The Long and Winding Road of the Orville by Gibsons.
Yamano = Orville by Gibson and Orville, Japanese Orderer and Distributor under license from Gibson USA.
Terada and FujiGen = Japanese guitar factories.
Iida (Ida Gakki) = Japanese guitar factory who also own Peerless in Korea.
OBG = Orville by Gibson.
sn = serial number.
Kanda Shokai = Greco and Fender Japan, Japanese Orderer and Distributor.
Hoshino = Ibanez Orderer and Distributor.
Samick = Korean guitar factory.
Email from Jim Donahue to me (including Jims spelling mistakes which he does a lot on the Ibanezcollectors posts).
Jim Donahue worked for Ibanez in the 1980's and 1990's and visited the Japanese guitar factories that Ibanez was using.
I asked him about whether he saw any OBG's or Orvilles at Terada, FujiGen, Iida or Tokai and this is what he said.
"I remember seeing the Orville by Gibson at the Fuji Factory also at Terrada. I asked Fuji what these were and they told me that the Japanese Distributor was sellinged these made in Japan as a sort of Epiphone model for Japan. They could not use Epiphone at that time and they wanted to make a Gibson bot they were not allowed to use the Real Gibson Name. So they came up with the Orville name.
I have never visited to Tokai so I have no idea on that, they were making many at Fuji back then thiswas around 1993 or so."
Jim
He did not see any Orvilles at any of the Korean factories that he regularly visited (Samick, Cort, Peerless, Saehan/Sunghan etc) in 1991 http://www.stribble.com/showarticle.php?ID=49 he only saw them at Terada and FujiGen around 1993.
The K Orvilles were being made in 1991 so if they were being made by a Korean factory he would have seen them.
The K Orvilles have catalogue and serial number years from 1989-1993.
He would have visited FujiGen frequently as Ibanez still had their high end guitars made there and he didn't see Orvilles at FujiGen until around 1993 because the Orvilles were not made by FujiGen until mid/late 1992 and from 1988 to mid/late 1992 they were being made at Terada only and he wouldn't have visited Terada much because Terada only made guitars for Ibanez for a short time starting in 1986/1987 and then the production was moved to Korea.
In mid/late 1992 FujiGen joined in with Terada with the OBG making (and in 1993 the Orville making) with FujiGen taking over most of the solidbody making which is why the G letter starts disappearing from the OBG solidbodies from mid/late 1992-1995 and why the G letter is still used on the OBG Semi Acoustics from mid/late1992-1995 because Terada gave up most of the solid body making to FujiGen in mid/late1992 but kept on making the Semi Acoustics which all still had a G letter from mid/late1992-1995.
This is verified by what Jim Donahue said "they were making many at Fuji back then thiswas around 1993 or so" as most of the OBG's and Orvilles in 1993 were FujiGen no letter ones and Terada were only making a small number of OBG's in 1993 which were mostly Semi Acoustics with a G letter.
All the OBG's from 1988 to mid/late1992 have a Terada G letter.
When 2 or more guitar factories are making the same brand of guitar some sort of factory ID code has to be used for quality control, warranties and returns.
Hoshino did this with Ibanez, for instance Jim Donahue says that Terada and Iida were making models for Ibanez so Terada used a H letter (probably for Hoshino) and Iida used a I letter.
For the OBG's from 1988 to 1995 there are only 2 codes used which are a G letter code and a no letter code and each code ID's the guitar factory with G = Terada and no letter = FujiGen.
The 2 codes means that there were only 2 guitar factories making the OBG's and Orvilles, Terada and FujiGen.
J = Terada is used for the Orvilles after the OBG's end in 1995 up to 1998 and FujiGen keeps using no letter for the Orvilles from 1995-1998.
In 1988 FujiGen obviously wasn't interested in the OBG Yamano contract and why would they be.
FujiGen were much busier than Terada, Iida or any other guitar factory.
