1960s Teisco (Kawai) ET-230 Sharkfin Electric Guitar

Ever since a blue-metallic Sharkfin passed-through the shop years ago, I've been really taken with the 2-pickup version of the model. The 3 and 4-pickup varieties are nice, too, but this is the one that does it for me. To think, too, that this guy used to be finished in blue-metallic when it was new! It's since been stripped and repainted a half-dozen times judging by the layers of build-up under the pickguard, though.

A customer of mine is going on one of those, "I don't know when or if I'll be back," kind of road trips soon, and so he's trying to pick a guitar and amp to head with him on his voyage. He brought a number of his guitars in for quick setup adjustments but this guy hadn't seen any love since the '70s at least.

Most of the wiring was shot but I did save a couple of slider on/off switches for the pickups and trashed the rest. The wiring for a lot of these old Teisco guitars is often more involved than it needs to be, so they wake-up a lot in the tone department every time you simplify the circuit. This is very simple in that it's got only the two on/off switches for the pickups and then master volume and tone. A lot of sound can come out of it with this configuration, though, because in the "middle" position it's out-of-phase and gets an almost Strat-sounding, chimey, strum-friendly sound.

Other work was bare-bones and to the point -- it got a fret level/dress, we got the mismatched tuners working decently, the whammy's spring was removed so it's just a "stop" tail now, and the bridge got some adjustments to allow good intonation. Post-repairs it plays fast and easy like a champ.

My friend Todd was in the shop and had never played a Sharkfin before, so the video this time is a quick one I snagged of him giving it a test-run.

I didn't grab the specs, but these guys tend to have a 1 5/8" nut width, slim-C neck profile, and a Gibson-like 24 5/8" scale length. They're the most playable Teisco necks that I know of, though once in a while the same neck style pops-up on their violin-body instruments and it's definitely on the Sharp 5, and some of the Spectrum and "monkey-grip" models, too.

The blank patches on the pickguard are for a 3-way mud switch, second volume control, and an in-phase/out-of-phase slider switch.