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Is this Sunburst legit?


thoro

Question

Hi,

I just bought my first Hamer guitar (or at least I hope it is one), mentioned in this thread.

It arrived today and although I knew it was refinished some things look strange, maybe because of the clean finish. At least the neck looks played :-). I would like to know if this is really a Hamer Sunburst.

  • No serial number and a water decal Logo, the seller says this is because of the complete refinish.
  • The binding seems to be a bit too thin, bright and new – maybe the person who did the refinish renewed the binding? Maybe the binding was the cause for the new finish?
  • The chrome of the bridge looks just new, I'm not sure if the saddles are original, one looks different from the others.
  • The pickups are DiMarzios but to me they sound quite hot. The pickup cavities look like they have been rerouted a bit.
  • Taking a look into the pickup cavities I just can't tell if the veneer has to be this thin and if the neck joint looks original (last image below).
  • The pots and switch seem to be original, the cavity cover is a thin metal plate. It has a jack plate instead of a flush mount jack.
  • It came with a printed "certificate" saying "Congratulations on your acquisition... Please take a few moments to join our registry... www.hamerguitars.com/registry" – in 1979/80?  Without a serial number? Maybe from a later Hamer guitar or just fake?
  • The seller says that he bought it from an ex Hamer dealer who did the refinish and sold it to him.

After setting it up properly (the intonation for example was not set at all) it plays and sounds good.

I took a few photos. Can somebody please have a look at them and tell me his/her thoughts?

Thank you very much!

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22 answers to this question

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There are a lot of scratches on the head for a refin though. Other than that it's a well made refin. Very original and highly sustaining guitar. The original Hamer Dimarzios had been hotter than the regular market versions as far as I know. That explains your impression and underlines the originality.

Great guitar!

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From looking at the slug posts on the Dimarzio's they look time period correct. The should sound great. Very sensitive to pick up height and screw post adjustements. Mess with them until you find your sweet spots. When you do, they will sound as good as any expensive boutique paf out there today.

Binding looks okay and original. Refin looks like its done right. Congrats on a great looking Sunburst!

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I agree that the "certificate" is not appropriate for the guitar.  I wouldn't like the absence of a serial number and original logo, either.  But it does look like a sustain block Hamer.  The maple top in the sustain block period was thin, more of a veneer than a cap, if I understand correctly.

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Thank you very much for your evaluation! This helped a lot.

 

On 8.2.2018 at 8:32 AM, gorch said:

There are a lot of scratches on the head for a refin though. Other than that it's a well made refin. Very original and highly sustaining guitar. The original Hamer Dimarzios had been hotter than the regular market versions as far as I know. That explains your impression and underlines the originality.

Great guitar!

The logo decal has been applied by the one who sold it to me, he sealed it with a thin layer of clear coat and it looks like he didn't polish it. The previous owner who told him he is a former Hamer dealer in the Netherlands sold it to him on a vintage guitar show in Veenendaal a few months ago. He was the one who commissioned the refinish. The finish looks really well done, without any flaws. I will polish the headstock this weekend.

 

On 8.2.2018 at 11:38 AM, Disturber said:

From looking at the slug posts on the Dimarzio's they look time period correct. The should sound great. Very sensitive to pick up height and screw post adjustements. Mess with them until you find your sweet spots. When you do, they will sound as good as any expensive boutique paf out there today.

Binding looks okay and original. Refin looks like its done right. Congrats on a great looking Sunburst!

I think I found a good pickup height. Really like the tone of the pickups, especially the neck pickup.

 

On 8.2.2018 at 2:14 PM, mrjamiam said:

I agree that the "certificate" is not appropriate for the guitar.  I wouldn't like the absence of a serial number and original logo, either.  But it does look like a sustain block Hamer.  The maple top in the sustain block period was thin, more of a veneer than a cap, if I understand correctly.

Read about the thin veneer in the "Ultimate" book, too. Seems like Paul Hamer preferred the tone of a Les Paul Goldtop and found out it had no maple cap.

Haha, the "certificate" is printed on a sheet of A4 paper – just fishy. The only reasonable thing I could imagine is that maybe the "former Hamer dealer" from the Netherlands printed these sheets for other Hamer guitars he sold in the early 2000s. Im not sure if there ever was a working URL "www.hamerguitars.com/registry".