In 1988 FujiGen had the Ibanez contract, the Fender Japan contract, the Greco contract etc so the OBG contract wouldn't excite them much.
Jim Donahue has said that in 1987 Hoshino could not get FujiGen who made most of the Ibanez guitars in the 1980's to make the Ibanez set neck models in the numbers that Hoshino needed because FujiGen was too busy with Ibanez, Fender Japan, Greco etc bolt on neck production so Hoshino had to use Terada and Iida to produce the Ibanez set neck models.
"Here's some Fujigen trivia: Nick (Nick Sugimoto worked at FujiGen at the time) and some other Fujigen luthiers were responsible for getting the president of Fujigen to rescind the decision to get completely out of making setneck guitars. (You'll notice that most Ibanez setneck guitars from the late 80s are Iida and Terrada made.)"
http://www.ibanezcollectors.com/discus/messages/12/21327.html?1177550983
Fujigen didn't get back to full set neck production until after the opening of the FujiGen Hirooka Factory in November 1991 http://www.fujigen.co.jp/history/ which is why the early 1988-1992 Orville by Gibsons and K Orvilles were made by Terada and why Kanda Shokai had the no serial Grecos made to fill the lower end production Greco gap left by FujiGen opting out.
So Yamano starting off the OBG's in 1988 would not have had much of a chance to have FujiGen make them.
Have a look at FujiGen in 1987 a year before the OBG contracts start.
http://www.daeschler.com/articles/fujigen/
So in 1988 Terada was available to build all the G letter OBG and (K) Orville models and that's how it stayed until mid/late1992.
By mid/late1992 FujiGen had lost a lot of it's Fender Squier contracts to Korea and had lost a lot of it's Ibanez contracts to Korea and Kanda Shokai was looking elsewhere to other guitar factories to make some of the lower end Grecos so by mid/late1992 FujiGen were a lot less busy than they were in 1988 and they made themselves available for the Yamano OBG and Orville contract.
So around mid/late1992 FujiGen start making OBG's and Orvilles in 1993 with no letter and the Terada K Orvilles end and the Terada G letter is not on most of the OBG and Orville solidbodies anymore because FujiGen was making most of the solidbodies with no letter.
When the OBG's end in 1995 Terada changes it's letter from G to J but basically everything stays the same with FujiGen making most of the Orville solidbodies from 1995 to 1998 with no letter and Terada making most of the Orville Semi Acoustics with a J letter (instead of a G) from 1995 to 1998
This is also how it was for Epiphone Japan models as well.
The Terada G letter probably stands for Gibson and the Terada J letter probably stands for Japan.
The K letter is completely different from the G and J and does not stand for Korea.
The K letter has a completely different serial number format to the G and J letters.
The K letter is from Yamano and not from Terada even though Terada made the K Orvilles (just look at the Terada G letter OBG and Terada K letter Orville custom headstocks, they are both the same and both are different to the FujiGen no letter custom headstocks).
At first glance you could say G = Gibson J = Japan and K = Korea but it doesn't work that way.
The G and J serials have the same format but the K format doesn't so they can't be directly compared.
The K = Korea and the J =Japan can't be linked because they come from different years with the J letter coming from 1995-1998 and the K letter coming from 1989/1990 to 1993.
There was made up info that the K Orvilles were from 1996 probably because the person who made it up was trying to pair off the K = Korea against the J = Japan and had to put the K Orvilles past 1995 (when the J letter starts being used) to do so.
This info turned out to be made up by someone and was false.
The likely reason that the K Orvilles had no ink stamped serial is because they were actually made in 1988 with the first OBG's but not released till nearly 2 years later in 1989/1990.
The first LP and SG K Orville models in 1989/1990 correspond with the first LP and SG OBG models that come from nearly 2 years earlier in 1988 indicating that the first K Orvilles were actually made at the same time as the first OBG's in 1988.
Yamano probably didn't want the K Orvilles dated with a serial number because they were not sure when they were going to release them.
