Barney Kessel Guitar

**Greentone** · 12-12-2016, 02:59 PM

A Napolitano lam-body, 17" with a CC would be pretty sharp.

**tcaster** · 12-13-2016, 05:07 AM

17" laminate body but only around 2.5" or so thick.
The guitar has a great vintage vibe but that CC pickup is brutal if the room isn't wired well.
More hum than a P90 even but it sounds so great when it is not humming.
I wonder if folks had a real issue with single coil hum with their CC equipped archtops
back in the day and how they coped?

**oldane** · 12-13-2016, 09:53 AM

Originally Posted by ingeneri

If you can find one, weren't Tom Painter's 17" guitars modelled after the 350 with Vintage Vibe CC pickups?

Yes. That model was called P-350. One could order them with PU free of choice, but Tom liked the HCC a lot. One could also custom order scale length, fretboard width and body depth. I had Tom make me one with 2.5" body depth, 1.75" fretboard and 25.5" scale. It is equipped with a Biltoft HCC with Alnico II magnets. I had Tom place the PU a little closer to the neck than standard (under the imaginary 24th fret). Mine is made of plywood with a thicker ply of mahogany in the middle and very thin cosmetic layers of maple on the two outsides and it has a one piece mahogany neck. Mahogany braces. For all practical purposes it's a mahogany guitar, so it's not quite the same as a Gibson 350T. BTW, I swapped the gold speed knobs for chicken head. With chicken head knobs, I find very easy to see and feel where the settings are at.

**Fred Archtop** · 12-13-2016, 10:41 AM

Daniel Slaman, the Dutch luthier, is proposing a BK model upon order on his website. Everything's identical to the BK ES 350 custom model: CC pu, chicken head knobs, ebony fingerboard with dot blots and, yes, no brand on the headstock if you request so.

Seen that Daniel is one of the best archtop luthiers of our galaxy, I am sure it's a terrific instrument.

Cheers.