And I don't know why somebody installed a jack plate. At least I have never seen a photo of a Sunburst with a jack plate. Whatever...

 

The Sunburst is fun to play and sounds good. When I bought it I worried that the neck may be too thin for me, but it feels good and supports fluid playing.

Here are a few additional photos of the whole guitar.

Cheers

Thorsten

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People install jack plates like the one on your Sunburst because the barrel jacks that Hamer used sometimes fail and are hard to find.....  My 1978 Sunburst has had a LP-like jack plate installed before  I purchased her in 1983...... 

https://imgur.com/pudhDWI

 

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Thank you very much, guys!

I played it a few hours and it is a real joy to play. Will take it to my band's rehearsal next week.

bondedbybrick: Wow, your Sunburst looks great and your explanation makes sense. Two Sunbursts (1978/1979) popped up at a German vintage dealer and one of them has a jack plate, too.

Cheers

Thorsten

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There are some clues to its age.

The close dots on the finger-board tell me it is post-Holmes, so 1980 onwards.

The bridge is authentic. Because they are smaller saddles, that makes it 1981 (or at least very late 1980) onwards. But there are small gaps between the saddles, a phenomenon seen mostly on 1981 guitars from earlier in that year. By later 1981 the bridge plate intonation holes were drawn in and the saddles a tighter fit.

The octave side dots gap kept changing around 1980-81, and can provide further clues as to the production date.

It looks a very good refinish, by the way.

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1 hour ago, kizanski said:

Didn't the one piece neck end in '79?

I have the exact serial number somewhere - "9  1016"? - but, yes, in mid-79 they went three-piece, although they were still made by Holmes for a few more months (wide octave dots are the best indicator).

I am pretty sure I can see a three-piece neck in the pickup cavity on this one.

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3 hours ago, Andrew said:

I am pretty sure I can see a three-piece neck in the pickup cavity on this one.

That would change things.
I don't see it, but I will yield to your expertise.

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On 2/7/2018 at 7:40 PM, thoro said:

Hi,

I just bought my first Hamer guitar (or at least I hope it is one), mentioned in this thread.

It arrived today and although I knew it was refinished some things look strange, maybe because of the clean finish. At least the neck looks played :-). I would like to know if this is really a Hamer Sunburst.

  • No serial number and a water decal Logo, the seller says this is because of the complete refinish.
  • The binding seems to be a bit too thin, bright and new – maybe the person who did the refinish renewed the binding? Maybe the binding was the cause for the new finish?
  • The chrome of the bridge looks just new, I'm not sure if the saddles are original, one looks different from the others.
  • The pickups are DiMarzios but to me they sound quite hot. The pickup cavities look like they have been rerouted a bit.
  • Taking a look into the pickup cavities I just can't tell if the veneer has to be this thin and if the neck joint looks original (last image below).
  • The pots and switch seem to be original, the cavity cover is a thin metal plate. It has a jack plate instead of a flush mount jack.
  • It came with a printed "certificate" saying "Congratulations on your acquisition... Please take a few moments to join our registry... www.hamerguitars.com/registry" – in 1979/80?  Without a serial number? Maybe from a later Hamer guitar or just fake?
  • The seller says that he bought it from an ex Hamer dealer who did the refinish and sold it to him.

After setting it up properly (the intonation for example was not set at all) it plays and sounds good.

I took a few photos. Can somebody please have a look at them and tell me his/her thoughts?

Thank you very much!

01.jpg

02.jpg

03.jpg

04.jpg05.jpg

06.jpg

07.jpg

08.jpg

09.jpg

10.jpg

11.jpg

12.jpg

15.jpg

13.jpg

14.jpg

Yeah! Good Luck with that! Welcome to the CULT!!! It's not as bad as it seems! 

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20 hours ago, Andrew said:

There are some clues to its age.

The close dots on the finger-board tell me it is post-Holmes, so 1980 onwards.

The bridge is authentic. Because they are smaller saddles, that makes it 1981 (or at least very late 1980) onwards. But there are small gaps between the saddles, a phenomenon seen mostly on 1981 guitars from earlier in that year. By later 1981 the bridge plate intonation holes were drawn in and the saddles a tighter fit.

