Hondo 781 Deluxe Series

hondo explorer copy. red w/ yellow van halen stripes (matching headstock). 1 humbucker, 1 volume, 1 tone (volume & tone controls are on a metal plate like on a telecaster). plywood body. very nice maple neck. standard fender style bridge w/ tremelo. 6 in-line tuners.

stock pickup sounds great. classic 80's metal crunch. this is a guitar w/ 1 basic sound - heavy.

excellent action, excellent finish, all hardware is solid, the tuners are cheap but work fine. the body is heavy, but not too heavy.

this guitar is built like a tank and is fine for playing live or recording. no problem to have this as your main guitar.

hondo is long gone - no customer service available.

i've played guitar & bass since the early 80's. i would buy this guitar again definately. it's comfortable to play and has the classic 80's metal sound. great guitar.

got this guitar in 1984 with the black an white checkerboard fnish for all you cheap trick fans, has the gibson destroyer body shape, wasnt much of a playing guitar very cheaply made but was funt o screw around with. recently i pulled it out of the closet an decided to upgrade it an make a lil screamer out of it, added an new charvel reverse neck, and some seymour duncan pickups what a great metal guitar it is now, great for all those 80s hair band songs. took a little bit of redrilling the mounting holes for the neck, but what an upgrade.

for good sound i run this through an old original tom scholz rockman and then into a marshal amp rock on.

from the factory this guuitar was a chaeply built guitar not much for sound or action but for a gfew buck an minimal work its a nice lil guitar now

had to move the one of the strap buttons as the strap kept coming off the guitar moved the button to the backside of the guitar an that stopped that problem, finish is good an very durable a few minor chips .

been playing for over 20 years, i love the paint job and the design of the body, cheaper to get than the oringinal gibso for sure. as far as other gear ive got a 66 gretsch tennessen, a hamer chapparall that just rocks, a fender telecaster,ovation accoustic, a fender accoustic,takamine accoustic,fender telecoustic,a charvel ,

dont know when or where it was made, 21 frets, 1 volume one tone, pickup isnt factory, i trashed that and put a seymore duncan screamin demon in it (humbucker)i dont know the woods used, its finish is glossy black with spider web graphics. its made to look like a gibson explorer. 3 spring tune-o-matic bridge. some crappy factory tuners that i need to replace....along with the reset nut thats chipped in a million places. neck is actually pretty decent...i lined it out when i got it...its got a pretty fast action to it, medium frets.

it looks good when i play it...the sound with the seymore duncan is great for metal, and with the toe adjustment i can get a bit of a fat sound out of it when i play clean...i pretty much use it for jamming with my friends when we have nothing to do...i run it throught a peavy 130, with a dan electro fab tone distortion pedal. i like the playability of it the way its set up....ive had it for 10 yrs now...the only thing i dont like is the fact that it is a single humbucker setup...and the paintjob...overall for goofing around its a good guitar....and any guitar you dont have to pay for is a good guitar...lol

ok by the time i got this thing....the action (if it ever existed in the beginning) was gone...the factory pickup blew chunks....no tone...just brite nasty twangy sound....the bridge of coarse was off....took about 5 minuites to fix that and another 15 adjusting the tension on the tune-o-matic bridge so the damn thing wouldnt pull up when you tuned it. the factory machine heads are great...if you like losing tuning after each strum...eventually to be replaced

ok ive had it for 10 yrs...its survived church functions...3 kids, being moved several times...the finish is barely blemished...im impressed, never a problem with the strap buttons....ive been able to depend on it as a backup for yrs now....ive used it on stage when needed...and still do from time to time at church and such...mostly its at home through a practice amp when i need to figure something out

ok the company does exist ie looked in to it because hondo's are still eing manufactured...lol...this is my second hondo....my first one was a fat strat copy..and after the reset nut adjustment it was flawless....but as far as support for these things....if you cant fx it or find a shop who will touch it...pawn it and layaway something better.

