Dave Myers and Mosrite

[101Volts]

Welcome to the forum, Rick, And thanks for sharing the story.

(image links)

Adam, When I looked at those they were dead links. I know this thread's close to five years old as of when I posted this though.

Austin

[Hammond]

Actually it was Semie who wanted to call the shape a crescent wave. He wanted to paint the guitar blue because he felt it would be better suited for surf music. I was still stuck on my original design to match up with the hotrod flames of the 1950's. In retrospect, Semie was right. Blue would have been the better choice. Below is a photo of Dave Meyers and his Mosrite:



I don't have any photos of the shop on Panama Lane. I took quite a few at the P Street location when I was home on leave but they are gone. I remember Bill Gruggett was back working in the paint department at that time. Semie took me out for lunch and we caught up on old memories of the shop out on Panama Lane. Semie was more like an older brother to me than a boss.

I used to hang out in his shop in the old metal shed in Oildale. I would pedal down there on my bicycle and show Semie the latest progress I was making on my second guitar. He would show me what needed to be done next. When finished, Semie did the painting. I never learned how to play guitar but it was a big hit with my friends in high school.

I remember a lot of the instructions. Simple things like how to cut the sandpaper into four sections then fold it over twice. It was a way of saving sandpaper and it also gave your fingers a better feel of what was being worked on. I was the only other person in the shop at that time. Semie was in the process of producing the Venture model prototypes. I believe Bill Gruggett was working with him in the beginning but left the shop to venture out on his own when they were about half way completed. Semie told me that we were doing a trail run or an experiment to see what it would be like to build many guitars all at once on an assembly line basis. He also wanted to see if he could train others to do the work. There were problems along the way. Some got finished faster than others and there was a lot of going back and forth between the different stages of construction.

Toward the end it got really stressful. The contract called for them to be finished on a certain date and they were nowhere near ready. I remember going into town with Semie to pick up the Vibramutes. The foundry that was supposed to produce the Vibramutes failed to have them ready. Semie was really bummed out. I never saw him like that before. When we got back to the shop Semie found some left over Vibramutes that were made for another client. I think it may have been Guild but not really sure. Anyhow, the name was still on the plates and it needed to be removed in order to use them. We were up really late that night. My job was to use the drill press to see if I could somehow burnish the name off as best as possible. It didn't work out very well and Semie ended up painting over the burnish marks with black paint. Even so, you could still see the drill bit impressions after it was all done.

[Bob Shade]

Hello Rick! Nice to see you here!!

I finished the restoration about 2 years ago on my 63 Hammond/Mosrite 1963 flame guitar.

It is funny, I called Dave Meyers a good while back and told him I had the #1 of two and his #2 was the only other one to exist. He knew about that and we chatted about the guitars for a while. He informed me that he had his re finished in blue. I told him that I had done the same thing!?!

We both thought it was odd that we both re finished the guitars in blue. I asked him why he did and his answer was "because that is my favorite color".

I told him mine was in hideous desperate condition and was falling apart so, it had to be re finished. I thoughtthe guitar looked more like a wave than flames, and since he was the only guy known to have used one professionally and he played in a well known surf band, the guitar should be a "surf" guitar showing a blue wave all the way!

One more reason I had to re finish the instrument: Semie had painted the rear of the neck in 3 tone sunburst. Rich stopped Semie and said NO, it is supposed to be RED like FLAMES! So Semie left the 3 tone burst on the rear of the neck and proceeded to finish the rest of the guitar in red with black outline. It looked so weird for no reason and I couldn't figure it out when I got the guitar. So I thought, "this has to go"! Rich later filled me in on the reasoning. Ha! Funny!

Dave said he never thought of the wave aspect but he thought it was a good idea.

So enough rambling....... here is my #1 "Mosrite 63 sidejack Blue Wave", I hope you enjoy the photos!

A big thank you to Rich for all the helpful information on this rare Mosrite.

Surfs up and it's a MAD Wave!!

Bob Shade

[Dennisthe Menace]

Rich and Bob, incredible story! BTW, up until now, I had always thought that the AMPEG Dan Armstrong Model was one of the first guitars to have 24 frets. But I'm looking at your '63 Blue Wave and it's telling me that I'm wrong. Was that originally loaded up with 24 frets??

[ElTwang]

This is very very cool! I must say I dig that original red'n'black burst.

[Bob Shade]

Yes this is is a 24 fret guitar and it is original!! The Dave Myers #2 was a 22 fret. Perhaps due to it being a 2 pickup model.

If you look close Semie glued a piece of rosewood to the end of the fingerboard to make it long enough for the design. (notice it is darker in color very slightly) When I got the guitar the added piece of rosewood was coming loose from the fingerboard. (along with several other problems) I removed the 24th fret and had to pry the end of the fingerboard off. It went POP and landed across the room

Then I cleaned up the small piece and neck from the old glue. Then I used super glue to clamp the fingerboard piece back in place, then re install the fret. You would never know I had to repair it, it came out very clean and hopefully it is on for life now.

I did not know this was perhaps the first 24 fret guitar. Does anyone know of an earlier 24 fret model??

Best, Bob

[Dennisthe Menace]

Bob had posted:
"I did not know this was perhaps the first 24 fret guitar. Does anyone know of an earlier 24 fret model??"

Bob, the only other guitar that I can think of might be Danelectro. I do remember them making a
"thirty something" frets. You would think that Nat must of made a 24 fret model as well??

[Bob Shade]

Yes Nathan Daniel was a genius. Anyone who could figure out how to make a guitar for the price he was allowed from Sears that was a unique, well planned out great sounding guitar made in USA gets two thumbs up in my book.

Nathan went on to build ships after his guitar engineering stint. So he was a true engineer. Also he invented many things that today's guitarists would never know about that is employed on many of today's guitars.

I will check and see if Nat had a 24 fret guitar. That is a good thought.

Amp in case regards,

Bob

[Hammond]

Wow bob! The refurbish looks great! Other than the blue paint this looks just like the original. Semie would have loved the blue. That was always his choice to begin with. The reason for the extra fret was because after we bought the rosewood we discovered that the length of board fell short of the length of the neck. Rosewood was expensive and hard to find. That's when Semie came up with the idea of adding an extra fret.

[dubtrub]

Hi Rick, did you ever appear on TV with your flame guitar? I remember a kid came on the Don Rodewalt ( I think) Saturday afternoon TV show here in Bakersfield demonstrating his flame guitar that he built along with the help of Semie. I was about 13 or so playing in a little combo on that show with Jelly Sanders son Jimmie. That was probably around 1960-61. It's strange that although the guitar pictured here looks a lot like the one I saw, for some reason I thought the body was carved thicker in the middle and tapering real thin almost to a point all around the edges. I've always remembered that flame shaped guitar and thought it was the coolest guitar I'd ever seen.