Setting the Standard

For over 30 years Hamer has been setting the standard in electric guitars.  Over the years we have refined our earliest models while introducing many new ones.  Our first model was the Hamer Standard.  It has remained our flagship ever since.

Some may speculate that our glory years are behind us. Ohers may be misinformed as to our history. We look at Hamer as a continuum, learning and moving forward while remaining true to our heritage. 

This Standard epitomizes that philosophy and is very much like the original, a bound body with a dot unbound neck. A primary difference is that rather than bonding an eastern curly maple veneer to the body we use a massive big leaf (western) flame maple cap; we view this as an improvement.

What a phenomenal top.

We’ve also upgraded our wiring, paying as much attention to those parts of the guitar that you can’t see as those that are visible.

Quite a few years ago we changed pickups from DiMarzio to Seymour Duncan.  While we have collaborated with both companies to voice pickups specifically for Hamer, we have left the winding to them – it’s what they do best.

We like to show off our tight neck joints.  Our luthiery remains unsurpassed.

As our production is limited, we have the luxury of using only the highest grade Honduras mahogany. It has to be wide enough for a one piece Standard body.  We’re discriminating in our choice of woods –  just like you.

In the late 1970s we made a decision to change from Grover Rotomatics to Schaller machine heads.  Like Schaller, Grover has a storied history.  However, Schaller continues to manufacture their tuning gears in Germany, as they have all along. Sadly, neither Helmut nor Rene Schaller are still with us.

The logo on this Standard is like the originals, a paint transfer at the tip of the headstock.

Setting the standard with simple understated elegance brought to you with the highest level of craftsmanship. This Standard is ready to rock.

Brand New Classics for a Modern World

While there’s been lots of fun along the way, what we most enjoy doing is designing and building guitars. On occassion our love for our craft truly shines through. It warms the heart to be recognized as doing something special. Here we are featuring two guitars we completed this week. Both are siblings to the original models within their family. Both have earned respect in their own right.

Newport Pro: We’ve been building the Newport for over ten years now. It was in February 2000 that Guitar Player magazine put the original Newport through its paces in one of their bench tests. The Newport did very well in the ratings game, earning an Editor’s Pick award with five picks (the highest rating) in all six rating categories: Tone, Playability, Workmanship, Hardware, Vibe and Value.

By the time the Bench Test was printed we had already introduced the Newport Pro, an adaptation of the Newport but with two significant changes. The original Newport was fitted with Phat Cat single coil pickups. On the Pro we replaced the Phat Cats with Seth Lover humbuckers. We also replaced the Bigsby tremolo found on the  Newport with a Tonepros tailpiece.

Much, however, remained the same. We retained the spruce top and mahogany back and sides, the 24 3/4″ scale length and fingerboard appointments, the twin f-holes, the interior sound chambers and the electronics.

After three separate levelings, Todd Gencarella buffs out the guitar, also a three stage process.

The real deal.

First time, every time. Despite our thin finishes, we take pride in seeing our guitars go through the first time – no errors or rework.

Time to install those Seymour Dunan Seth Lover pickups.

All done by hand in the Hamer Guitars workshop.

We use AAA Stika spruce for the tops on the Newports. This is the same high quality spruce as is found on the best acoustic guitars. The difference is that we have to find billets that are two inches thick so that they can be resawn and bookmatched. Sourcing fine woods has long been a challenge that we have embraced.

Another view.

While we have employed a number of different systems, the jack cups that we currently mount on the side of the guitar are the most functional to date.

The Newport Pro has certainly earned its place in the Newport family.

A family with a rich and deserving heritage.

Korina Junior:  Following a long Hamer lineage, the Junior is Special indeed.

The magazines raved over the original Special: “the Special’s combination of raw good looks, functional design and superb sound make it a truly exceptional instrument.”  On the Junior we lightened up the Special by using Korina (African Limba) rather than our typical Honduras mahogany.

A Tonepros wrap around bridge took the place of a Tune-O-Matic and Stop Tail piece from our original Special.

The Junior has a single dog ear P-90 with a tortoise shell pickguard rather than the two P-90s on the Special.

Truly clean Korina has become increasingly difficult to find.

However, we’ve always found character in each piece wood. It individualizes the guitar for the player.

We don’t make guitars like they used to. We don’t even make them like we used to. We make them better.

Custom Collage

Throughout our history we at Hamer have learned much through the customization process. Many struggle with defining exactly what comprises a custom guitar.  We feel that pretty much every guitar that we build  is custom. Yes, we do have a line stock models; it’s the build process itself that renders the guitars custom.

