I'm leaning towards thinking that maybe it could be possible (although I'm not sure), that my beloved Col Joye is not MIJ at all, but was built right here in Australia by the Pacific Guitar Company.
The floating bridge and the camping cookware tail-piece, as well as the neat stencilled fretmarkers and the painted rosette and binding are all too similar.
Other pics (Thanks Spud for the link):
http://vintagecowboyguitars.com/images/aus_03.jpg
http://vintagecowboyguitars.com/images/aus_02.jpg
So you can sleep a little better Sneakypete....
EDIT: So how come there are Made In Japan stickers on some of them?
Well it looks like that the full-sized instruments did come from Japan, but the 3/4 sized were locally produced by Pacific.
Statistics: Posted by PickerAUS — Tue Apr 07, 2009 6:58 am
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I was like a little kid!
I materialized in the loungeroom seconds later, cut the packing away and I found the cheapest, nastiest piece of 50s/60s crap.
It turns out to be a 3/4 size version of what I thought I was getting.
Everything is painted - no inlays at all. Pure plywood. No lamination or anything like that - just plywood.
Tuner had been replaced - 2 lefts don't make a right!
Stuffed pegs
Forget glue! Let's just screw it in place!
I don't know why I took a pic of this. At least it's not cracked.
Remember those 50s and 60s aluminium (aluminum) cooking pots? Same grade here....
The thinnest plastic. Warped with age. The strings were very taut and bowed the top over the years. It's just not playable.
Nice stencilled top though - sort of...
Now compare those pics to this currently on the market for $395
EDIT: http://www.grouseguitars.com.au/sold/coljoye.htm
Check the 'more pics' link at the bottom.
<sigh!>
Statistics: Posted by PickerAUS — Wed Feb 04, 2009 12:10 am
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If you think you've got the disease, you might feel better after you watch this video of a collector in Arkansas that collects cowboy stencil guitars. Interestingly, he mentions the name of a luthier in Australia where he sent his Gene Autry for bridge repair. Strange he couldn't find someone closer to home to fix it for him.
We look forward to your better quality pictures.
Statistics: Posted by VintAxe — Thu Jan 29, 2009 8:10 pm
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OK I've got the disease....
I just bought this and I'm expecting delivery early next week.
It's a 'Col Joye Model'. Col Joye was one of the first R&R stars in Australia and a local music importer/distributor called Nicholsons had them made in Japan from 1960. I'm pretty sure that they stopped selling it by 1965.
This one is special cause of the hawaiian scene.
The only other one I've been able to find is on the Powerhouse Museum site: http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collect ... es=&c=&s=1
There's a handy little + icon so you can zoom in and check the condition of theirs, which is really poor IMHO.
I'll post better pics when I get it, as the image above is from Ebay.
Statistics: Posted by PickerAUS — Thu Jan 29, 2009 6:28 am
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