... MiJ guitars from the 70s & 80s that almost nobody has ever heard of
The KS range - the "proper" ones - proper woods, proper quality, proper heavy. KS11XL - KS12XL - KS12XL - KS11XL
The 11s added a hefty maple top but lost the phase mini-toggle switch compared to the 12s. The plain mahogany 11 was my first Kawai, the 12 on the left was the guitar that off my original Kawai quest. Took about 10 years before I found that one (by which time, I'd found a fair few others).
Perfect shape, no bling, great guitar!
The Fs.F-I, F-1-12, F-III
Where the KS range was beauty-through-simplicity, the F range (a few years later) was more of a "how complicated can we make these things" design.
The FI-12 is as common as the proverbial rocking horse shit.
The on-board electronics include a pre-amp on/off and level control, a boost/off/distortion switch, a varitone circuit, and the coil tap and phase reversal switches carried over from the KS12.
Couple of oddballs ...
The "rock & roll star" model
What else would I do on a locked-down, warm & sunny Good Friday!!
Comments
Every day is a school day. Even bank holiday.
Nice looking collection either way mate!
The yard is nothing but a fence, the sun just hurts my eyes...
https://i.imgur.com/3IUZVtn.jpg
.... although I did put @sweepy onto his (and he's just reminded me of something I need to do for him!!)
The F range also reminds me of the Alembic models - But in the late 70's many MIJ models favoured this thru' neck approach - jam sandwich vibe
Not sure who distributed them in the UK - assume the same as the Kawai piano company - If so that might have been part of the issue in that the suit and tie accounts would have been offered product lines and not the 'rock shops'
When they pulled out in 1980 (I think) Tim Gentle then bought up the remaining UK stock and sold them off ... that's when I bought mine.
Tim still had a (much-modded) KS11XL last time I had any contact with him.
Original ad from back in the day;
I recall Tim Gentle having a shop in Southend and his adverts - He still uses that same logo now with a shop in the North East - Is it still Tim who runs it ?
Seems that "Stentor Music" picked up distribution later on through - mid 80s when the Aquarius range were about.
Tim was certainly still running the business about 5 years ago.
HarrySeven - Intangible Asset Appraiser & Wrecker of Civilisation. Searching for weird guitars - so you don't have to.
Forum feedback thread. | G&B interview #1 & #2 | https://www.instagram.com/_harry_seven_/
NO
Mind, it took me a while to persuade the previous owner to part with it!!
Seriously, those R'R Stars are fairly rare. Even by the standards of Kawais, the R'n'R stars are tough to find. But you never know. I saw the one that Sweepy bought - he found it via a PSA thread that I started here. I'll do the same again if I ever find another R'n'R star for sale.
Ash @OilCityPickups had/had one (I swapped it for a set of p'ups in years gone by), and I know of a few more out there in the wild, but I think I could count them all on the fingers of one hand.
I should probably give the website some TLC and get it up Google's search rankings again. I found a few of my collection that way - or, more accurately, they found me. Since I stopped buying them, I've not really bothered with the site, just leave it there as a bit of free information to other Kawai owners out there.