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Magnatone Guitar, Part 2

1. Neck pickup 2. Bridge pickup 3. Back view 4. Controls 5. Neck pup back close 6. Bridge pup back close

Zooming in now, as the Magnatone geekfest continues! I’ve looked “under the hood” at a lot of guitars, and this one showed me some things I’ve never seen. The pickups are completely non-adjustable, unusual for the time. The black sections are plastic, and the chrome rings are plated metal. The parts, especially the baseplates, have the stamp of a Danelectro-like ingenuity, are made simply and still work and sound fine.

The wiring is very neatly laid out and all these parts are high-quality U.S.-made stuff, the same parts Gibson and Fender, among others, were using at the time: CTS pots, Switchcraft jacks and selector switch, and Cornell-Dubilier capacitors. I suppose the pickups were made in-house or specifically for Magnatone. I haven’t managed to track down any info on that yet.