Hayman 1010

This British made solid body electric guitar dates from 1973 (April 30, to be precise) It has three passive pickups with master volume and tone and a three position Strat style switch.
The body is made of obeche (oh-beach-ee) a soft light colored mahogany-like wood from Africa. It contains a chamber with springs that the through-body strings pass through; an innovation Hayman called a "Vibrasonic Tone Chamber". It seems to increase sustain. The scratch plate is clear gray-tinted plastic with an aluminum inlay where the controls mount. The name and model are prominently displayed on this part. The original finish was a thick, clear polyurethane, with a lot of checking. It has since been repainted a mellow ivory color. The double cutaway body shape is Weird British--a kind of combination of a somewhat stretched-out Tele and a squashed Melody Maker.
The neck is maple with a maple fingerboard, it's bound with black plastic with white side markers. there are black dot position markers. It has 21 medium frets plus a zero fret on a 25 1/2 inch scale. The neck is very narrow and thin, and the action is very low, typical of European guitars; Hayman called it "Slender-Slim". Grover Tuners are original and still smooth and tight. The headstock has a clear plastic insert with a Hayman logo and four string trees.

The pickups are different from any I've ever seen. They're mounted on a steel plate that holds several large magnets and steel cores for the coils. The coils are scatter-wound and bound in mylar tape. They consist of relatively few turns and are just slipped over the cores, and have plastic and metal covers. For years, this instrument had cheap Strat style pickups, but I was lucky to get "new old stock" originals from Brandoni Custom Guitars in London, in honor of its 35th year restoration.

The bridge is a hardtail, fully adjustable for intonation, string height, spacing, and arch. The bridge height adjustment thumbwheels are reversible allowing the bridge to rock in combination with a Bigsby B5, which was an original option. Strings go through the body.

I bought this guitar during my punk rock/experimental/performance art phase, and usually played it with a lot of distortion, gain on the amp cranked, a Small Stone phase shifter and a digital delay. It just plain roared, but retained a lot of detail and articulation.
Nowadays I'm into Americana, and it's just right for the folk/roots/country rock I like to play. I would describe its tone in one word: sweet.
I mostly play it through a Line 6 Tone Port DI box, and Gear Box Gold software. Ocasionally I'll use my Fender Sidekick Bass 30 or my vintage 1968 Univox U-45 amplifiers. Effects include Arion Stereo Chorus, Stolz Rockman, or Zoom B1-x boxes.
When gain is cranked the pickups become fairly microphonic, but in sort of a good way, picking up body tone. Otherwise its pretty quiet, with scarcely any hum.
I generally use the bridge/middle position on the 5-way switch I installed on it, and sometimes the middle only. It can go from a thin Telecasterish tone on just bridge to more like a vintage mahogany SG Standard on just neck, but it doesn't really sound like anything else.
Bottom line, it's a versatile rhythm guitar. I've heard a friend play jazz on it and it holds up pretty good there, too.
There's not much I dislike about it--I'm a long-time fan of single- coils and softwood bodies. Mostly I like it for being different.

Meh, it was a cheap, 25 year old pawn shop guitar when I bought it, it's a 35 year old refinished and restored guitar now.

Overall, the craftsmanship is fine, the design and materials are somewhat odd, but suitable to me. I believe the original thick urethane finish deadened the tone, but the new hard enamel finish has worked out.

Hardware and components were probably the best available at the time it was made. I'll rate a 9 because it's gotten better after repair/restoration/refinishing.

If I didn't happen to be a bass player, I would definitely gig with it, and I have in the past.

I would bear in mind that the body is brittle and has has cracked twice before and been repaired; I would fit it with straplocks if it went out of the house with any regularity.

I could definitely depend on it, otherwise.

Not applicable.

I've been playing 42 years, and have owned close to 40 guitars in my life. Other instruments I own are a Carvin LB75 bass--circa 1998, a Jay Turser acoustic/electric bass of unknown but fairly recent vintage, and a Sigma 12-string dreadnaught that's maybe 25 years old.
If it were lost, I doubt I could replace it. I've been offered $1000 for it recently, but refused the offer.

What I love about it is just that I've had it for a long time, and its grown very comfortable. It fits my body and my ears, and it just got better after restoration. I also like the fact that it's unique, I've always liked weird guitars, like my old Hagstrom 12-string and Fender Malibu and Electric XII, and my old guitar-shaped Hofner bass.

When I bought it, I wasn't looking for a guitar, I was helping a friend pick one out. She tried every guitar in the store and rejected this one for being too damn ugly, despite the fact that it was both the cheapest and best in the whole store. She bought a crap Epiphone, and I ran back the next day and grabbed up this one.

I'd kind of like to put a Bigsby B5 on it, but I'm afraid it would lose its sustain. I'm planning to put an EMG SPC active Presence Control in place of the tone pot, which I never use anyway - plenty of room inside for a battery without surgery needed.

I'd just like to encourage folks to take a second look in the dusty corners for those oddball instruments. You just never know what you might find.