Old Kawai Archtop guitar

[Acidhouse]

I have been wanting an archtop/jazz box style guitar for a while. Last weekend I was fortunate enough to find an old Kawai for $15.00 at a garage sale. It needs some work but it looks beautiful. The old toaster pickups work perfectly without any hum. The back looks to be birch. The neck looks like mahogany. The top and sides are a bit of a mystery. It needs a nut, bridge, and a small repair around the neck joint. I would love to have some info on this guitar. I don't know if anyone is familar with these old Kawais. I actually found a British site for Kawais but they are more dedicated to the 70s Kawai solid body electrics.

Also, I would like to make some repairs but since this is an Asian guitar and I am guessing from the 1960s from the looks, I'm not sure what parts will work. Here is a link for a GFS bridge. Does anyone know if that would work?
Here is a link for a new nut but I am not sure which one to order.
Last, here is a picture of the old beauty. Thank you in advance.

[Bassassin]

Lovely old guitar. I see no reason why the bridge wouldn't be fine, although it might be worth checking the neck width & necessary string spacing first - some older MIJ guitars have narrow necks & tight string spacing. As the guitar has a trem system, maybe roller saddles might be a good idea.

As far as the nut's concerned, because this guitar has a zero-fret, the nut's only acting as a string guide. I'd be inclined to find a pre-cut plastic nut (which it likely would have had originally) of the correct width, and simply file the base to get the correct height.

BTW do you have a link for the Kawai site you mentioned?

Jon.

[Acidhouse]

Jon, thank you for the info. That picture was actually taken at the garage sale. I spent last weekend polishing, cleaning and doing lemon oil treatments and it is a real beauty. I just need to get it up and running again. The website is a very simple . Just looking at that site made me want to start picking up a 70s Kawai solid body.

[Bassassin]

Thanks for the link - nice little site & I'm surprised I haven't come across it before.

I should send him some pics of my Kawai Sleekline bass - although I'd have to put it back to stock first - it's ever-so-slightly modified at the moment:



It should look like this:



Sorry for hijacking your thread!

J.

[Bob K]

Nice find, Acidhouse! Not bad for 15 balloons!! All I ever see at garage sales are baby clothes and chipped coffee mugs...

I'd love to see a shot of it cleaned up.

Bob

[Rufus]

I have a different kawai archtop with the exact same neck from 1968. The neck feels great, it should play nice once you get it set up well

[johnnyb]

definitely check the size of the bridge before you put one on. looks like a narrow 60's neck and modern bridges just wont fit. maybe think about a rosewood bridge as opposed to metal, they are more forgiving on the spacing. do some measurements, a 16th of an inch can be a lot.

[Rufus]

It is definitely a pretty narrow neck at least compared to the Gibsons that I am used to. The bridge that came on mine was a bit warped and it screwed up the radius on the strings so it was really hard to play chords up the neck. I put a compensated rosewood bridge on and cut the grooves in the saddle myself. If you take that route it should be easy to set up. Nice tone also.

[johnnyb]

those pickups are pretty nice an that guitar. i picked up an old kawai a few months ago and now im obsessed with them. ive since picked up a set of just the pickups and also another solid body guitar with them in it as well. ill have 3 guitars when im done with them. in the neck position they are very fat and clean, they overdrive nice too, although they can feedback. but im going to take a day and dip all my 60's pups in wax to try and fix that about them.

[cheepaxes]

Rufus,

Can you describe the procedure you used to cut new grooves in the saddle?

-Scott