Hondo 734 Deluxe Series

22 frt twin humbucker....shitty tuners (replaced with goto) bought this guitar as my first in 1978 and use it to practise with at home.........I love it mainly for sentimental reasons (saying that I have bid for the occasional one that appears on ebay) I love the red body it polishes up superbly. The thin neck makes it easy to play.

I would swap the pick ups as the sound is nothing like my Tele

action is low and easily adjusted

still going strong since '78 without any maintainance although I don't use for gigs

none Hondo is gone now ........tragic in my opinion. If someone bought the name and re-introduced the quality they would make a fortune

Will keep this guitar till the day I die

Beautiful guitar, a standard SG copy, but with only 1 tone & 1 volume rather than Gibsons 2 vol 2 tone standard. Much better in my opinion, less fussy. Oh and no pickguard either. Lovely deep red stain finish, really lets the grain shine through, absolutely no doubt that this a mahogany guitar (looks like a single slab too), no doubt at all. Bolt on mahogany neck, crappy tuners, bone nut. Solid tailpiece and tune-o-matic though.

Someone in a review above stated this guitar was "only good for beginners". Perhaps his guitar was a lemon but for my guitar that is absolutely false. However, the problem is the pickups. They suck, and need changing, but as a player it plays lovely. Still, spend 5 minutes with your setup and you can get a reasonable sound out of it. I'll be swapping out the pickups, but they'll do for now.

Hell, this is an old guitar, buckle rash, chips etc are here and there, and it looks like the finish is probably a bit delicate in places, a little britte. But it is a nice shade of deep red, real real nice shade for all the dings a guitar picks up in its tours of duty. As I said before, real beautiful grain on my example.

Simple guitars, like tele's or this 'un are dependable. But who gigs without backup ? Stupid kids who don't know any better. I'd gig it with no sweat however, but I'd never gig without a backup. Defintely a solid guitar.

No chance, Hondo's long gone. Shame, they made good instruments.

I'd be heart-broken if I had this guitar stolen from me. Its a real find, if you see one of these, give it a try. If you like it, snatch it up, I got mine for the equivalent of $80 and I would have paid 5 times that amount. This is a good guitar, period.

1970's made in korea, 22 fret,2 humbucker type pickups, two tone controls and three way selector.
Haven't a clue what wood it is but whatever it is, it's solid.

It's a Gibson SG copy in a cherry red laquered finish. It looks Good.

Neck is smaller than a Gibson, makes it easy to play.

I did play through a graphic equaliser amp once and it sounded a lot better. It sounds quite good with volume controls on guitar quite low and amplifier settings quite high.

The pickups let this down and if I wasn't so lazy I'd replace them. They are poorly fitted.
I've adjusted the settings on a number of occasions and now I'd say the action is as good as any guitar I've played.
No real flaws, as I say I don't know what wood is used but I think it could withstand a drop from a skyscraper.

It's almost 30 years old and I dont think it's likely to fall apart now. The finish is almost like new apart from the inevitable wear and tear , bumps etc that you would expect. It's got to get a 10 for this.

Never called support

This was my first electric guitar, so has a sentimental value. I still play and still use gig this on the odd occaision. I currently own Gibson L5, J-55 (acoustic) and Fender Mandocaster. They all hang on the lounge wall at home and the Hondo doesn't reall look aout of place. You can't compare it to the Gibsons, thats a bit unfair so my overall rating is based on the Hondo in isolation. It's a good first guitar and spend a small amount of money replacing the pickups and it would be a great first guitar. 8/10

Manufactured mid 70's as a "spare"
SG style body. Really nice deep,Cherry Red finish.

Two humbuckers, two volume controls ,Two Tone controls and a 3 way pickup selector. I own a Gibson SG Special but used the Hondo for band rehersals. The Hondo has the look and feel of the Gibson action very low and the guitar keeps tune. Tone and clarity not as good as Gibson but it cost me about 80% less than the real thimg so what would you expect?

I've had the guitar from new and it has been played hard and after almost 30 years the electronics need a bit of attention, nothing too serious.

It gets a high rating because it has represented great value.

I play "dirty" blues and suited me fine. I played it through a variety of amps and always used it with tone control foot pedal. This compensated for the limited tone variables.

I tried very light guage strings once but this was a bad idea. The Hondo sounds best with heavier guage strings.

I adjusted the set up when I first purchased it. The tuneomatic bridge made this a relatively easy task. Action is very very low, suited me. I cant really complain about the finish.

I purchased this as a backup guitar but ended up playing it about 50/50 with my original Gibson SG. (I used to play some rough places)

It's had some abuse over the years but even today there is hardly a blemish. For the monety I'd say it's been outstanding.

Never used it.

I sold my Gibson SG a few years ago when times were hard but hung on to the old Hondo. These days I play acoustic blues. Have Gibson J-200 , Martin D-28 and Martin DM-12 (12 string) and , of course the Hondo. I know that these are a bit of a rarity these days but my advice for anyone starting out aor looking fpr a spare guitar is this. If you happen to see one of these at a car boot sale or in a junk shop BUY IT. It looks good, is solid and whilst it doesn't have the sound quality of the Gison SG, it comes pretty close.

made before i was born, sometime. (dob 6/14/84)
SG style body. Cherry Red paint with a very thin clear coat.
Two humbuckers, 500K pots, one vol one tone. 3 way pickup selector,
exactly like the les paul kind. no pickguard, solid guitar.
Wood? HEAVY. You could swing it as an axe and bash in anything.
Be aware though....finish sucked. It chipped so easily.
Intonation was horrible. play for an hour and it's out of tune.
the pickups were Gibson T style. I replaced them with single coil
D'Armond Harmony pickups. (made in the 60's sometime)
Tune-O-matic bridge. stop tail piece. 3 per side gotoh tuning keys.
I replaced the peg ferrules with new ones recently.

It wasn't very good.

A basic beginner guitar. But even then a beginner would have
a hard time playing on a guitar with horrible fret buzz.
Barre chords? Don't even try.

Horribly made action.

don't count on it withstanding a couple falls from your knee high.

none

not very good, only submitting for purposes of model history for others.
Only useful as a beginner guitar.