In this short video we take a look at a Vintage Made in USA house branded budget guitar from the mid-60s. Complete with the famous DeArmond foil pickups.
Just watched Steel Beans on the Andertons channel and he was playing the exact same Silvertone guitar. They were trying to figure out how those pickups worked; being raised off the scratch plate. And now you’ve shown it. So cool!
That same style of tubular flat apring material was also used as shielding inside late 1950s tube hifi equipment such as Scott and Fisher, to bring the AC wires up to the front panel to the on off switch without radiating hum into the preamp. I'm older than dirt but I never actually saw that stuff for sale anywhere and I have to wonder where the manufacturers got it from because it almost looks like something that was left over from turning metal on a lathe! I believe I also saw actual round wire springs used for the same purpose in some audio equipment from back then. The one caveat is that some alloys of spring steel cannot be soldered to.
Nice guitar. I recently picked up a Holiday branded one of these and I love it, super resonant, great couch guitar. One thing I always do on old Harmonys is drill a hole from the control cavity to the tailpiece and run a ground line with a quick disconnect so you can work on the wiring easily enough. These arent exactly 59 bursts, so I feel fine with an invisible, very beneficial modification.
Very cool. I have a couple of Harmonys, an 1963 H17 Silhouette (I know they call them BobKats now but it was Silhouette back in the day) and an H59 Rocket III, 1967. A bunch of years ago in the early days of eBay, I picked up one of these, an H19. The seller was less than honest about the condition, dead pickup, neck issues, beat to shit (there was one photo and that wasn't too clear. I ended up sending it back but, man I really loved those. Now they're close to or well over a grand. With all my guitars I can't justify it. Big fat neck.
