Is it my imagination....?? Hanks Burns Marvin

[gardinga]

I have been wondering for a little while.... whether Hanks original Burns Marvin had a slightly bigger body than Bruce's one.
They certainly look that way when you look at some of the photo's and clips of them playing them... and I wonder if anybody else had noticed this.

I am also sure I have seen another original Marvin that looked like it had a larger body....but did not have another example to compare it with. Certainly my Burns Legend has a body that is a good 1/2-inch wider than the current 2004 onwards Marvins. (I know this because it will not fit in the case's of my two modern Marvin's.... ). I understand that the body's of the current Marvin's were based on a guitar that Bruce still owns... and indeed the original 64 Marvin that I own also has the smaller body size.

I just wondered if this was something that was well known among Burn's owners and collector's.... or if I indeed it was just my imagination ??

[Iain Purdon]

I don't know, but it prompts me to say that I always thought the shape looked different then from the way it does now. Maybe an optical illusion? The guitars went through a few badge changes over the period and changed the visual imapct no end.

[gardinga]

Exactly... if you look at the clips and look at the photo's from the time... the guitar Bruce plays has exactly the proportions of the current guitars, while Hanks has a slightly taller looking body (exactly like the Legend I have)... the big clue is that the scratch plate is further from the edges of the guitar...
Anyone else agree ??

[51 Relic]

Hi I agree with you my Legend has a slightly different sized body to my Drifter and also more modern Marvins .Funny i always thought that the Legend was based on Bruces Marvin . ( look at my aviator pic )

[51 Relic]

Hi I agree with you my Legend has a slightly different sized body to my Drifter and also more modern Marvins .Funny i always thought that the Legend was based on Bruces Marvin .

Could it be that the Marvin only looks correct when Hank is playing it ,after all it was made for him !!

[cockroach]

The prototype Baldwin Marvins that Hank and Bruce used on the 1967/8 Australian tours certainly had different body shapes to the original Burns versions, as well as different shaped scratchplates...

[ErikMAMS]

Interesting - I never noticed any differences, not to say that your observations are wrong, it just never caught my eye.

I have an original if you want to compare dimensions.

Erik

[gardinga]

I think I have answered my own question....
Having re-read Pearls and Crazy Diamonds and looked at the guitar's on Alfon's Lahaye's burns-guitars.nl website... I can see that there are many variations and evolutions of the Burns Marvin in the original manufacturing period. Different body sizes are noted in addition to all the of other variations that I did know about.
Because of the hand made nature, and low production, every batch would have been different in some way or another. It appears to be that thought that Hank had at least two different white Marvins.. we can also see that Hank started out playing a guitar with an unbound neck but can also be seen playing one with a bound neck... and that he apparently had both mahogany and obeche wood bodies... so I guess we will never know... I presume that at the end of every tour or major engagement the guitars would go back to Burns for adjustments, refurbishment and repair... and substitution of parts.
It still does not change the fact however that in some images and clip's, Hanks guitar looks to have the larger size body, and Bruce's the smaller size...

[Bill Bowley]

You can go chasing for variations in BURNS (or BALDWIN) 'Marvin' guitars all day and still not find all the answers - its a bit of a 'lucky dip' as to what will be discovered lost in a vault somewhere next!
Here's a clip with two different configurations of the 'Marvin S, being used at the same time.

[bor64]

Many moons ago... in 89 i was in a room with 7 original Marvins and one pre Legend Burns aka a fake..........
One of those was my 65 Burns Marvin,we the owners had a good laugh about our guitars in the form "mine is bigger"
Just two Marvins had the same body dimentions...scrateplates were diffrent the scrolls also....
As i understand back then,at the factory they made batches of the same guitar in one week...one week Double Six the other week Marvins etc.
One of us made pictures,but it was pre digital,at the time the film was developted they discoverd that the camera didn't transported the negative at all....and every pic taken was on the same spot on the negative...
So a great uppertunity was lost forever,most Marvins where sold lateron and are around the world now....