ive been playing for 13 yrs. i have a fender acoustic, the hondo deluxe 781, a knockoff of a les paul custom with ibanez hardware(its flawless) a peavy 130 guitar amp, dan electro fab tone distortion, a crate b200 bass amp head, peavy 15" cabinet, an swr working man bass amp, a 73 fender p-bass, a hohner 6 string solid 1 piece bass with live actives that can be turned on and off, a single piece ibanez soundgear 5 string bass...very very nice. i wouldnt pay for a hondo again unless it was at a yard sale for 20 bucks and i needed a hobby.

OMFG!!! My first guitar was a deluxe series 781!! It was completley finished in this rainbow laminate that changed colors in the light. It looked like a Gibson Explorer with a single humbucking pickup, and a volume/tone knob setup that looked like it came off of a Fender Telecaster. It came with a 3 spring tremolo that was tight enough to shoot arrows with, guaranteeing to take it out of tune in one playing of "Barracuda." I think it had Grover tuners and someone had fitted this one with a graphite nut. Bolt on neck that was accessible up to about the 18th fret before you had to stretch your fingers.

WOCK AND WOLL!! This was the ultimate heavy metal guitar! Without the distortion, it sounded dry and low. But a little overdrive made this thing come to life! Raising the low side of the pickup to just short of the E string (holding it at the 20th fret) made the guitar eminate booming lows, making for crunchy rhythms.

I got it standard from the factory, second hand for $100. Came with one of the nicest and toughest hard cases I have ever seen. The action was good, but nothing to scream about. The rainbow finish cracked around the border of the guitar, separating to nearly 1/16 of an inch over about 12 years. Everything on the guitar worked, but I would have liked a locking nut on this particular model, as mashing down the tremolo is too tempting to resist.

the finish looked really cool, but the cracks were hard to cover up after a while. The front strap button was the top right screw of the bolt-on neck, and slipped off a lot. I dropped the guitar on stage about once a week. However, it took a lot of abuse, and was even used to hit a violent heckler in the teeth once. Still played great, despite the teethmarks.

Are you kidding? I was not able to even find a phone number. I think Hondos must have been made by aliens, because finding a dealer on this planet was impossible..

I have been playing 20 years, and sold the guitar to a freinds kid about 5 years ago. Now I play a Washburn Electric guitar, a Yamaha acoustic, and have contrived a small studio in my home.
Back in the 80's this was the ultimate chick getting guitar. The Explorer shape and the rainbow changing reflective finish fit right into the big hair heavy metal image, and it sounded like a V8 through glasspacks if you used enough distortion. I would only buy another one if I woke up tomorrow to find myself at age 16, in 1983.

i have no idea where this guitar is made, it has 1 volume, 1 tone and 1 humbucker thats it. Definatley no frills. cheap bridge, cheap tuners, though it does have tremolo

This guitar has a awesome distorted sound and picks up the lows pretty well, it is missing something on the higher notes though (maybe because the pickup is pretty old and starting to rust a lil' bit) but still works and sounds good for good heavy rythem

this guitar has a very low action, you can play it very fast. like i said earlyer the pickup is in pretty bad shape im just wating for my emg-60. the guitar is an explorer nock-off with a black body that has spider webs covering it. it had a short in the volume switch that seemed to fix itself after just taking it out and staring at it for a little while. the only bad thing about this guitar is that it is very heavy, it weighs at least 20 pounds.

other than a little electrical problem this guitar is solid. its built well and feels very durable. the stap buttons are good but even if they failed a good hard drop on the floor will not hurt this guitar at all

im still a beginner, this is definatley not the best guitar ive ever played, i wouldnt dream of using this guitar for leads or for a high screaming solo. but if u need a cheap rythem guitar for metal or hard rock this is your guitar. if something happend to this one and i was low on cash i would not hesitate to go buy another one.