This lady is as mysterious as she is beautiful. I have seen about four of these with a metal Ibanez logo before, but never one in such great shape and with a ‘paint-on’ logo like Ibanez did in the transition year of 1967.
These pickups look like bass-humbuckers, and can be controlled separately. Operating this requires quite a manual:
The black switch on the left manipulates the two left oblong magnetic pickups; the black switch on the right manipulates the other two pickups on the right.
So… left switch for bass strings; right switch for treble strings.
If you put the left black switch in the upward position, then the upper left pickup comes to life. Put the left black switch in the downward position; then the lower left pickup works. Switch in the middle position and both left pickups are on.
The right black switch works the same way, but for the right pickups only.
The little white switch on the bottom turns it from mono into stereo. And yes – she even still has her original stereo plug!
That’s about all I know. Please add or contact me if you have any information.
11/18/2020 at 10:36
Greetings from South Africa, I picked up this same model about 18 years ago and have had her since, though she’s not in quite as good a shape as yours. The tremolo arm is missing and a lot of the screws have been stripped, pickup springs are shot and there is a ton of rattling. I hope to get her restored soon though!
Does anyone have any more information on this guitar? I’ve searched Ibanez back catalogues and every place I can think of but this post is the most detail I could find.
11/19/2020 at 12:11
Hi Nic,
Welcome to Ibanez-Vintage.net!
Ah – great to hear you’ve got one of these beauties, too. Cool! Good luck on restoring her to her original condition. A lot of ‘trem arms’ were taken off and lost over the years. Pity. Hope you can find a replacement. And I especially hope you will get the electronics right.
South Africa? It does not surprise me to hear you’re from South Africa, because almost all of the examples of this type of guitars seem to come from there. I’ve seen 4 specimens of this guitar on a South African ad-site. And I know of one other, that was found in Scandinavia. And that’s about it… She’s a rare and mysterious bird.
I bought my guitar from a UK seller… and he got it in South Africa, too.
Mine is the only one (so far) I’ve seen with a ‘painted-on’ logo (gold sparkle paint). They did that because they ran out of metal logos in 1967, and they didn’t know how to make an inlay logo yet.
All of the others I’ve seen had a metal logo on the headstock.
What more can I tell you about this guitar? Not a lot, I’m afraid.
This guitar was not shown in any known Ibanez catalog. First of all: we don’t have all the catalogs.
Two fantastic resources:
https://www.ibanez.com/usa/support/catalogs/
(scroll down to see the old catalogs)
Or
https://www.vintagejapanguitars.com.br/catalogos-ibanez-guitars/
But unfortunately… there are no Ibanez catalogs for 1967 to 1970. And that’s the period in which this guitar was built.
The second thing what makes it difficult is this:
In the 1960s, lots of Japanese guitar plants made guitars for lots of different brands. In the book “History of Japanese Electric Guitars” (by Frank Meyers), about 20 different guitar plants are shown in the Ibanez chapter. All of them made guitars branded Ibanez. And they also made (the same) guitars for other brands.
And to make it even more difficult: some plants made the exact same guitar.
A friend of mine has the same guitar, branded “Mark Twain”.
What about your guitar? Could we see a few pictures, please? I’m very curious!
Cheers from Amsterdam, Netherlands
Leo
01/08/2021 at 15:02
Dear Leo,
you made my day! Just joined the forum and saw your 60s Ibanez semi – I have an exact copy of it although without the label and I was wondering for quite some time what it is!
Cheers from Hannover area, Germany,
peter
01/08/2021 at 15:24
Hi Peter,
Welcome to Ibanez-Vintage.net!
Cool to see you also have one of these beauties!
I have seen a few of these models without a brand name on the headstock. And one with the “Mark Twain” brand.
And: here’s one branded “Kimberly”:
https://reverb.com/item/32882370-1966-kimberly-teisco-e-335t-cherry-burst-split-rail-pickups
I spoke to one of the people from this seller, and they confirmed that TEISCO is the manufacturer of these guitars. Teisco made a lot of guitars for a lot of different brands in those days.
Could you share a few pictures of your guitar? I’m curious!