The K sticker is from Yamano for warranty dating purposes.
The OBG that was found that had a sticker the same size as a K sticker backs this up because the sticker on the OBG would not be a guitar factory sticker because the guitar factory would have put a ink stamped serial on the OBG, so the guitar factory missed putting a ink stamped serial on the OBG and so Yamano must have put the sticker on.
The 65,000 Yen K Orville Les Paul Custom is in the Orville by Gibson catalogue volume 3 from 1989/1990 and the K Orville Melody Maker (there were no OBG or ink stamped Melody Makers) is on the cover of the Orville by Gibson 1990 catalogue.
There were theories about the K meaning Kanda Shokai but these are wrong as I emailed a former Kanda Shokai employee who worked for Kanda Shokai (and now runs o2factory guitars) in the early 1990's (same time as the K Orvilles) and he said Kanda Shokai was not involved with the OBG's or Orvilles and a 1990 K Orville with a Yamano warranty has turned up on Yahoo Japan Auctions http://page2.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/b80953869 which means that the K Orvilles are definitely from Yamano and not Kanda Shokai.
K can stand for a lot of Japanese words and it most likely stands for Kuramae which is Yamano's wholesale division.
Some people will bring up the K Orville quality issue.
All the Orvilles (K and ink stamped) were made from African Mahogany and not Alder or Agathis like some Korean guitars were.
The Terada K Orville Les Pauls started selling in 1989/1990 at 65,000 Yen and the K Orville SG's sold for 60,000 Yen.
By 1990/1991 the Terada K Orville Les Pauls rose in price to 75,000 Yen and the K Orville SG's rose in price to 65,000 Yen.
When the FujiGen ink stamped Orvilles start in 1993 and the K Orvilles end the Les Paul and SG prices are kept the same with 75,000 Yen for ink stamped Orville Les Pauls and 65,000 Yen for ink stamped Orville SG's.
The ink stamped Orville Les Paul models were added to by a 80,000 Yen flametop model and a 85,000 Yen ebony fingerboard model and that's how it stayed with a few variations until the Orvilles ended in 1998.
There would be a difference in quality of a 65,000 Yen K Orville Les Paul compared to a 75,000 or 85,000 Yen ink stamped Orville Les Paul and the quality is based on price.
There is hardly any difference in quality between a 75,000 Yen Terada K Orville Les Paul and a 75,000 Yen FujiGen ink stamped Orville Les Paul or a 65,000 Yen Terada K Orville SG and a 65,000 Yen FujiGen ink stamped Orville SG.
How the OBG and Orville serial numbers tie in with the above info.
Every OBG has a Terada G letter sn from 1988 to mid/late 1992.
The first OBG models are Les Paul Customs and Standards and SG's and ES-335's.
The Terada K Orvilles get released in late 1989/ early 1990 but were really made at the same time as the 1988 OBG's.
The first K Orville models are Les Paul Customs and Standards and SG's which are the same as the 1988 OBG models with the exception of the OBG ES-335.
The OBG ES-335 was not going have a corresponding K Orville model at this time as the K Orvilles are just cheaper versions of the best selling models LP's and SG's.
It wasn't till after the OBG's ended in 1995 that the ES-335 model became an Orville model.
So the K Orville LP's and SG's had a delayed release probably because Yamano wanted to see how the OBG's went before launching the Orvilles.
When the K Orvilles do get released in late 1989/ early 1990 the OBG range had been expanded to include other models like Explorers etc and the K Orvilles get released with a Yamano sticker for the warranty dating.
Yamano were unsure of a release year for the K Orvilles so they did not want them made with a G letter ink stamped year dated serial number.
When Yamano does decide to release the K Orvilles in late 1989/ early 1990 they release them with a EB-3 bass model that has a G letter ink stamped serial number.
