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Anonymous
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I bought a Springy ST60 back in October. This lengthy thread lists what happened, and why I thought I was buying an ST80:
http://www.tokaiforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=9379
The thread is now closed, and I don't intend to go into details of the sale again. The bottom line is that I got a nice Springy, even if I paid over the odds at nearly ?750. A couple of people have asked me (in PMs) what it's like, so I thought I'd post details on here for anyone else who is interested to see as well.
The rest of the pics are here:
http://s183.photobucket.com/albums/x153/stratman323/Tokai%20ST60%20Springy%20SB/
I am told that it is a 1980 model; the serial number is 0014539. There was originally some suggestion that it might be an ST80, or possibly an ST60 neck on an ST80 body. However, I believe that ST80s have a V shape neck (something that Fender only produced in the 50s on maple board Strats, not in the 60s after rosewood boards were intoduced). Mine has an unusually slim neck, quite similar to my 1986 Fender US62RI. This is great news for me as it's hard to get necks as slim as this.
The finish feels like poly to me, not nitro as on the 80s and above. However, it's a thin poly (much thinner than the finish on my 2 1984 Goldstars), and it doesn't seem to box the sound in like thicker poly does, so I'm fairly happy with it. There's also no sign of the lacquer on the body crazing, which sometimes happens with nitro after nearly 30 years, so I'm assuming it's all poly.
When it arrived, the action was so low as to make it unplayable. After restringing (10-52) it and raising the action, it sounded and played much better, but I still needed to get the frets stoned to get it playing really well. Money well spent I think.
The pickups are the "E" stamped Dimarzios that so many people rave about. They read 5.47, 5.61 & 5.61k, which is a bit lower than my Goldstar pickups, Fender re-issues, Seymour Duncan vintage pickups etc. But output alone is only part of the story, they do have a good "vintage" sort of tone. However, compared to my US Fenders, which are quite dark and more solid sounding, the Springy's sound is lighter, almost like a maple board Strat.
I reckon this is down to 2 main factors - first the body is ash (2 piece I think, not that this makes much difference), wheras Fender used alder for Sunburst Strats after about 1957. Ash tends to give a brighter sound than alder. Also, the rosewood board is a thin cap, as used by Fender from about 1964 onwards, whereas my Fenders have the earlier slab boards. The experts reckon that cap boards tend to sound brighter than slab boards.
It's hard to put my finger on why it's a better guitar than my 84 Goldstar, but it has more of a quality feel about it, and an openness to the sound too. The spaghetti decal is cleverer than I originally thought - when it's on a stand next to a Strat with the Fender spaghetti decal, it's hard to tell the decals apart from a few feet away unless you look carefully. No wonder Fender were provoked into action. :lol:
There is one strange detail that Tokai got wrong, even though they claimed that the Springy is "THE EXACT REPLICA OF THE GOOD OLD STRAT" - the dot markers on the side of the neck are black, not white. Now I know that this doesn't matter, in fact it's almost an improvement as they are a little easier to see than the white dots that Fender use, and that Tokai had started using by the time the Goldstars were introduced.
I have a theory about this. I reckon that Tokai set out to copy a 50s Strat in 1978, and used features that only 50s Strats had - ash bodies, black dot markers, single ply scratchplates (till 79), V profile necks etc. It looks as though the 60s copies with a rosewood board were an afterthought - the 78 and 79 models even had the truss rod inserted from the rear of the neck, complete with skunk stripe, though they had corrected this "error" by 1980. By the time they made the Goldstars in 83/4, they were using different necks on the maple and rosewood board guitars - the maple necks are chunkier than the rosewood board necks.
All in all, it's a very interesting guitar, especially when you consider that Fender were still producing quite poor guitars up till 82 when they introduced the US 57 & 62 re-issues, which were generally considered to be their best Strats since about 66 or 67. Clearly they wouldn't have felt the need to introduce these guitars if it hadn't been for the pressure that Tokai had put on them by making better Strats than they were making themselves. So I think that any lover of good Strats should try a Springy. The only thing that might make me sell this would be if I got an ST80 or 100 that I preferred, though I'm not sure if the V neck will suit me. We'll see when I get round to trying one.
Sorry that this post is so long, but I've tried to give an impression of what a Springy is like to anyone who hasn't tried one, and is curious about why they tend to sell for so much more than a Goldstar. I know this is what I wondered when I first joined the forum, so I hope it's of some help to a few members.
