greyburst ; 1969 Fender Tele- Blonde ; 1969 Fender Esquire - Blonde ; 1969 Fender Tele Bass - Blonde ; 199? Jackson Randy Rhodes V - black ; 199? Peavey Wolfgang - cognac burst ; 200? Gretsch Duojet 1957 RI - black w/bigsby ; 2005 Gibson SG Special - black ; 1968 Vox Sidewinder Bass- cherry ; 1965 Silvertone amp-in-case 2pickup - red sparkle; 1965 Hagstrom I(powder blue) |
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| you're gonna hate it... they have a broad range of tones, coil tap, light and innovative body engineering, fast ebony fretboard over a bookmatched mahogany neck, and a brass nut... and they sustain forever.
you should send it to me immediately. :D
Glenn |
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Location: NW Washington State | Tom-
Did you buy that barnburst (gray) one that ended in the last couple of days? If so, it looks like a good deal. I was watching it but came to my senses and realized I should sell a guitar before buying another.
-Steve W. |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | Let me get this straight . . . you have over 30 guitars, some of which are genuine tone kings, and you want an opinion about a UKii? My kind of fan!
I'd say as to tone and sustain, it may be the best of Ovation's early solids. Set it up to your liking with some nice light or very light strings, and you won't be able to tell any difference (sound wise) from an off-the-shelf Strat. I would rank it below my Strat with TS pups, but above the 50th Anniversary and Deluxe. It doesn't have the comfort of a Strat, but I would certainly be comfortable using it for a three or four hour gig. You can also do things with its two-octave neck that you can't with many other comparative models (not counting other Ovation solids). |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | numbfingers
Tom-
Did you buy that barnburst (gray) one that ended in the last couple of days? If so, it looks like a good deal. I was watching it but came to my senses and realized I should sell a guitar before buying another.
-Steve W. Here is the one I bought:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Ovation-solid-body-electric-UK-II-1291-White_W0...
It looks pretty cool ! I can't wait to try it out. I did sell a guitar , my Taylor 314-CE ,to by an Orange amp but I couldn't resist this guitar, too.
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | ProfessorBB
Let me get this straight . . . you have over 30 guitars, some of which are genuine tone kings, and you want an opinion about a UKii? My kind of fan! I know it sounds crazy but it's the same reason I can't bring myself to sell my Silvertone amp-in case 2 Pickup; every time I get it ready to sell I play it for what is to be the last time and then I remember how awesome it sounds and change my mind ! It sounds like this guitar may be like that too. Even though I have lots of guitars and amps, I don't necessarily believe you have to spend a lot to get good tone; but sometimes it does make it easier !
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | Amazingly-Detached..
you're gonna hate it... they have a broad range of tones, coil tap, light and innovative body engineering, fast ebony fretboard over a bookmatched mahogany neck, and a brass nut... and they sustain forever.
you should send it to me immediately. [Big Grin]
Glenn Thank you.I was hoping that some one would say that ! All I had to go on were the reviews at harmony Central, which sometimes can be unreliable, especially when it's something a little less common and only a few posts.
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: Bluffton, SC | Originally posted by Dr.Tom:
Thank you.I was hoping that some one would say that ! All I had to go on were the reviews at harmony Central, which sometimes can be unreliable, especially when it's something a little less common and only a few posts.
Regards,
Tom Doc, you know about the resources here and you turn to Harmony Cerntral for a review? Ooo, that's gonna leave a mark. |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | Weaser P
Member # 3834 - posted April 06, 2007 05:54 PM
quote:Originally posted by Dr.Tom:
Thank you.I was hoping that some one would say that ! All I had to go on were the reviews at harmony Central, which sometimes can be unreliable, especially when it's something a little less common and only a few posts.
Regards,
Tom
Doc, you know about the resources here and you turn to Harmony Cerntral for a review? Ooo, that's gonna leave a mark.
Hopefully you'll find some way to forgive me; I was in my compulsive mode and didn't want to wait to pull the trigger. I'll try to do better next time (I don't even believe that myself!!)
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | I paid a lot more for mine and still believe I got a fair deal (thanks StephenT). For the price, you got a really excellent deal, particularly if the set up is close to your liking. |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | ProfessorBB,
I got it for $400.00 plus shipping. It has a couple of dings in it but hopefully it's set up properly.
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | No, you didn't get a good deal . . . you stole it! |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | ProfessorBB
Member # 4155 - posted April 06, 2007 07:55 PM No, you didn't get a good deal . . . you stole it!
ProfessorBB,
Thank you. It's not often that I get a good deal, so I'll continue to hold my breath until I have the guitar in hand. Do you think that ding on the binding of the fretboard will cause any problems?
Regards,
Tom |
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| you got as good a deal on that guitar as I just got on my Adamas!!
re: binding/fretboard ding... the binding did it's job... protecting the fb... as long as the ebony is not compressed or raised up should not be a problem.
you can smooth the binding back down I'm sure. and other's here can probably tell you how to do that.
nice score!!!