The reason that the EB-3 bass model has a G letter ink stamped serial number and the K Orvilles don't is because the EB-3 bass model was not delayed and were made just before Yamano decided to release the Orvilles in late 1989/ early 1990 whereas the K Orvilles had actually been made nearly 2 years before in 1988.
Yamano decided just before the release of the delayed K Orvilles to also include a EB-3 bass model in the Orville range and so the EB-3 bass model doesn't have a K sticker like the other K Orville Les Pauls and SG's do.
So the delayed K Orvilles and the EB-3 bass model get released for sale at the same time but were actually made in different years.
As I said before every OBG has a Terada G sn letter from 1988 to mid/late 1992 and from mid/late 1992 the first no letter sn OBG's start appearing and in 1993 the K Orvilles stop appearing and are replaced with no letter sn Orvilles.
The appearance of the no letter serial numbers coincides exactly with the time that FujiGen joined in with Terada.
From 1988 to mid/late 1992 every OBG or K Orville or Orville bass was from Terada.
From mid/late 1992 FujiGen takes over most of the solid body OBG and from 1993 the Orville making and Terada assumes it's more traditional role making mostly Semi Acoustics.
From mid/late 1992 to the end of the OBG's in 1995 the Semi Acoustics still have the Terada G sn letter whereas most of the solid body models from mid/late 1992 to the end of the OBG's in 1995 have the FujiGen no letter sn.
These serial number variations coincide exactly with the info above about when FujiGen actually started producing OBG and Orville guitars for Yamano.
When the OBG's end in 1995 the Orville range had some of the previous OBG models added to it such as the ES-335's, Explorers etc.
Basically after the OBG's end in 1995 the serial numbers stay the same until the end of the Orvilles in 1998.
The only difference is that Terada uses a J letter for the 1995-1998 Orvilles instead of the G letter they were using for the OBG's.
There are no OBG's with a J letter.
The G letter stands for Gibson and when the OBG's end so does the "by Gibson" logo and the use of Gibson pickups and so Terada thought that a using a J letter (J stands for Japan) for the Orvilles would be better than keep using a G letter which was connected with the OBG's.
So just as it was with the OBG's and Orvilles from mid/late 1992 to 1995, Terada makes mainly the Orville Semi Acoustic models with a J letter sn from 1995-1998 and FujiGen keeps on making most of the Orville solid body models using a no letter sn from 1995 to 1998.
Terada can make any type of guitar but they usually specialize in Semi Acoustics and Acoustics.
All the Orville by Gibson Semi Acoustics and Acoustics have a G or J letter serial number code.
Terada Factory Tour image showing that Terada had the Orville by Gibson contract starting in 1988 and that Terada used the G letter code as Terada would have made the Orville by Gibson Semi Acoustics and all of them have a G letter code and Terada also used the J letter code as all the Orville Semi Acoustics have a J letter code and it also shows that Terada had the Orville by Gibson contract in the years that the K Orvilles were made as the K Orvilles were made in the same years as when all the Orville by Gibsons (and not just mainly the Semi Acoustics) have a Terada G letter code from 1988 to mid/late 1992/1993 (before the FujiGen no letter code starts appearing in mid/late 1992/1993).
The image also shows that Terada had the Yamano contract spanning the Orville by Gibsons, the Orvilles and the Epiphone Japan's as the image was taken in 2003 (long after the Orvilles ended in 1998) and Terada are still using the Orville by Gibson decal box for the 2003 Epiphone Japan models.
http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/4223/teradaobgwl1.jpg
http://www.gretschguitars.com/terada/images/IMG_4051.jpg
http://www.gretschguitars.com/terada/
Orvilles and other factories and the K sticker
Sometimes Iida is said to have made some of the Orvilles but by the G and J letter Terada serial numbers and the no letter FujiGen serial numbers Iida can be rejected as having anything to do with the Orville by Gibsons.
For the K Orvilles Iida sometimes comes up as the maker of the K Orvilles with Iida's Korean Peerless factory providing the parts but this theory has problems.
