I 'laughed out loud' when I saw this Greco listed on Reverb

[guitar hiro]

I was looking at Reverb listings & I saw a listing for a 1979 Greco EG 850 that has the below statement in the verbiage.

"Pickups on this model are PU-2, with an ‘A’ stamp to indicate Alnico magnets."

I have never heard that before. Actually I have read discussions on forums & I have never heard anyone state what the A stamp on some PU-2 bases actually indicates.

Now I know; it's AlNiCo.

[_JDZ]

I was looking at Reverb listings & I saw a listing for a 1979 Greco EG 850 that has the below statement in the verbiage.

"Pickups on this model are PU-2, with an ‘A’ stamp to indicate Alnico magnets."

I have never heard that before. Actually I have read discussions on forums & I have never heard anyone state what the A stamp on some PU-2 bases actually indicates.

Now I know; it's AlNiCo.

Why did you find it funny?

https://jk-guitars.jimdo.com/greco%E3%8 ... 3%BCvol-3/

[guitar hiro]

Yes, I LOL. I find humor in just about everything.

In all the years I have been reading about MIJ pickups I have yet to see anyone mention what the A stamp on the PU-2 bases actually relates to, if anything.

Maybe they are Dry A pickups; worth five times more than the fabled & hyped Dry Z.

I see the link you provided is the first of any info I have seen to address the subject.
"20 days after the above specification, the base plate has been restored to the standard 2-point mount. In addition, A stamp that seems to represent Alnico magnet specification is pressed."
That may be correct but then it may not; I don't know.

The writer did state (translated of course), "In addition, A stamp that seems to represent Alnico magnet specification is pressed."

Utilizing the term 'seems' doesn't lend itself to being definitive IMO. Maybe it's a guess, a theory, etc. Who knows.

After all, it its the interwebz. Everything I read on the interwebz may not be true & I won't believe everything I read.

Yep, I LOL all the time; it keeps me young.

PS - the author's comment concerning the stamped date code is off by ten days.

[_JDZ]

You are simply Trolling.

Well, I do regret sharing that link with you and see no point in providing you with any other info on this.

Clearly you are just to be ignored - which is apparent from many of your posts.

'quality over quantity' - indeed...

[guitar hiro]

Trolling? LOL. Thanks for the laugh; I feel younger again.

As some of us know, all things MIJ are not as easy to decipher as we would all like them to be.

Case in point: There was at one time the commonly held belief that the vintage Tokai LS-120 examples were solid flame tops. There are threads here concerning that very idea. Even one of the forum’s most noted Tokai ‘experts’ was at one time stating that LS-120s were all solid top. Well, as history has spoken, we now know that not to be the case. As a matter of fact, there have been more documented veneer top LS-120s, and very few documented solid top LS-120s.

Me? I am employed within the science & engineering fields. We like theories just as much as the next guy but we like facts even more. MIJ facts are often times difficult to come by. I typically won’t take a single mention of a theory as fact. IMO that is fake science. I also won’t do that with MIJ guitars. The potential for variance has been demonstrated again, and again with MIJ.

As I alluded to earlier, more than once, I have read a few things concerning MIJ pickups. Your link was the only mention I have seen concerning the (potential) explanation for the A stamp on the PU-2 bases. Also, as I previously stated the (translated) verbiage, “seems to represent” does not IMO lend itself to being a definitive ‘end all, be all.’ It is nothing more than one person’s theory.

Back in the day before the internet there was an old saying; ‘don’t believe everything you read.’

In the age of the interwebz it’s the same thing IMO but there’s a different spin on it now. ‘I saw it on the internet so, it must be true.’

By the way, thanks for that link.
AFA your trolling accusation; if anyone here is trolling, it isn’t me.

[CliffsComicWorld]

Guitar Hiro... I agree with JDZ.. you are a troll.

[guitar hiro]

Did some more digging around on the interwebz and located a couple of interesting things.

Here is a link that shows what look to be a set of PU-2 pickups with the three screw mounts.
https://japtone.com/en/tienda/maxon-en/ ... 5/?lang=en
These are coded 190910 = September 10, 1979, and they also include the A stamp.
The above set pre-dates the set seen in the link from the second post in the thread, listed as ＜1979年製 #191020＞ PU-2, that are coded 191020, which do not have the A stamp.
Interesting that the set with the earlier date code has the A stamp, and the set with the later date code does not have the A stamp.


I also ran across an interesting post from a TF member from nearly nine years ago.
Below is what it states.

“I came across the YJ listing for a set of DRY-Zs and noticed something interesting in the listing.
It said that the hand-winder Takano who is the K&T guy was the guy who actually develop the DRY-Z. That would explain why he charges Dry-Z prices for the K&T winds, but I thought I would see it there was any other supporting evidence to that. Unfortunately I didn't find anything yet.
What I did find was a blog entry that gave lots of detail about Greco pickups as told to him from a person from the time connected to the company.
It does say some interesting things:
- In January 1979 in the middle of the "copy guitar wars" in Japan Greco decided to develop a copy of the "PAF"
- In July 1979 they had the prototype completed
- "Z" was the internal company management letter and doesn't seem to have any special meaning other than that.
- 1982 Dry has Alnico 8 magnets.
- Groove and Double Trick have Alnico 3
It didn't say what Dry-Z magnets were.
As usual, the disclaimer "I read it on the Internets" is in order here.”

Why do I find that interesting?
It is interesting to note where it states, "Z was the internal company management letter and doesn't seem to have any special meaning other than that.” The ‘Z’ was (eventually) seen ink stamped on the pickup bases for these pickups.
I also find it interesting to note the member that posted the post stated, “As usual, the disclaimer I read it on the Internets is in order here.”

[wulfman]

Good post, I translated the blog entry of Takano and this information was pretty useful. My theory is that the A was used when making the DRY-Z pickups and PU-2 pickups at the same production location to easily differentiate them (nevermind the stamped baseplates of most PU-2s). What is the opposite of Z? Why not use A?

[guitar hiro]

Interesting theory you have there wulfman.

It seems that the Z Dry prototype was 'completed' during the summer of 1979.
The A stamp on the PU-2 pickups did start showing up within a very short time frame after this development.
I assume production examples of Z Dry would have to be manufactured between summer 1979 & the initial phase of 1980 Super Real that had Z Dry pickups.

Your theory may be spot on.