We thought that we’d treat you to a collage of some of the guitars currently being started, in process and being completed. We’ll let you decide what is custom building and what is not.

Here’s a Korina Special in progress.  The double cutaway was our original production guitar body shape, introduced on our Sunburst Series. The Sunburst featured the Sustain Block bridge, a true Hamer innovation. We eventually moved away from the Sustain Block. However, ongoing custom requests led us to reintroduce it, most notably on the Talladega.

This Korina Special looks pretty custom built to us…but is it a custom guitar?

We also received custom requests for guitars with sound chambers. We adapted chambering to a number of models, such as this Newport Pro. We even began chambering our Standard with a honeycomb pattern.  Now, perhaps unsurprisingly, we receive custom orders for guitars without the sound chamber.

Here we are sanding the neck of the Newport Pro, a stock model.

Custom work?

We listened to our customers and decided to change our logos to be inlaid mother of pearl. We felt that it was a needed upgrade in the product line. However, some customers prefer that we use our original paint transfer logos placed in the position that we did at the beginning.

Here are some guitars nearing completion.

A simple Studio in cherry transparent.

The mohagany on this Newport is unique.

The Monacao Bass is part of our standard product offering but when we were building this one it it certainly seemed custom made to us.

While Hamer has predominantly been known for its guitars, some of our biggest innovations have been with basses.

There are a number of colors that were once considered custom and are now stock.

Blue Transaparent

Black Transparent

Tobacco Sunburst

On occassion we’ve turned down custom requests. While we try to remain consistent in our approach, there are varied reasons for such a decision.

At times we as a company were moving in a new direction and a customer wanted to hark back to guitars, or elements of guitars, that were not representative of that direction. Currently, we make every effort to accomodate such custom orders. 

Some requests involve us using a competitor’s trademarked features. Understandably we cannot undertake such work.

Sometimes we simply had not yet developed a way to deal with a given request. As a result, one day we couldn’t accomodate a given custom request and later, after we had developed a new process or procedure, we suddenly could.

Because they are so visible, artist guitars can present a real dilema. We have worked out arrangements with some artists to offer models that we jointly developed with them. Examples include the Steve Stevens and the Watson. With other artists no such agreement exists and so the instrument remains a signature guitar for the particular artist. On still other occassions, we have an agreement for one artist model, but not another. Examples of this are Glenn Tipton’s Phantom GT versus Glenn’s current more radical guitar and the Rick Nielsen model that we introduced in 1998 versus Rick’s five necks and checkerboard finishes.

We well know that with customs and customization lines get blurred and mistakes can be made; it seems to be the nature of the work. We’re doing our best to remain consistent and error free. To all of you, thanks for your support.

Virtuoso!

Since posting photos of some of our earlier guitars, we’ve been receiving custom inquiries for a variety of discontinued models. We recently were asked whether we could build a Virtuoso. As a result, we decided to hunt one down to refresh our recollection of  how we built them and to photograph it for future reference.

Paul Hamer designed this guitar in 1986, aptly naming it after the type of musician who would covet such an instrument.  The first Virtuoso was completed in January, 1987. We continued to build Virtuosos on a most limited basis into 1989. This one was built in June of 1988.  The lacquer checks reveal its age while adding to its personality.

36 frets on a scalloped maple fingerboard.

Reverse peghead, mondo logo, Floyd Rose tremolo

Can’t get enough of that fingerboard.

Smoothly blended heel.

Early Floyd Roses bolted through the neck. Hamer pioneered the use of the Floyd Rose on a “production” guitar. The Floyd allen key holder was mounted to the back of the peghead.

Extended cutaways for those who dare play past the 24th fret.

We’ll see whether we get an order for a Virtuoso some 20 years after it was discontinued.

Spraybooth Ready

Bravo to those of you who made the trip to Chicago to get to know Paul Hamer along with his family and friends.  We’re confident that a wonderful time was had by all.  In days gone by Paul would regularly visit our music dealers both in the U.S. and abroad, often holding clinics at the stores and allowing our customers to get to meet him.  It’s good to see that a group of you have recently been able to associate a person with the name on your headstock.

We only wish that there was still a shop in the Chicago area for you to make the pilgrimage to while you were visiting. Though we feel that we have found our home in Connecticut, our old shops in Palatine, and especially Arlington Heights, were special indeed.  When in Arlington Heights we started the tradition of opening our doors to our customers. We’ve continued that tradition on a number of occassions since moving to Connecticut in April 1997 and continue to do so with these postings.

