Product: Yamaki AY339S
Price Paid: 600 (cdn)
Submitted
05/05/2006
at
06:48pm
by
Al in Brisbane
Features
:
10
Cedar (spruce? impossible to tell at this age, golden 35 years later, bout sounds a tad darker than spruce) top, D45 inlays, brazillian rosewood back and sides, martin clone headstock right down to the tuners. a beautiful guitar. bought originally in vancouver around 1970 from a department store. if blueridge and other 'repro' companies could do this well, they'd be in business. bravo yamaki (who are you anyway?)
Sound
:
10
Had this guitar for 30 years, treated it roughly, sat in case for whole decades, pulled it out, restrung it and - it's amazing. sounds better than my taylor 310 (for obvious reasons), with depth of aged wood and martin-design, richer sound then my Gibsons, partly because of scale, age and rosewood. very balanced bass, midrange, bit less bright on treble, which is probably cedar effect. An amazing guitar. thins out a bit on upper register, but rich bass, would stand up next to older martins. great for finger picked folk/country, very nice midrange, booming with flatpick, almost too loud.
Action, Fit, & Finish
:
7
terrible set up at first. lots of disasters here from sitting in case for long periods of time, travel across the pacific, etc etc. but now set up well. took millimetres off the back of the neck to make it less V and more C shaped in the late 1970s (stupid, eh) and never refinished it, oiled neck. and it paid off 30 years later. neck has stayed stable and increased playability.
Reliability/Durability
:
10
needed struts reglued after 30 years, tiny bow at bridge remains but it's fine, one finish crack on rosewood back , pickguard fell off (left it off, looks ugly but sounds great). it survived my attempt to shave the neck 30 years ago and it keeps on going.
Customer Support
:
No Opinion
don't know who they are, which factory it was made in, or whether they still exist. but it always sounded better than yamaha 70s acoustics and has aged well.
Overall Rating
:
No Opinion
great wood and solid construction stays the test of time, regardless of which strange company made the guitar. aged real rosewood of the 70s and 80s sounds much better than mahog, cedar or spruce top. this guitar probably doesn't have much trade/sale value, but it plays and sounds like a vintage martin. wouldn't give it up.
Product: Yamaki AY339S
Price Paid: 700.00 CAN
Submitted
04/30/2006
at
11:12pm
by
Gerry
Features
:
10
Made in early 70s in Japan, this guitar has 20 frets, 2 piece cedar top, believe that the sides and back are brazilian rosewood of this dreadnought a Solid Brazilain Rosewood old growth deep chocolate brown Yamaki, made to replicate a D45 to a T. Abalone, YAMAKI inlaid insignia vertical down headstock and simply the best deepest bass sounding Yamaki I have ever owned. The 2nd yamaki that I have owned.
NEck scale is 25 1/2.
Sound
:
9
Do a little flat and finger picking and it works very well. I have a sonnd hole pickup mounded which gives a very good sound.It booms bass and yet has the mids covered easily.The pickup does get in the way a bit. The cedar top does give a different sound than a martin D35 that I have played.
Action, Fit, & Finish
:
10
This is where this guitar does really shine.It has the lowest action that I have ever seen on a dreadnought and that is with a 56 gauge string on the 6th string.There are no buzzes on this old-timer. It would even rival most electrics for the lowest action.
Reliability/Durability
:
9
This guitar holds the tuning very good, although it is suseptible to temperature changes. I can take it out of the case and the tuning is pretty good. THe gold plating is quite faded on the tuners. The finish is a little cloudy in places, it was like that when I bought it back in the mid 70s. This is a very dependable guitar and I use it on many gigs by itself. The top has various dings on it and the luthier said just leave it.
Customer Support
:
No Opinion
never dealt with the company.
Overall Rating
:
10
I have been playing this axe since mid 70s (over 30 yrs). I would definitely buy this treasure back again. I don't know how I could ever replace this gem if I lost it. I love the ease of playing this because of the lowest action I ever seen on a dreadnought with no buzzes.I played a D35 and put it back after the first song because there was no comparison.I chose this at the time because it was a lot cheaper than a martin. IT has some dings on the top but no splits or cracks anywhere.
