Edwards & Navigator St***s

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I'm trying to clarify which are the Edwards & Navigator guitars that so many people on here are so keen on, as I hadn't heard of either name till I joined this forum. It's only Strat & Tele types I'm interested in - I'm not so keen on LPs.

There are 2 UK ads on eBay at the moment:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330141014723&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:UK:1

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230147565259&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:UK:1

Are these the type of guitars that you rave about? Tokai quality? The Navigator wouldn't suit me - I think black is the worst colour to go with a maple neck, & I prefer rosewood anyway. The Edwards looks good, but the price is the same or a little more than an 80s Tokai, while it is only a few years old (I think).

I would appreciate comments about these two.

Thanks,

Mike
 
Mike I'm no expert, but here's what I know.

Navigator used to be a private company hand-building guitars in the early '80's, but now the name has been bought by ESP and is used on ESP's high-end models.

Edwards is another ESP brand but more mid-range.

Both are apparently very good quility - on par with Fender Japan (built in Tokai factory).

Black and maple is my favourite Strat colour combination :D

IMO an 80's tokai would be a better bet than the new Edwards, but that Navigator looks tempting!
 
in one of my books there are pics of a Navigator catalog from 1977-78 that also says produced by ESP featuring the Esparto, Lespa and Torrocco models. As far as I can tell, ESP began in 1975. If Navigator ever was independent, it was cerainly connected to ESP by 1975 .
The company also had/has ProGauge guitars, as well as Pro-Ceed...which was a custom shop type branch, they now have a custom shop that will build anything a customer wants to pay for. Grassroots is the low end series.
 
I own a NST-300M(Maple neck) and it?s the best guitar I own,fantastic stratocaster old style and I mean fantastic! great building quality and the most important great strato sound! My only drawnback is having a so thin finish that It?s relicing naturally and pelling off :cry: I don?t like relic finish but this is a natural reliced :D so I live with it.

ESP has/had a Seymour Duncan line too so sometimes they mixed parts and I remember seeing a Navigator neck on a Seymour Duncan body in Andrew Mechling?s guitarsjapan site(Where are you Andrew? I miss you)...
 
luis said:
....Andrew Mechling?s guitarsjapan site(Where are you Andrew? I miss you)...

Last I heard, Andrew is in Spain teaching school. Two of my most cherished guitars came from him - my 81 ES100J and my LS60 Reborn. Really a nice guy too.....
 
Go here and explore.....you'll find most of what you are asking about here except for the Super Real "no name" guitars:

http://www.espguitars.co.jp/edwards/index.html
 
in 2006 ESP Big Boss stopped selling the Duncans...in this city at least, they don`t carry the line anymore. The catalog for that year showed the line greatly reduced in terms of number of models...only 2 strats , 2 basses and no teles. The headstock was altered to look something like a cross between a strat and tele...not attractive at all to me. No idea who is building the Duncans now because therte aren`t any in the city. Shame too because they were excellent...still, I have one from each series so I shouldn`t complain...gotta get em used now...but prices are going up. So far I`ve not seen a 2007 catalog.
I don`t think the company mixed parts...owners may have though...and to me the Navigators and Duncans were very similar, just different headstock logos.
 
These are the ones I was talking about, the Super Real series.

I played the 128, the 108 and the SRV. I liked the 128 and 108 more than the SRV, but that was mostly a feel thing. The 128 was fretting out a bit, not sure if it was just a set-up issue or a fundamental fingerboard radius problem.

http://www.guitarjapan.com/edwards/edwards-gutar.html

I can't speak specifically to the two that you posted, but on the face of it they look like pretty reasonable deals.

The new Edwards and Navigators are outstanding guitars in my experience.
 
I guess I posted pretty much the same thing in the other thread.

LOL!
 
The ESPARTO model of Navigator must be a rather low price model ... look at the Japan price of this one ...
http://www.j-guitar.com/sp/sea/view_detail/s13620143.html

... whereas the N-ST-300M model that Luis mentioned above has all the premium class specs we're used the navigators would have ... 1p ash body, lacquer etc. ... price - about 6 times more than the Esparto ... !!!

BTW - the N-ST-300R has an Alder body and Honduras mahogany fretboard and lacquer ... :wink:

Roger
 
Espartos were made 30 years ago, it`s true they don`t seem to fetch as much as other vintage MIJs for what ever reason.
I too own a top of the line Seymour Duncan...the DT-250M-PRO and it is an incredible guitar...F/USA could learn a thing or two that they evidently have forgotten recently. I also have a strat from the Vintage Standard series, a DS-200M/BLD...got it used for almost nothing a few years ago but that doesn`t happen any more...too many guys have turned old MIJs into a business and sucked the fun right out of finding them. Even the Duncan Traditional series give F/USA Standards a run for their money, at least the Standards I see over here...they don`t tempt me at all. Soi yeah, if you ever get a chance to play a Duncan you should.
 
tudor said:
The ESPARTO model of Navigator must be a rather low price model ... look at the Japan price of this one ...
http://www.j-guitar.com/sp/sea/view_detail/s13620143.html

... whereas the N-ST-300M model that Luis mentioned above has all the premium class specs we're used the navigators would have ... 1p ash body, lacquer etc. ... price - about 6 times more than the Esparto ... !!!