Glenn |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | Here is an excerpt from http://www.BaronAudio.com/collection on the UKII
On the surface, there is nothing more than its shape to help it stand out in the crowd. However lets start with that beautiful woodgrain finish. Rather nicefor a guitar that has NO WOOD on the body! In fact the body is an aluminum frame surrounded by a lightweight urethane foam called Urelite. For maximum sustain and transference, the neck and the bridge were mounted directly to the aluminum frame. The humbucker pickups (with 10,000 winds!) were especially designed for this guitar to have a higher output than anything on the market at the time and 20bd quieter also. Each pickup had a series/parallel switch so that a player could achieve a single coil sound. The chrome plated, bar style pole pieces used in the pickups were non-magnetic to prevent any pull on the strings which dampens sustain. These bar style pole pieces also provided constant interaction between the strings and the pickups, so that no volume would be lost by string-bending. Even the special volume and tone controls were tapered so that when the volume and tone levels were adjusted the output correspond exactly with the numbers on the knobs.The body cavities were shielded with a non-conductive paint to reduce magnetic interference on stage or in the studio. |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | It's a brilliant guitar. A Tone Monster. It will sustain for days. It's comfortable and lighter than a les paul. White is the coolest color, and you got the Schaller bridge which is awesome. This is the most underated guitar ever made, everybody needs one. It has a really wide range of sound, all packed with soul.
well, what do you expect the guy who designed it to say? |
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Location: Bluffton, SC | My understanding is that, in the perfect light, it may also solve pi... :D |
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Location: Up North | Originally posted by cwk2:
well, what do you expect the guy who designed it to say? In what other forum can you get a response like that? |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | I'll tell you the rest of the story tomorrow. |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | cwk2
It's a brilliant guitar. A Tone Monster. It will sustain for days. It's comfortable and lighter than a les paul. White is the coolest color, and you got the Schaller bridge which is awesome. This is the most underated guitar ever made, everybody needs one. It has a really wide range of sound, all packed with soul.
well, what do you expect the guy who designed it to say? cwk2,
That's very cool to be able to talk directly with the designer of the guitar ! I can't wait to hear the rest of the story .
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: Midland, MI | Was it the UKII or a different model that had the bowtie inlays? I have always thought those looked cool; a UKII in white with ebony board and bowties would be killer. |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | The white never had bowties. Only the black and brownburst
I always like the L5S. Ovation had 3 body shapes in the can. #1 became the Viper and #2 the preecheur. #3 never made it to production at the time. Fast forward several years.
There were thoughts that we should use the Foam to make a solid body in addition to the necks of the applesause and matrix.
With foam you only need a mold, sooo you don't need all that special carving on both the front and back to make a L5S. So we took body #3 and made a mahogony model and arched both sides. Mahogony had nice grain and reproduced it well in the foam. There's the body.
We knew that the foam by itself wasn't strong enough so it needed a skeleton. You can do wood but we had a nice foundry doing the necks for app/mtx for us so we designed an aluminium skeleton that had full contact with the bottom of the neck and pods in the back that the bridge adjustment screws anchored into. Aluminum gives great sustain, (remember at this time I was totally into Travis Beans) and the foam was nice and light so players didn't have to deal with the Les Paul shoulder syndrome. Also the foam was rather dry and hard on the inside, as opposed to styrofoam, so it would vibrate well instead of absorbing the vibrations.
The pickups needed to be really powerful so we went with thinner wire to get more wrapps(which gives more output, or so I was told) The bar polepieces picked up the string signal wherever you slid the string, so no dropout between polepieces. The magnets were put at the bottom of the bobbins so the pollpiece bars are not magnetized, you can get them real close to the string and not dampen the vibration.
We put the series parrallel switches on the pickups so the control cavity wouldn't be too clogged. Forward is fat sounding back is brighter, just like the selector switch works. 2 vol and tone like a LP. We went with the sterio/mono output cause we had so many of those plates left over from the preechers. I was against it but there were a gazillion of those parts left over and marketing thought that there might be someone out there who would like sterio...
The name came from Kaman Corporate who thought that the Ultra Kaman was nice. I thought it sucked and said so. They added the two to it to shut me up and say it was named after me. It still sucks but I shut up. So it was the UKII.
The first ones were black and the brown s/b with bow ties. The next color was requested by Tommy Mec who worked for Brian's guitars in New Haven. He wanteed white and the abalone neck. As it turned out the bowties were machined out of plastic and cost twice as much as real abalone. When I found that out it was pretty easy to make the decision to switch. The next color was the barnboard, grey to black s/b. It became real popular and over the next 15 years marketing would use it on everything that ever moved in Korea, cows, trucks, guitars. On the barn board UKs the non wood bodies looked more real that the mahogony necks painted this color!