The octave side dots gap kept changing around 1980-81, and can provide further clues as to the production date.

It looks a very good refinish, by the way.

Andrew, you know your stuff. The Ex-ex-owner said that it is a 1981 model. I posted a photo of the side dots below.

The neck seems to be made of three pieces, it's hard to see it on the neck but you can see the stripes on the back of the headstock.

Yes, the refinish looks really good to me, too. Polished the headstock last weekand, it had been dull on front and backside when I bought the guitar.

I think I will replace the three volume/tone knobs with black top-hat knobs.

Sounds and feels like the D'Addario strings the seller put on it were new, so I just kept em on the guitar. Spent a few hours playing the Sunburst and now it sounds better and better. Great guitar. Chords really shine and it is a joy to experiment with picking strength.

 

13 hours ago, geowolves said:

Yeah! Good Luck with that! Welcome to the CULT!!! It's not as bad as it seems! 

Haha, thank you.

 

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My "wandering side-dots" hypothesis would suggest this is in the 1 3300 - 1 4300 region.

Although my method is highly fallible as necks were not always used in the order they were made. I have two consecutive numbered 1981 guitars with different spacings on the side dots.

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8 hours ago, kizanski said:

Whatever the year, you need to do something about that action.

Nice striping in the rosewood:D

May I suggest Skulls of Death for the knobs?

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Ouch that fingernail looks b-b-b-b-bad.  bad to the bone.  you should have a blacksmith take a look at that.    Cheers!

caddie

 

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Andrew: Thank you, that's interesting. I'm currently reading the "Ultimate" book and really like this kind of background information and stories behind the guitars.

kizanski: Hey, I like it that way. Maybe it looks a bit higher on the photo than it actually is.

caddie: Haha, nice suggestion :-)

Took the guitar to rehearsal yesterday and the pickups are too microphonic so it was hard to play it at high volume. I'm used to that on vintage guitars so I brought a backup guitar with me.

Now I'm thinking about wax potting the DiMarzios (did that a few times before on other guitars from that era) or keeping them as they are and replacing them with two DiMarzio PAF or maybe Air Classic pickups. I had a set of zebra DiMarzio pickups and the creme bobbins looked really bad, grey and as if they were painted.

Maybe putting some foam beneath the humbuckers will help? I tried that with other guitars and it never did much...  I always ended up wax potting them.

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After playing the guitar a while the behaviour of the volume pots seemed strange to me, I was not able to use them to clean the distortion. I read that the Hamer pots are slightly different than other pots but it just seemed strange so I took a look at the wiring and saw that whoever assembled the guitar after refinishing did it wrong (picture in first post).

I rewired the volume pots and replaced the capacitor – and I replaced the microphonic DiMarzios with wax potted PAF copies in double cream and zebra colour. I'll keep the original unpotted DiMarzios as they are. I tried to use them but my band is just too loud and I like to play the Sunburst live. The taper of the Hamer pots (now) sounds good to me, they clean up nicely.

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Don't wax pot those Dimarzio's. You will ruin them forever. I have/have had them in many old Hamer's. Squealling has never been a problem for me. And I play pretty loud through and old Marshall JMP. When I play live I almost always use an old Sunburst with these pickups. Never had problems with feedback.

Are you playing high gain? What amp are you using? Any mean dirt pedals? Try to move away from the amp, don't stand right next to it if you play loud.

If they squeal try to put some foam material under the pickup that it keeps it from vibrating. And check that the screws that holds the bobbins to the base plate are tight. (Don't over tighten them, that can break the plastic.)

I know a vintage collector who uses these in a vintage LP. They are that good, the old Dimarzio paf's. The fact that they are unpotted is a big key to how great they sound. Real vintage Gibson paf's were never potted. 

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I really like their tone and I'll keep them unpotted as they are. That's why I replaced them with low output wax potted pickups.

I don't use that much gain, but we are playing quite loud. Our rehearsal room is small so it's not possible for me to avoid the squealing. I tightened the base plate screws, fixed the loose polepiece screws with rubber rings and put foam under the pickups. But the feedback was still uncontrollable and so I put in the other pickups. Maybe in the future I'll play a setup with an amp shield and In Ear Monitoring, who knows.

 

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