Here’s a peak into some of the custom guitars that are currently in, or about to go into, the spraybooth.  Though they are primarily variations on stock models, they all receive the same level of painstaking attention.

Birds Fly

Some of you are currently preparing to travel to Chicago to get to know a little more about our early roots, meeting, playing guitar and celebrating with Paul Hamer and some members of the old Hamer crew. The New Hartford contingent, many of whom are Chicago transplants, isn’t going to be able to make the trip but wishes you the best in your journeys!

We’ve been staying busy completing this bird, which is beautful in its simplicity and harks back to some of our earlier days.  As for color…

It buffed out nicely.

Reverse peghead, mother of pearl logo, Schaller machine heads.

Seymour Duncan zebra ’59 pickup, single 500K volume control and a Tone Pros wrap around bridge.

Clean neck joint with full fingerboard support.

The cup jacks have worked out nicely.

Bursted all over.

Made in the USA – a clear preference.

This bird’s ready to wing its way to its new home. If you are winging your way (or however you may travel) to Chicago, enjoy the Windy City.  We’ll be thinking of you. 

Autumn Colors

 

It’s fall in New England.  That means that we are surrounded with vibrant colors.  We wanted to share some of them with you.  Enjoy.

A Vintner’s Dream

We were somewhat surprised when our long time friend Mark Snyder decided to come off the road and take up a day job.  We first got to know Mark when he was Vernon Reid’s guitar tech.  He later worked with Peter Frampton, collaborating with him on the Framptone line of effects.

Perhaps we shouldn’t have been terribly surprised that Mark’s day job was to start a winery in…Brooklyn!  It’s not as outlandish as it might sound.  Mark supports local growers by using New York grapes.  He was recently featured in his winery in Guitar Afficianado.

Mark introduced us to Robert Foley.  They’re close friends and business associates.  Earlier, in its maiden issue, Bob was featured in Guitar Afficianado.  In addition to guitars, the magazine is clearly big on wine.  Bob owns the prestigious Robert Foley vineyards in Napa Valley.  His vineyard is the Hamer of wines: small, handcrafted and of the highest quality.

When he’s not making some of the best wines that come out of Napa, Bob is playing guitar.  His placing an order for an Artist Ultimate seemed a natural.  The color?  Cognac of course.  We previously showed you this Ultimate being built in our woodshop.  Here are some pics of it coming to fruition.

The guitar is grounded to the Belgian shielding paint that is applied to the pickup cavities. 

Using a set screw to lock the tailpiece into the stud.

 Normally we outfit Artist Ultimates with Duncan Custom Shop serialized and and signed humbuckers. This guitar was fitted with Phat Cat single coil pickups that we developed in conjunction with Seymour Duncan.

Nice detail work.

Measuring for string action.

Dangerous curves.

Impeccable fretwork.

Hand cut mother mother of pearl purfling.

In addition to their normal serial number, Artist Ultimates are wood stamped with a consequtive serial number.  This guitar is the 66th Artist Ultimate built – an excellent vintage.

Free Bird

 When we were approached to build an FB, we gave it some thought and decided…why not?  In the past we had built this body style both for guitars and basses.   The first FB was built in March, 1986.  We actually built more basses than guitars, which may well have been due to our relationship with Nikki Sixx.

We don’t have the original tooling for the FB series so everything had to be laid out and routed by hand.  Note the pencil lines extending from the neck route.

Rather than building the body from three pieces of wood as would be typical for a guitar like this, we built it from one massive piece of mahogany and then routed the wings down, leaving the raised center section.

Final routing the body perimiter.

Here we are plunge routing for the pickup tabs and height adjustment screws.  Typically, the guitars had two pickups.  This order called for one humbucker, making the woodworking somewhat more complex.  Because the neck continues for the length of the entire fingerboard and we retain a very tight neck joint we can build the guitar without a neck pickup.

Did we mention that it was ordered with a reverse Standard headstock?

The neck has been bonded to the body and the guitar filled with grain filler.

Measuring and laying out for the bridge position.

Drilling for the bridge.

With a single pickup and one volume control, the electronics cavity is sparse.

Taped up and ready to for paint.  What color will set this bird free…

Marooned

Several weeks ago our friend Mike Buffa called, asking if we would like to attend the Maroon 5 concert at the Mohegan Sun Casino here in Connecticut.  Prior to working with lead guitarist James Valentine of Maroon 5, Mike worked first with Jane’s Addiction and later with Nuno Bettencourt.