Leo
01/08/2021 at 15:58
Hi Leo,
I’m just adding the guitar via “add guitar” – how do I add the pics?
peter
06/18/2021 at 23:03
Hello. Greetings from Argentina. I inherited the same guitar from my father, although without any brand. We always thought it was a Luthier guitar. It only says “Aircaster” in the truss rod cover, but nothing else. But it’s the exact guitar. I’ve been trying to find it for a while, and the closest I’ve found was a vintage Kimberly guitar with 4 pickups, but it’s not stereo. Thanks for sharing this!!
06/21/2021 at 10:30
Hi Fernando,
Welcome to Ibanez-vintage.net!
First: Wow – I’m so sorry to hear you lost your dad. Best wishes to you and your family.
About this guitar: Yes, I’ve seen a few of these with different brand names, and also a few without a brand name. Does your guitar have two little ‘holes’ (maybe filled holes) where a nailed-on logo might have been?
In the 60s, a lot of Japanese guitar plants were building guitars for different brands. So it’s common to see the same type of guitar under different brand names. We know this guitar was made by TEISCO, and I’ve seen it under at least 4 different brand names.
I have seen about 10 of these branded “Ibanez”, most on the forum of my favorite site: http://www.ibanezcollectors.com, and a few on a South African ad-site. Most of these have a metal nail-on logo stating “Ibanez” – mine is about the only one that has the gold-flake painted-on logo (which dates mine to 1967, when they ran out of metal logos and weren’t really sure how to create a good inlay logo).
I hope your guitar sounds and plays well!
All the best
Greetz from Amsterdam
Leo
06/22/2021 at 00:18
Hi Leo. Thanks for the reply.
As English is not my native language, when I said I inherited it from my father, I meant he gave it to me. Fortunately, my father is alive, he read this, and swore me he is not dead.
The guitar indeed has two screw holes where I supose a label where screwed, but I don’t know what it said.
Unfortunatly the guitar has a broken neck which was glued about 20 years ago, and broke again. Now I’m repairing it (I glued it, and I’m going to make wooden splints to strengthen it). After that, I will probably refinish it and rewire it. It needs knobs and potentiometers replacement.
My father says it used to sound really good.
Here are some bad pictures:
https://mega.nz/folder/oSBAkT5a#b4HremVSmPm82zWlfpb5Rg
Thanks for replying
06/23/2021 at 11:00
Really lovely to see some more examples of this guitar out in the wild! Here are some pics of mine. She is also in need of some restoration work, pots need replacing, coil springs are shot. Hopefully I will be able to restore her one day!
https://mega.nz/folder/CHIkFZAB#TUad3Fa1RNU3QmN6STQE4A
06/23/2021 at 16:37
I also came across this one that sold in Dublin 7 years back https://www.adverts.ie/electric-guitars/1960-s-ibanez-335-vintage-hollowbody/5658594
06/24/2021 at 08:23
Hi Fernando,
Well… I’m really glad your dad is still alive.
Apologies to you and your dad for misreading that. I’m Dutch (Amsterdam), not a native English speaker either.
Wow… a neck break. That’s a pity. I’m not a luthier, but I would not try to fix that myself. The tension of the strings pulling at that neck can be quite strong, so I would go to a repairman for that, to make sure it is repaired correctly, with the right glue.
Thanks for the pictures. She’s worth repairing, I think!
Good luck
Cheers
Leo
06/24/2021 at 08:38
Hi Nic
Nice to hear from you again!
Wow – Am I seeing this right? The first guitar you posted (with the Ibanez logo)… is that a real inlay logo, or is it gold-flake painted-on (like mine)?
If this is an inlay logo, that is completely new to me… I didn’t know they existed!
The other one (from Dublin) I’ve seen before. This is an ‘unbranded’ one. The owner of that guitar had some questions about that guitar (how to restore it). We discussed it on my favorite site “www.ibanezcollectors.com’.
Cheers
Leo
07/15/2021 at 16:06
Hi Leo
Yes, as best as I can tell it is an inlay logo – it’s definitely not painted on! Really fascinated by these guitars, thanks for all the info!