I would welcome comments about the guitar, especially from anyone else who owns an ST60 - do they all have such slim necks?
Mike
http://www.tokaiforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=9379
The thread is now closed, and I don't intend to go into details of the sale again. The bottom line is that I got a nice Springy, even if I paid over the odds at nearly ?750. A couple of people have asked me (in PMs) what it's like, so I thought I'd post details on here for anyone else who is interested to see as well.
The rest of the pics are here:
http://s183.photobucket.com/albums/x153/stratman323/Tokai%20ST60%20Springy%20SB/
I am told that it is a 1980 model; the serial number is 0014539. There was originally some suggestion that it might be an ST80, or possibly an ST60 neck on an ST80 body. However, I believe that ST80s have a V shape neck (something that Fender only produced in the 50s on maple board Strats, not in the 60s after rosewood boards were intoduced). Mine has an unusually slim neck, quite similar to my 1986 Fender US62RI. This is great news for me as it's hard to get necks as slim as this.
The finish feels like poly to me, not nitro as on the 80s and above. However, it's a thin poly (much thinner than the finish on my 2 1984 Goldstars), and it doesn't seem to box the sound in like thicker poly does, so I'm fairly happy with it. There's also no sign of the lacquer on the body crazing, which sometimes happens with nitro after nearly 30 years, so I'm assuming it's all poly.
When it arrived, the action was so low as to make it unplayable. After restringing (10-52) it and raising the action, it sounded and played much better, but I still needed to get the frets stoned to get it playing really well. Money well spent I think.
The pickups are the "E" stamped Dimarzios that so many people rave about. They read 5.47, 5.61 & 5.61k, which is a bit lower than my Goldstar pickups, Fender re-issues, Seymour Duncan vintage pickups etc. But output alone is only part of the story, they do have a good "vintage" sort of tone. However, compared to my US Fenders, which are quite dark and more solid sounding, the Springy's sound is lighter, almost like a maple board Strat.
I reckon this is down to 2 main factors - first the body is ash (2 piece I think, not that this makes much difference), wheras Fender used alder for Sunburst Strats after about 1957. Ash tends to give a brighter sound than alder. Also, the rosewood board is a thin cap, as used by Fender from about 1964 onwards, whereas my Fenders have the earlier slab boards. The experts reckon that cap boards tend to sound brighter than slab boards.
It's hard to put my finger on why it's a better guitar than my 84 Goldstar, but it has more of a quality feel about it, and an openness to the sound too. The spaghetti decal is cleverer than I originally thought - when it's on a stand next to a Strat with the Fender spaghetti decal, it's hard to tell the decals apart from a few feet away unless you look carefully. No wonder Fender were provoked into action. :lol:
There is one strange detail that Tokai got wrong, even though they claimed that the Springy is "THE EXACT REPLICA OF THE GOOD OLD STRAT" - the dot markers on the side of the neck are black, not white. Now I know that this doesn't matter, in fact it's almost an improvement as they are a little easier to see than the white dots that Fender use, and that Tokai had started using by the time the Goldstars were introduced.
I have a theory about this. I reckon that Tokai set out to copy a 50s Strat in 1978, and used features that only 50s Strats had - ash bodies, black dot markers, single ply scratchplates (till 79), V profile necks etc. It looks as though the 60s copies with a rosewood board were an afterthought - the 78 and 79 models even had the truss rod inserted from the rear of the neck, complete with skunk stripe, though they had corrected this "error" by 1980. By the time they made the Goldstars in 83/4, they were using different necks on the maple and rosewood board guitars - the maple necks are chunkier than the rosewood board necks.
All in all, it's a very interesting guitar, especially when you consider that Fender were still producing quite poor guitars up till 82 when they introduced the US 57 & 62 re-issues, which were generally considered to be their best Strats since about 66 or 67. Clearly they wouldn't have felt the need to introduce these guitars if it hadn't been for the pressure that Tokai had put on them by making better Strats than they were making themselves. So I think that any lover of good Strats should try a Springy. The only thing that might make me sell this would be if I got an ST80 or 100 that I preferred, though I'm not sure if the V neck will suit me. We'll see when I get round to trying one.
Sorry that this post is so long, but I've tried to give an impression of what a Springy is like to anyone who hasn't tried one, and is curious about why they tend to sell for so much more than a Goldstar. I know this is what I wondered when I first joined the forum, so I hope it's of some help to a few members.
I would welcome comments about the guitar, especially from anyone else who owns an ST60 - do they all have such slim necks?
Mike