If Iida is making the K Orvilles why are the Terada Orville by Gibson LP custom headstocks the same as the K Orville LP custom headstocks but both are different to the FujiGen custom LP headstocks.
The way the OBG and Orville headstocks are done is they use a thin maple headstock veneer and paint it black and then they glue the black headstock veneer to the headstock and then apply and position by hand the Orville logos, split diamonds etc which are mother-of-pearl, about 0.1mm thick, and applied with a poly type glue (info from Mike Lewis from Gretsch and the Terada tour).
The script logos like the "Les Paul Model" are decals (not mother of pearl) and are positioned by hand.
The Terada made Gretsch headstocks are done this way as well and are shown in the Terada Gretsch factory tour.
In the Terada picture
http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/4223/teradaobgwl1.jpg the Orville by Gibson box holds the mother of pearl Orville logos and the Gretsch box holds the mother of pearl Gretsch logos and the Gretsch guitar in the image has a red painted headstock veneer and the Gretsch mother of pearl logos are being applied as described above.
The chances of another guitar factory making the K Orville custom headstocks look exactly like the Terada Orville by Gibson headstocks for 3 1/2 years are just about non existant.
The 70s Gibson headstock veneers are done in a similar way to the above.
Modern Gibsons use a different headstock veneer technique which is shown in the Gibson factory tour where they use a pre made black fibre (cardboard like) based headstock veneer with the Gibson logos embedded (pressed) into the veneer and the script logos like "Les Paul Model" are decals whose edges are covered by the final finish.
On the faded series where the final finishing is not that thick you can see the "Les Paul Model" decal edges.
They then glue the veneer to the headstock and apply the final finish.
The Gibson reissues are done with a Holly (wood that's a bit like Maple) veneer and the Gibson and split diamond logos are fitted into the Holly veneer after logo spaces are carved out of the Holly using a cnc router (or originally by hand) and then the whole veneer is painted black and then the black paint is scraped off the logos and the script logos like "Les Paul Model" for standards are then applied using silk screening techniques and are not decals.
They then glue the veneer to the headstock and apply the final finish.
Gibson has also sometimes used no headstock veneers mainly for some Acoustic guitars that don't have headstock inlays.
The Terada and FujiGen OBG split diamond headstock inlay positioning is noticeably different so how could Iida or Peerless consistently position the K Orville LP custom split diamond headstock inlays exactly the same as the Terada Orville by Gibson LP custom split diamond headstock inlays for the 3 years that the K Orvilles existed from 1989/1990-1993.
This reason alone is enough to reject Iida or Peerless as having anything to do with making the K Orvilles.
Jim Donahue from Ibanez who visited Terada, FujiGen, Iida and Peerless in connection with Ibanez in the late 1980's/early 1990's never saw the Orvilles at Iida or Peerless when I asked him, and he only saw Orvilles and OBG's at Terada and FujiGen.
Then there are the years the K Orvilles were sold (1989/1990-1993) which mostly correspond to when only Terada alone had the Orville by Gibson contract between 1988 and mid/late 1992.
Why Iida is raised in connection with the K Orvilles is that it makes explaining the K sticker easy but as I've written above the K sticker is from the distributing company Yamano and not from a guitar factory like Terada or Iida.
The K Orvilles are leaving the guitar factory with no serial number at all.
The reasons for the K Orvilles leaving the guitar factory with no serial number at all is that Yamano did not want them dated as the K Orvilles were really made starting in 1988 and not released until nearly 2 years later and once you start this routine you can't just begin to use serial numbers at some point because every guitar made is out of step by nearly 2 years so if Yamano told Terada in 1991 to use a G ink stamped serial number on the K Orvilles then because of the K Orvilles nearly 2 years delay a G 1991 serial number could be on a K Orville sold in 1993 due to the backed up Terada K Orville stocks having to be sold first before the G 1991 ink stamped serial number Orville could be sold.