In all the UK2 had about a 4 year run. At the end there were a bunch of different colors done and configurations, (chrome, dots etc) but it died just like every other Ovation solid body for all the same reasons. While it was 80%(or you pick the number less than 100) right it wasn't 100% and the market is unforgiving. It also didn't have a F or G on the peghead.
So be it, they still are cool guitars. I still have my original black one with bowties.
I'm sure I left something out but there's a brief history. |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | Thanks much, Bill. Sure makes me appreciate mine, an early s/b with bowties. Unlike the other solids, the headstock logo also appears to have been inlaid. |
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Location: Latitude 39.56819, Longitude -105.080066 | Prof....now you understand the value ;) |
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Location: Buffalo,NY | cwk2
Member # 7
The white never had bowties. Only the black and brownburst
I always like the L5S. Ovation had 3 body shapes in the can. #1 became the Viper and #2 the preecheur. #3 never made it to production at the time. Fast forward several years.
There were thoughts that we should use the Foam to make a solid body in addition to the necks of the applesause and matrix.
With foam you only need a mold, sooo you don't need all that special carving on both the front and back to make a L5S. So we took body #3 and made a mahogony model and arched both sides. Mahogony had nice grain and reproduced it well in the foam. There's the body.
We knew that the foam by itself wasn't strong enough so it needed a skeleton. You can do wood but we had a nice foundry doing the necks for app/mtx for us so we designed an aluminium skeleton that had full contact with the bottom of the neck and pods in the back that the bridge adjustment screws anchored into. Aluminum gives great sustain, (remember at this time I was totally into Travis Beans) and the foam was nice and light so players didn't have to deal with the Les Paul shoulder syndrome. Also the foam was rather dry and hard on the inside, as opposed to styrofoam, so it would vibrate well instead of absorbing the vibrations.
The pickups needed to be really powerful so we went with thinner wire to get more wrapps(which gives more output, or so I was told) The bar polepieces picked up the string signal wherever you slid the string, so no dropout between polepieces. The magnets were put at the bottom of the bobbins so the pollpiece bars are not magnetized, you can get them real close to the string and not dampen the vibration.
We put the series parrallel switches on the pickups so the control cavity wouldn't be too clogged. Forward is fat sounding back is brighter, just like the selector switch works. 2 vol and tone like a LP. We went with the sterio/mono output cause we had so many of those plates left over from the preechers. I was against it but there were a gazillion of those parts left over and marketing thought that there might be someone out there who would like sterio...
The name came from Kaman Corporate who thought that the Ultra Kaman was nice. I thought it sucked and said so. They added the two to it to shut me up and say it was named after me. It still sucks but I shut up. So it was the UKII.
The first ones were black and the brown s/b with bow ties. The next color was requested by Tommy Mec who worked for Brian's guitars in New Haven. He wanteed white and the abalone neck. As it turned out the bowties were machined out of plastic and cost twice as much as real abalone. When I found that out it was pretty easy to make the decision to switch. The next color was the barnboard, grey to black s/b. It became real popular and over the next 15 years marketing would use it on everything that ever moved in Korea, cows, trucks, guitars. On the barn board UKs the non wood bodies looked more real that the mahogony necks painted this color!
In all the UK2 had about a 4 year run. At the end there were a bunch of different colors done and configurations, (chrome, dots etc) but it died just like every other Ovation solid body for all the same reasons. While it was 80%(or you pick the number less than 100) right it wasn't 100% and the market is unforgiving. It also didn't have a F or G on the peghead.
So be it, they still are cool guitars. I still have my original black one with bowties.
I'm sure I left something out but there's a brief history. Bill,
Thank you so much for that history; I am really psyched about getting the guitar now; probably won't be here till next week but I'll give a full report. It's very kind of you to share that with me and I really appreciate it.
Regards,
Tom |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | The early ones had pickguards till we ran out of the brackets to hold them off the body. We ditched them after that, nobody really uses them anyway. The necks were basically Preecheur deluxe necks after the abalone switch. |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | The only thing that would make the UKII better would be to make one with a wood top. Oh... they did :) |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Yeah, just one and you have it! It's the core of an Adamas top molded onto the top of the body. I wonder if the Adamas top core adds sound? |
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Location: Houston, TX | Hey Bill - did you have another name in mind? Just curious. |
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Location: NJ | "HenryF@cker". |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Henry didn't come till after 85.
I don't remember what the other choices were. |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | Originally posted by cwk2:
Yeah, just one and you have it! It's the core of an Adamas top molded onto the top of the body. I wonder if the Adamas top core adds sound? Maybe "add" isn't exactly the right word, but it does change the sound slightly. When compared to my other UKII's there seems to be a subtle difference on that one that I can only attribute to the wood. A slightly different tone, and slightly different sustain. I like it's sound a little more, but I'm sure it's uniqueness factors in as well. The easiest way to "hear" the change is to cranck it up and let a note turn into feedback. The woodtop UKII sounds richer at that point then the others, and it's easily noticeable that it's different. |
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What can you tell me about the Ovation UK II electric guitar?