Not another Norlin era thread!!!!

[NeoConMan]

Yes, Boys & Girls, another Norlin era thread.

 

[cool]/

 

Honestly and objectively, let’s discuss the Norlin era of Gibson guitars.

I don’t want to exclude the youngsters or the newbies, but let’s hear from those of you who’ve owned them.

I’ve played a bunch of them myself, and after learning what they’re all about I would proudly own one.

Well, if it was in great shape and the price was reasonable…

 

In the Norlin years, what are the biggest mistakes they made?

Volute? Well, there was a weak headstock problem.

Decreased headstock angle? Same as the volute.

Pancake bodies? Saved money on materials.

Shallow carve on bodies? We could have simply called that a natural evolution.

 

There’s more that I’m not mentioning here for sure.

Especially when you consider other guitars besides the Les Paul line.

There was some models that never should have been born all the way across the board.

 

What would be viewed by history (and collectors) as the dumbest moves they made?

[duane v]

I don't see any issues with Norlin era guitars

 

I have two, and I'll admit the SG200 I have is lacking the horn bevels, but both Norlins I have are durable and sound great.

 

And those that believe that the pancake era was a cost savings gimmick, are sadly mistaken.

 

My only beef with the Norlin era is the shotty record keeping during that time

[Murph]

My '79 "The SG" is a badassed machine. I bought it "New Old Stock" around 1993, and the velvet brick is to die for.

 

That guitar retired a '72 "Recording" and put a new Strat back on the market in the late '90's.....

 

The solid Walnut body will rattle your fillings.

 

"Unplugged"......

 

Yes, it's THAT bad......... (and when I say bad, I mean GOOD.............)

 

It's my "ACE In The Hole" when I need a mean machine for studio work......

 

It's NOT for sale.....

[ksdaddy]

(steps up on soapbox, sets egg timer)

 

Okay. I've owned pre-Norlin, Norlin, post Norlin. I've seen them do some pretty dumb things in retrospect. The acoustic line went right down the toilet. Not saying there weren't some good playing/sounding Norlins, but they were overbuilt yet structurally unstable. Underset necks, thin bridges, heavy bracing, a complete abandonment of the round shoulder design that helped define Gibson to the world.

 

I have a '71 sandwich LP. Best LP I have ever owned, hands down, and I have owned many. It weighs more than any guitar has a right to, but it's part and parcel; I wouldn't swap it for a lighter model for fear it wouldn't have the vibe. Second in line was another sandwich '70 LP. Third was a run of the mill '80 Std.

 

I dig SGs, any style or year. Ironically I do not currently own one. I like the cheapass line of early 70s SGs even though they were sacreligious to the original SG design.

 

Norlin gave us some awful guitars that were non-Gibson like the S-1, Marauder, RD, Mark, etc. I'm glad they are gone.

 

I've had a few 70s Gibsons with distinct twists in the neck. Not good. Norlin's fault? The wood's fault? Dunno. No problems with other decades. You do the math.

 

I will continue to buy Norlin era guitars although I proceed with caution (necks).

 

*ding!* time's up.

[Andre S]

I saw this great looking ES335 for sale, or a 345 possibly a 355, can't remember, it was going for 2500, it was a norlin, but when I saw the guitar, and how deep the walnuty finish made it looked, I would have bought it in a snap....I'll see if I can get a link.

nah its gone from the website

[DanvillRob]

Yes' date=' Boys & Girls, another Norlin era thread.

 

[biggrin']/

 

 

You know I have two "Norlin Era Guitars", One is a 1969 Jubilee. It's been my "go to" acoustic for about 35 years. It plays like a dream, and sounds pretty nice for what it is.

 

Then, I have a 1979 Dove. It not only plays just as nice as the Jubilee, but it sounds incredible. I've owned it for about 30 years, and it out performs any guitar it's up against.

 

Were there "bad" Norlins? I suppose, although I personally haven't seen them, but then I don't play a whole bunch of other people's guitars. I enjoy playin' mine, and I almost never go anywhere without one of my guitars in tow.

 

The "headstock" issue, could be something I wasn't aware of. My Jubilee did get it's headstock broken off years ago when I was shipping it up to Oregon VIA AmTrack. In it's case and was broken when I got there. Didn"t realize it was a design weakness in the guitar.

[NeoConMan]

My only beef with the Norlin era is the shotty record keeping during that time

Doesn't end there.

Gibson doesn't have sh!t on many guitars made in the nineties.

[L5Larry]

I've owned two Norlin era Gibsons, both 1975 models, an ES-335 and a Les Paul Standard. Both were fantastic guitars. I still have the Les Paul, and I would still have the 335 except that I played the frets off it. I chose to sell it as "original" instead of refurbishing it, and got 4x what I paid for it.

 

The Norlin years of Gibson get an undeserved bad rap, as do the AMF years of Harley-Davidson. I see the problems of the Norlin years as exactly the same as the problems with Gibson today.

[tazzboy]

The Tim Shaw had it right the Pancake body cost a lot more to the just doing it with regular way.

[Murph]

I see the problems of the Norlin years as exactly the same as the problems with Gibson today.

 

Man, I'm on the other side.

 

I've got an '07 339, and 2; '08 Studios in this house that are damned good guitars. I'd put em' up against anything for the money, and as far as tone goes, it's a no-brainer......

 

Just sayin'....

 

Best to ya.

[NeoConMan]

Pancake body cost a lot more to the just doing it with regular way.

How can that be?

Then why did they do it?

 

It was my understanding that they basically saved wood that would have been scrapped before.

Glue it, press it, you're done.

How would that be expensive?

