Who made this guitar/factory wise ???

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brokentoes

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The Duncan is not original
 
Thanks Hiro for your response.


Didn't Tokai always off set their necks ?? the wiring channels and the back control cavity don't seem to be tokai at all. The square tabs in the cavity are a little too small also by the looks of them.

Could this be from the Inkie factory ? I don't know what they looked like inside.

This brand of guitars has always been portrayed as being Tokai from sellers here in Canada where i live and there is even a back story about how a music chain from the West Coast imported these under that name in a partnership with Larry Dimarzio but these are the first pics of internals i've ever gotten. Almost every MIJ brand that's kinda unknown is usually said to be made by Tokai here so its hard to believe anything. It looks like a very nice guitar but i don't know what it is honestly and i can't match up the cavity shapes or wiring channels etc from the usual suspects i know, i'm no more than an amateur at that though to be honest. I know that there were more than a few makers of guitars in Japan, so it might always be a mystery. I have seen strats and tele's under the Vintage series and the Phantom series... Not sure if that helps anything. They all look to be very well made but i've never had one to inspect myself.
 
found this but!

http://jedistar.com/phoenix-canada/


*Made between 1982-1985 by Tokai in Japan. They may or may not have been made for the Canadian market only, and they replaced the El-Degas brand of guitar
 
Yes, i would think though if they were made between 82-85 though they would just be Tokai's with the different brand on the headstock. Why would they make them with different wiring channels and back cavity shapes... Doesn't add up to Tokai as far as i can see. I'd love to think they could be, but the clues add up to a different maker. I do like a mystery. I fear this one might be unsolvable.
 
I wouldn't get hung up on the different routing, when you order enough, you can determine how it is setup.
 
Well i have to say i take the Jedistar with a grain of salt. Plenty of good info on there too though for sure.

I just don't see anything about that guitar that makes me think its a Tokai, I doubt a little music store in Canada would care enough to pay the extra money to have Tokai change their cnc program for a small order of guitars. I thought the cavity shape of the electronics cavity might point at a certain maker, they often have a "fingerprint". Tokai does and its certainly not like that one.

I have seen maybe 10 Phoenix guitars over the course of 20 or so years, most were telecasters.
 
I'm not convinced it's a Tokai either and most of the stuff on other forums referred to strats.
 
It is an interesting brand, we did have a few off brands that were imported by music stores. I had a store in the town next to me that imported "Northern" guitars. MIJ. Very much like the Phoenix brand, it had strats a and teles and LP's etc.. Some even had Maple leaves as fret markers which was kinda cool, since well Canada lol. However it was easy to peg Kasuga as the manufacturer by the fingerprints and such. Its nice to finally find out who really made these guitars instead of getting the same old stories, made by Fujigen in their Tokai factory etc.. I like a good tale as much as the next guy, but i do like to have evidence at the end of the day as well. They have always intrigued me because they do look like a very well made brand of MIJ guitars, and i'd love to know more about them and their history.
 
Yes, it is intriguing to know but the web is full of anecdotal tales and not much evidence! I have also seen tales of these small brands being made in a variety of factories depending on size of production runs, current capacity limits and prior commitments etc so for example an Antoria or Hondo could of been made in any one of say six factories depending on production costs and prior order commitments.
 
Chushin might be a good fit.
That Diamond inlay definitely isn't Tokai:

web friendly images
Compared to yours you can see that they're different.
Unusual not to have JAPAN stamped on the pots if they're original.
 
thing is, Chushin Gakki factory were established in 84 and Phoenix instruments were made between 81 and 83
 
thing is, Chushin Gakki factory were established in 84 and Phoenix instruments were made between 81 and 83

Chushin Gakki was founded in 1948, not 1984. :) According to my very recently acquired knowledge-like assumptions about those, what could be a Tokai-style offset tenon if the pic was better and the very distinctive control cavity identifies the guitar as Chushin-made.
 

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