FACTOIDS & TRIVIA

After Guild's electric guitar production was moved to Korea, the Starfire V was reissued in 2014 as a '60s inspired model as shown here. Like Guild's other Korean-made electric guitars, the Starfire V has many visual cues of its counterpart from the 1960s, but lacks vintage accurate details. The official Guild specifications state the body is made of "mahogany", which implies the true mahogany found in Central and South America. However, as we know, "mahogany" has become a generic term that has come to mean "any wood that has similar properties and look as genuine mahogany". The wood used for Newark Street series Starfire III, IV and V is almost certainly sapele, khaya or some other African mahogany-like wood. And that's fine, because Guild used sapele for the original Starfire series. The Bigsby tailpiece used on this guitar, and other Newark Street series models, is a non-US made licensed version that is milled from die cast aluminum rather than sand cast like the original US-made versions. They also have nylon bearings instead of needle bearings and are metric-sized. Sadly, they don't work as well as the originals.

 Body:  Semi-hollow; laminated 1-piece sapele top, back, and sides; double bound top and back

 Finish:  Cherry Red,  polyurethane

 Neck:  3-piece mahogany/maple, set-in; black plastic headstock overlay with pearloid logo and Chesterfield inlay

 Fingerboard:  Indian rosewood, single bound; pearloid block markers

 Number of Frets:  22

 Pickguard:  Acrylic

 Bridge:  Tune-o-matic on rosewood base, Guild/Bigsby B-9 vibrato tailpiece

 Nut:  Bone

 Tuners:  Grover Sta-Tite 97-18, nickel

 Pickups:  Two, Guild LB-1 humbucking with adjustable pole pieces, nickel

 Controls:  Master volume, tone and volume controls for each pickup, 3-way pickup selector

 Scale Length:  24 3/4 inches

 Neck Width at Nut:  1 11/16 inches

 Body Width at Lower Bout:  16 3/8 inches

 Body Depth:  1 3/4 inches

 Weight:  8.6 lb