We had heard that James Valentine had a connection with Hamer in the past but we didn’t understand what that connection was. It seemed natural to try to determine the history.

The rich history of Hamer guitars and the people who have played such an integral part in making that history does not cease to astound us.  The support has come from a wide range of people.  It starts with all of those at the shop itself, from the original basement workshop in Wilmette, Illinois to our shop in Palatine continuing to our much expanded shop in Arlington Heights and finally on to our current home in New Hartford, Connecticut.

Most are aware of the principles at Hamer Guitars, fewer know the names of the people who built so many of the guitars, from our original builders such as John Montgomery continuing through to those who we feature today.  Throughout, we have built on what we learned from those before us.  That is why our build quality has only continued to improve.

Our history has of course also been very much impacted by the musicians who have played our guitars over the years. These musicians have come from all styles and genres of music.  Some are household names, others are not. They all have added something to our history.  We may create the guitars in our shop but it is the musicians who bring them to life.

The music dealers too have had an influence on Hamer.  Our strongest music dealers have generally been those who shared our passion for Hamer Guitars. One such store was Dietze Music in Lincoln, Nebraska. In talking with James Valentine, we learned that his connection with Hamer Guitars dates all the way back to when he taught guitar at Dietze Music.  As such, James was surrounded by Hamer enthusiasts and had ample opportunity to play early Hamers. We had discovered his connection and it reached back. 

Of our current offering, James was immediately drawn to the Talladega. However, he was looking for a humbucking version.  We sent both a Talladega and a Talladega Pro for James to try out on the road.  As expected, he went for the Talladega Pro.

The Talladega Pro that we shipped was finished in Amberburst.  James wanted the guitar in black but was concerned that putting a hard rock maple cap on it, like we normally would do on a black guitar to minimize finish sinking, could alter the tone.  Therefore, the first step was to select a top.  We had three pretty spectacular tops, any one of which would do the trick.

We settled on “C”.  It has has an outrageous flame that we hope will be noticeable from stage.  We then milled out a back and set to work bonding the maple top to the mahogany body. Here’s a clear shot of the chambering that we do on a Talladega Pro.  You’ll notice that, unlike a Talladega, the mahogany “island” extends from where the neck cavity will be routed to bridge. 

We use a paint roller to spread the glue over the mahogany.

Rather than using clamps to bond the mahogany and maple together, we use a vacuum membrane, appropriately called a Membrano.  Here, Dave is loading the Membrano.

By using vacuum, we get even pressure over the entire surface.  This is very visible once the vacuum has been activated and the air evacuated.

After the body has been bonded and bound, we rough cut the arch in the top.  Notice how we tape down the body binding so that it won’t tear away during the routing process.

There’s still a significant amount of hard carving and sanding that goes into the top.  Here we’re using an random orbital sander.  We start with 80 grit paper, continuing to 120, 180, 220 and finally 320 grit.

We pay particularly close attention to the horns.  Some guitar companies flap sand their tops.  This results in a rounded look.  We like to see definiton in the horns.  Here we’re using a Dynabrade sander to remove the mill marks.  After the mill marks are removed, we’ll final sand with 220 no fill paper.

Naturally, the same process applies for the back as well.

Nice.

Hand drilling the strap button hole.

Because we apply shielding paint to our electronics cavities, here’s something that you won’t see every day on a Hamer, the contrast between the figured maple and the mohagany viewed from the back.

The body is completed.

Meanwhile, Tom Maule is pretty far along on the neck.  Here he’s using a heat gun to make the celluloid binding more pliable to insure a snug fit to the peghead.  As celluloid is higly flammable, Tom has to be careful how much he heats up the binding material.

Tom starts with several pieces of tape to hold the binding in place.

By the time he’s done, the entire perimeter of the binding is securely taped in place.

After the neck and body have been bonded together, it’s time to give James Valentine that black guitar that he wanted.

The back, sides and neck will be opaque black while the top will be black transparent.  This way James will get a black guitar but with the same sound that he liked so much from the Amberburst guitar that he first played.

After the first coat of stain is applied, we sand it down.

Only to apply a second coat of stain.  Much of the finishing processes at Hamer are quite traditional.  We apply many thin coats of finish and repeatedly sand it down flat.  This is how luthiers have been applying finishes from the onset.

The top took the stain beautifully.

The guitar is ready for the spraybooth where Gary Pirro will perform his magic.