[80LPC]

The Tim Shaw had it right the Pancake body cost a lot more to the just doing it with regular way.

 

Wasn't this in a Guitar Player interview ? Would make interesting reading...

 

The 'Norlin era' was 1974 to 1986. Gibson was under the control of CMI from 1944 to 1974, when it became a subsidiary of Norlin.

[myspace.com/jessenoah]

I like mine[cool]

[cwness]

I had 2 Norlins. The first I bought new was a 1975 55 Special. It had the twisted

neck issue that KS talked about and I only had it a couple months. The other was

an 80's Standard that was a real good guitar. It was stolen never to be seen again.

I agree the record keeping was pityful and seems that they still haven't got a handle

on it. I did like the walnut bodies funny they don't make them again.

 

CW

[The Mick]

I love my Norlins I've never had any other guitars that I can have the action set as low as them. The slim neck hell I swear the volute has saved both my gold tops from fractures with out a doubt. The are the players guitar no frills just good tools.

[deepblue]

There are great Gibsons made no matter what era....Some Norlins are killer, in fact im sure some would smoke

some original '59's

[myspace.com/jessenoah]

[FirstMeasure]

So Neo, was this thread inspired by that Black '76 you were considering? Whatever happened with those Black Beauties?

[tazzboy]

It was actually Tonequest Magazine Oct 2000 with late Sean Costello on the cover.

 

The question that was ask

 

There was such a gross disparity in the construction of Les Pauls over the years - and the 70's models

were particularly funky...

 

Oh they were pigs. A production Les Paul in 1979 had a 3-piece maple neck,a volute, a 14 degree peghead pitch...by then I think we'd stopped the sandwich body. That was somebody's idea to save money because thinner blocks of mahogany cost less than thicker pieces. Eventually they realized that by the time you had chopped and glued it all up you had spent more time doing that than you would have just buying bigger pieces. Those guitars also had nearly flat tops because at that time we were running a 4 station carver so fast that it was furrowing the maple top and they had to sand them down to get all of the divots out of them. We started asking ourselves what the high water mark had been for the Les Paul line, and we concluded that it was 1959. So we went from where we were, to a 1-piece mahognay neck with a 17 degree peghead pitch and a completely different peghead shape. But you have to understand that acquiring a "correct" peghead shape was always a compromise, because the original pegheads on vintage Les Paul were all hand-sanded. So to say that this shape or that shape is the "correct" peghead is BS.

 

There is a lot more but I think you get the picture at what Mr. Shaw was saying

[djroge1]

I've had my '78 Les Paul for 30 + years and I've not had any problems with it. Although it has been modded to the point of no return. It's not a pancake body, but it does have a maple neck with rose wood fret board.

 

I've watched it (from across the room) fall flat on it's neck onto a concrete floor when a drummer moved an amp it was leaning against and it only knocked it out of tune.

 

I would say it's a well built and fine playing guitar.

[NeoConMan]

Whatever happened with those Black Beauties?

Nothing yet.

All three are still sitting pretty.

 

Having a hard time deciding how to justify spending the money.

Too much going on right now...

[pippy]

As a little bit more to add to this quote posted by tazzboy earlier;

 

...by then I think we'd stopped the sandwich body. That was somebody's idea to save money because thinner blocks of mahogany cost less than thicker pieces. Eventually they realized that by the time you had chopped and glued it all up you had spent more time doing that than you would have just buying bigger pieces.

 

According to Stan Rendell (who worked in the 'Engineering Change Notice' section of Gibson at the time);

 

"...(the pancake body idea)...was to strengthen the body' date=' to prevent cracking and checking. It's a standard practice in the furniture industry. It ties the wood together."

 

The practice was stopped by about 1973. Tony Bacon confirms the cost theory; although there [u']had[/u] been customer complaints about joint-shrinkage, the real reason was that ..."the extra labour costs involved in preparing the sandwich priced it out of existence."

[Bender 4 Life]

I've had my '78 Les Paul for 30 + years and I've not had any problems with it. Although it has been modded to the point of no return. It's not a pancake body' date=' but it does have a maple neck with rose wood fret board.

 

I've watched it (from across the room) fall flat on it's neck onto a concrete floor when a drummer moved an amp it was leaning against and it only knocked it out of tune.

 

I would say it's a well built and fine playing guitar.[/quote']

 

Your avatar is identical to the '75 LPC Natural w/3-pc. top that I had in 80-83.

Got it very gently used, and it was a FINE guitar, only issue I ever had w/it was the "gold" plating started coming off everything.....pinprick sized spots when I bought it tripled in size in a few yrs. time.

Sadly, I sold it & my Peavey "Nashville 400" amp during my divorce from wife #1.

Wish I still had them.

[tulsaslim]

Like others here I've owned pre-, post- and Norlin era Gibbys. The three Norlins I owned were all LPs (a ''69 deluxe, an '81 standard, and a late-'60's-early '70s custom) and they were all great guitars that saw years of gigging each.

 

But on the other hand I saw some real crap passing as Gibsons in those days.

 

The Norlin era was a pretty long stretch and things changed as time passed. The Norlins of the '80s seem to be the worst, as by then all of the crappy Norlin practices were happening to those guitars.

 

The biggest problem I had with them is the fact that a great many guitars that should've been thrown into the fire were passed through by QC.

 

I would NEVER discourage someone from buying a Norlin-era Gibby, nor would I hesitate at all. But be careful, that's all.

[TommyK]

<-----------She,

 

Is my Norlin. She had a weak neck block, but I've reinforced her. She has a tone that has been duplicated by none. I will never part with her.