Have an EM19ECS, almost 20 years ago. The finish bubbled, common fault, they refinshed the whole guitar, set it up too...absolutely beautiful guitar to gaze upon, play, and the sound...spectacular.
I love Tacoma Instruments and have 22 of them including 3 mandolins and 3 Basses. It's a shame that they had finish issues and some of mine have the Tacoma rash but most of my high end models I got lucky and found some with no rash at all. Either way I just find them a joy to play and the sound is amazing.
Lowkey I have a problem passing a good condition Tacoma up. Have collected close to 20 years now and for the price you can get them no one beats them. Awesome video
I have an OP-2 made in Indonesia, I bought it a long time ago for $50, don't even remember where or if new or used just that I paid $50 for it. I think it was used but not sure exactly. I bought it for my kids to play when they were little but they never really did so it sat for years. I one day took it out, cleaned it up and put a bone bridge and saddle on it along with Grover mini tuners, did a proper set up, installed a JDL Bridge Dr on it and I also drilled out three holes on the top side upper bout about an inch apart, one next to the neck about an inch and a 5/8 then next to it one about an inch and a 3/4 and one more next to that about 2 1/8 inches. It looks and sounds really cool and plays very well. Its not real loud like a larger guitar but louder then it originally was and the sound now flows out and up to your ears. Saw a guy on you tube that did this to his guitar so I though hell yeah, the Tacoma is getting this hack. I have many fine guitars and find I play this one as much or more then any of the others just because it plays so well and is so small its easy to just have lying close by. I also take it camping a lot. Great beater guitar for sure.
I own a Tacoma Roadking that I picked up on a killer deal from GC some 20 years ago. It's a great all solid wood guitar with a unique look and some very cool features like the paisley soundhole and paisly bridge. The neck is bolted on with no heal and at the 15th fret. While this is blasphemy to some old school acoustic guys, it makes the guitar really easy to play and you can get to the high registers. I also owned an Olympia OM-C in a really cool blue finish. It featured the paisley soundhole too and played really well for the $100 bucks I bought it for. I gave the Olympia to a nephew and who knows where it ended up; I really wish I had kept it. I would love to get a Tacoma Chief and I'm always looking out for one in good condition but they are getting harder and harder to find nowadays. Sad that Fender killed the brand .
Hi. Nice video. I am from Indonesia and still have one. Acoustic model with one cutaway. It's been buried in my shed for years until i found it couples week ago. I think it made in Indonesia, back in the days when olympia can be found easily here in music shop. These days they're all gone. The silly is when i show it to friends. They askwd then what guitar is this.. like they never know it, i believe they don't. Then one of them started to play it and he was amazed with the sound and playability.. like whoa.. it's far better than any "beginner" guitars people used to buy on the shops today. It is. And i said that you can't find this brand anymore here. It's gone. So i will keep this lost guitar 🎸☺️
Great video. I have owned a couple of Tacoma guitars through the years. I don’t remember the models and one had finish issues. However I still have two Olympia OP-2 3/4 size guitars. I think the body is sapele or something similar. Great little guitars. Not the greatest tone but since they were budget guitars and somewhat travel worthy long before that was all the rage it’s not bad. They were built like a brick house. Solid and perfect for couch sitting and campfires or taking to festivals. The necks feel good and they paid attention to important details like bracing, quality glues, and fret work. The tuners have been replaced by me but that’s always an issue with a budget guitar. I bought one of them in 2004 or 2005 years before Fender and Recording King and the like were making 3/4 size budget guitars (Yamaha excelled at this as far back as the 1960s as you well know). The second one belonged to my girlfriend’s youngest son who was 9. He learned a few chords but was more interested in painting and soccer. To make a long story short she and I have been married for many years now and I adopted the 9 year old. He is now 26 and has a wife of his own and working on building his family and career. Me? I have both of those Olympias hanging on the wall in my music room. One is set up for bottleneck slide and the other with low action. I’ve never known the history of Tacoma and Olympia. Thanks for your informative video and it’s really great to see someone else appreciate this company’s efforts to build affordable quality instruments that are still floating around in the used market.
Wonderful story, thank you for sharing your experience with Olympia! I didn't show the back of the headstock in this video, because the previous owner had replaced the tuners with Ping's , and it left the original screwholes showing. I'm sure the Ping's are an improvement, but I wish I had the original tuners too. Let me ask you, did the tuners you replaced have the Olympia logo embossed on the back, like the Tacoma's did? Or were they just plain?
@@PinetopJackson They did not have the logo on them. They were the typical “pyramid” style tuners used on many budget guitars. They weren’t terrible but it was an improvement putting some Gotoh tuners I had in a drawer of parts on them.
I know. I actually found an OP-2 in my junkyard and fixed it up last week. It's killer and I'm going to take it up to North Carolina to play some gigs.
Killer guitars; I’ve got a Tacoma PM20 and a DR20. Correction, the factory was in New Hartford CT. Worth noting, the mighty Travis Meeks of Days of the New played Tacomas early on - they appear on the “Green” album.
Awesome man, I bet those Tacoma's sound incredible! The original factory was in Tacoma WA. When Fender bought them out and later closed the Tacoma factory down, they SAID they intended to resume Tacoma production in New Hartford CT, but it didn't happen. I remember Days of the New! Didn't know the guy played Tacoma, I'll have to check out some old videos!
Oh fender knew exactly what they were doing. If you play a fender acoustic next to a Tacoma there is no comparison fender acoustics suck. They were killing competition