FujiGen starts making the Orville by Gibson solid body models in mid/late 1992 and FujiGen don't start making the Orville solid body models until sometime in 1993.
So FujiGens no letter ink stamped serial numbers appear first on the OBG's in mid/late 1992 and then they appear later on the Orvilles sometime in 1993.
What happened is that Terada stopped making the K Orvilles around mid/late 1992 as Yamano had arranged that FujiGen takeover most of the OBG and Orville solidbody making sometime in mid/late 1992 and Yamano had a supply of K Orvilles in their warehouses so Yamano didn't need to start Orville production up again using FujiGen until sometime in 1993 because of the backed up K Orville warehouse stocks having to be sold first.
When FujiGen start making the Orvilles in 1993 they are made with a no letter ink stamped serial number.
FujiGen starts making Orville by Gibson models for Yamano in mid/late 1992 but doesn't start making Orvilles for Yamano until sometime in 1993 because of the backed up Terada K Orville stocks.
There is a clear delay between the first FujiGen OBG and Orville serial numbers with FujiGen starting to make OBG's in mid/late 1992 and FujiGen not starting to make Orvilles until sometime in 1993.
In simple terms Yamano always had a large amount of Terada K Orvilles in their warehouses at anytime between 1988 and 1992 because beginning in 1988 the K Orvilles were stored in Yamano's warehouses for a future release date which just happened to be 1989/1990 but could have been any year Yamano chose.
In 1992 Yamano contracts FujiGen to takeover most of the solid body models from Terada, and FujiGen begin by making OBG solid bodies in mid/late 1992 and don't start making Orvilles until sometime in 1993 because of waiting for the Yamano backed up warehouse supply of K Orvilles to run out.
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Serial Number Formats.
Y = Year
MM = Month
XXX or XXXX = production number
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K Orville Serial Numbers.
Terada Orville K Yamano serial sticker (1989/1990-1993)
K 0YXXXX = YXXXX format.
K 097674 = 9 7674 = 1989 K 007674 = 0 7674 = 1990 K 017674 = 1 7674 = 1991 K 027674 = 2 7674 = 1992 K 037674 = 3 7674 = 1993
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Orville Serial Numbers.
YYXXXX format.
Terada Orville EB-3 Bass G letter code (1988/1989) G893819 = 1989
YMMXXX format.
Terada Orville EB-3 Bass G letter code (1989/1990-1993) G103819 = March 1991
FujiGen Orville EB-3 Bass no letter code ink stamped serial (1993-1998) 403819 = March 1994
FujiGen Orville no letter code ink stamped serial (1993-1998) 403819 = March 1994
Terada Orville J letter code (1995-1998) J603819 = March 1996
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Orville by Gibson Serial Numbers
YYXXXX format.
Terada Orville by Gibson G letter code (1988/1989) G883819 = 1988
YMMXXX format.
Terada Orville by Gibson G letter code (1989/1990-1995) G103819 = March 1991
FujiGen Orville by Gibson no letter code (mid/late 1992/1993-1995) 303819 = March 1993
Terada Acoustic AG letter code (1991-1993) AG203687 = March 1992
Terada Acoustic G letter code (1991-1993) G203687 = March 1992
YXXXX format.
Terada Orville by Gibson reissue G letter code (late 1992/1993-1995) G3 3819 = 1993
FujiGen Orville by Gibson reissue no letter code (late 1992/1993-1995) 3 3819 = 1993
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G letter code = made by Terada
J letter code = made by Terada
K letter code = Yamano sticker and made by Terada
No letter code = made by FujiGen
A few things to note about the above serial numbers.
The Terada G letter code Orville by Gibsons start in 1988.
The Terada J letter code starts in 1995 after the Terada G letter code Orville by Gibsons end.
The Terada K Orville serial numbers end in 1993 and the FujiGen no letter code ink stamped Orvilles start in 1993.
The FujiGen no letter code ink stamped Orville by Gibsons start in mid/late 1992/1993.