Vibra Artist

[David Martin]

Following a chance remark in another posting, I am now the proud owner of Nick Allan's 1961 Vibra Artist.

After a day's concerted work, it now has a recut string guide, a new zero fret, reinstalled pickups (to allow lower heights), cleaned pots and switches, lubricated/cleaned bridge & trem, and a fretboard spring clean.

I'll post some pics later today, but, in the meantime, some amazing facts... posted as jpegs to preserve formatting ...

PU wiring.jpg

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Switching.jpg

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[BobGreg]

David,

The closest I ever got was the picture below which my electronic friend drew up at the time I first took the pick guard off the Artist that you eventually bought off me. I've used this before on previous querries about the various combinations of sound these guitars produce.

Hope this is similar to your layout?

[David Martin]

Here are the pics I took whilst fettling the Vibra Artist...

Vibra Artist body rout.jpg

Note the "post finish" crude mods with a chisel

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Vibra Artist scratchplate.jpg

Note that the pickup covers are isolated from the coil wires, and connected to twin earth rails via the pickup mounting screws

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Vibra Artist pots.jpg

The pots appear to be numbered 163509 FG

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Vibra Artist pots (alt view).jpg

Another view so that connections become clearer

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Vibra Artist cap on vol control closeup.jpg

I'm baffled as to why these caps are connected across the volume controls.

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Vibra Artist cap on vol control (alt view).jpg

No value markings are apparent.

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Vibra Artist pickup connections.jpg

Note the delicate wires from the pickup coils and their series connections

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Vibra Artist pickup selector.jpg

Note the bent and connected terminals

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Vibra Artist rhythm-solo switch.jpg

Seems much too big a value to be of use

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Comments and observations are most welcome.

[BrianD]

David

You lucky man (subject to what you paid!!). When I was at boarding school at Woodbridge the school group included Nick Lowe (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI2k6ase ... re=related) playing bass and Brinsley Schwartz (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWvrMoPp ... re=related) on lead guitar (this was in 1963), both of whom went on to various degrees of fame in the music industry. The second guitarist, Philip Hall, had a Burns Vibra Artist, one of the models with the mini-jack rather than the conventional one and he used to let me practice with it from time to time. I remember being in the dog-house when I trod on the lead and snapped the mini-jack off in the socket.

In 1964 Brinsley left the school and I formed the next school group and when we played at the end of term Christmas Concert Nick Lowe played bass with us. I still remember that we played three numbers - Stand By Me, Flingle Bunt but cannot remember the third song. At the time I had a Hofner V3. Two years later I left school and traded the Hofner in for a Burns Vibra Artist - with a standard jack! I used that through a Vox AC30 while playing with my college band gigging in the Eastbourne area. It was a great guitar but I never did suss out how the controls worked!

By the way going back to teh original school group I remember that Brinsley played a Fenton Weil three pick-up model. The drummer was Barry Landemann who went on to play keyboard and the recorder solo on Vanity Fair's one and only number one hit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIbaISxK8QY

Brian

[BobGreg]

David,

I don't recall the Artist that I parted with had the "chisel" mods to the pockets - can you remember?

Regardless you are a very lucky man to have secured your second Artist!

This one clearly is one of the earlier guitars because of the design of tremolo unit?

Clearly you won't let this one go - obviously the neck on this one hasn't bowed - which you pointed out was a feature on some of the earlier models.

A very lucky man indeed - I have withdrawal symptoms now that I've seen the details!

[David Martin]

Yes... the neck is true... no twists!

I'm about to lower the zero fret and replace the string guide with one of the correct colour and height, the modify the bridge saddles to allow a lower action with the correct break angle over them... then we should be all set...

Reference to the knurled edge on the knobs seems to suggest that this is one of the earliest...

And I love it!!

(p.s. Am I suffering from "insertion" symptoms? )

[Graylion]

Blimey! A brave man to take that apart! No other way to go but up I suppose? I've had mine since late 1962 (it's a late 1961 model with known provenance - the guy who sold it to me is still going strong in his 80s!). Ain't the wiring complicated? Multi-core wiring too - I wonder if that was original? I will have to take mine apart to clean the pots one day and find out why the controls never made much sense as to how the sound varied! It been years since I've taken it out of its case! (an original Burns case!) I've NEVER had the scratchplate off!

By the way it's "ARTISTE" with an "E"! I bet that'll cause some arguments! Bell Music used to spell it wrong too. I have an Ormston Burns leaflet dated April 1962 and has the last Artistes on it (spelt that way!) - photos of the de luxe and Sonic on one side, with listings of the standard Artiste and Bass guitars, and on the other side is the "MkI", 4-pickup Black Bison! I posted scans from this leaflet on the old site so if anyone's interested I can do it here.
My Artiste has the plain smooth control knobs adn the old style trem but, ususually, a chrome string bar across the strings between the trem and bridge. Again, I'll re-post pics - I can send some direct to you if you like David. What about those bent bits of steel for bridge pieces eh? I intend to take it apart and get themetalwork re-chromed ther next time I get some bike parts done. I think the bridge pieces might be best in nickel-plate. The paintwork is pretty good with the usual wear on the back of the neck and a little on the back of the body but, as I said a while ago, Maroon/red Humrol model enamel covered up the worst! Well, I was only 16 at the time!
Cheers, Lionel

[Graylion]

PS. Another famous Vibra Artiste user was Hilton Valentine, formerly of The Animals. I have 2 photos of him playing 2 different model Artistes - gleaned from his website. I wrote to him a few years back but he wasn't very chatty! The Searchers used them too in the early days. I recall seeing an album cover of theirs back in the late 1960s with the Artiste in the pic.
Lionel

[David Martin]

Great.... post the pics here for all to see... BTW, that's not multicore, it's single strands in a covering sheath...

[Graylion]

OK Dave, I'll sort some out later. Do we have an area for posting photos? I see there's one for video clips. Looks like a multi-core to me! Individual, insulated, colour-coded wires in a common sheath is definitely multi-core, even if they aren't individually screened like a front-of-house mixer/sound system - but let's not fall out over that! I can see that they have a common screen and would probably change that. Best that all signal wiring is screened right up to the switch or pot. I suppose they used what was available which gave them the colour coding. I have some of that cable somewhere and it isn't very flexible. Far better to use single or twin individually screened wiring and colour tag the ends. It's much more flexible in tight spaces. No screening/shielding on the scratchplate either - no wonder I used to receive the "Light Programme" at gigs in the early days!
Cheers, Lionel