BTW - the N-ST-300R has an Alder body and Honduras mahogany fretboard and lacquer ... :wink:

Roger

this one has a rating of 3 for condition so that affects price a great deal too. As far as I`m concerned having seen the top end Duncans and Navigators side by side they appeared to be pretty much the same guitar with different logos...same woods, parts...frets may be different types... but other wise same high quality.
 
I agree MIJ guitars prices were up in value suddenly and this increase seems to to stop.I got nice guitars in the past for fun and knowledge but now it?s difficult to find any,Tokais specially. I was willing to try and old LC-100 (Reborn era) but it?s not an easy task.
I?m not against these sellers at all,I understand supply and demand thing....

Regarding old Navigators they are shown now.... I was very tempted to get a red ES-335 style some time ago.I?ve seen this guitar advertised in several japanese shops and I guess now is here in Europe...

You?re right Roger, they?re expensive brand new,high specs made but
againg I recomend grabbing any recent Navigator Fender replica if you can, better quality and consistency than any regular Fender Custom Shop....
I can withness that.
 
Hmmm, interesting. Thanks for all the info guys, maybe one day I'll understand it all! It's taken me long enough to make any sense out of the Tokai F****r copies, and I first owned a Goldstar in 1983!

Most of the Edwards & Navigators I see on eBay are outside the UK (we do seem to get the rough end of the deal on these guitars). A search on "Edwards" mainly produces stuff that concerns Edward Elgar - not quite what I had in mind!

With regard to increasing prices, I've noticed that some people charge over ?600/?700 for early Springys. Although I'm sure they are great, & I'd love one, I only paid ?550 for my 1988 Fender US 62 reissue Strat - one of the finest guitars that Fender has ever made, IMHO (comparable to recent Custom Shop models). I'd find it hard to justify an extra ?200 for a Tokai over a US Fender. Maybe prices will settle down soon.

Mike
 
Having owned USA reissues and played quite a few custom shop USA Fenders I can say without a doubt that the high-end Tokai's, eg ST-80's are better guitars. Mainly the wood choice, some of the lovely figured ash tops you see on a Tokai ST-80 would only be seen on a Custom Shop strat costing much more. The lightest Strat I have ever owned is a Tokai.

In terms of build quality & sound there isn't really anything in it, but the vibe of an old guitar is something you dont get from a new one.
 
it would depend on the Tokai and F/USA for me. The top end Navigators... or Duncans... that I`ve seen are certainly on par with even the master builts sold in Japan... I`d gladly pay extra for a good MIJ, and have. In my opinion, F/USA has not been building the best strat types for some time, and I think there are other US builders making better guitars now too.
 
tudor said:
The ESPARTO model of Navigator must be a rather low price model ... look at the Japan price of this one ...
http://www.j-guitar.com/sp/sea/view_detail/s13620143.html

... whereas the N-ST-300M model that Luis mentioned above has all the premium class specs we're used the navigators would have ... 1p ash body, lacquer etc. ... price - about 6 times more than the Esparto ... !!!

BTW - the N-ST-300R has an Alder body and Honduras mahogany fretboard and lacquer ... :wink:

Roger


heres another one...

http://www.digimart.net/gk_detail.do?instrument_id=DS00279885
 
JohnA said:
Having owned USA reissues and played quite a few custom shop USA Fenders I can say without a doubt that the high-end Tokai's, eg ST-80's are better guitars. Mainly the wood choice, some of the lovely figured ash tops you see on a Tokai ST-80 would only be seen on a Custom Shop strat costing much more. The lightest Strat I have ever owned is a Tokai.

In terms of build quality & sound there isn't really anything in it, but the vibe of an old guitar is something you dont get from a new one.

Well, that's kind of a broad statement to say that an ST 80 is better than all custom shop Fenders. I have an ST 80, a real 1965 Fender Strat and a custom shop relic 65 Strat. There's no guessing on this......the real 65 Strat is the lightest and best sounding Strat I've ever played in my life.

While my ST80 is amazing, light weight and toneful as you said, my 65 Custom shop is so close in fit, finish, feel and sound to the real deal that I'm blown away - I've done an A/B comparison between it and the original and the only difference is the weight. The output of the pickups are almost exactly the same, the neck profile is identical, three way switch, and so forth.

Personally, I try to compare a reissue to the real thing to determine it's accuracy - that's what I was after with mine. My ST80 stands on it's own. It's the best Tokai strat I own - without question. But it's not a better guitar than my reissue - they both stand on their own. If it's a matter of economics, absolutely the Tokai is a "better" guitar in terms of what you get for the money.
 
marcusnieman said:
JohnA said:
Having owned USA reissues and played quite a few custom shop USA Fenders I can say without a doubt that the high-end Tokai's, eg ST-80's are better guitars. Mainly the wood choice, some of the lovely figured ash tops you see on a Tokai ST-80 would only be seen on a Custom Shop strat costing much more. The lightest Strat I have ever owned is a Tokai.

In terms of build quality & sound there isn't really anything in it, but the vibe of an old guitar is something you dont get from a new one.

Well, that's kind of a broad statement to say that an ST 80 is better than all custom shop Fenders. I have an ST 80, a real 1965 Fender Strat and a custom shop relic 65 Strat. There's no guessing on this......the real 65 Strat is the lightest and best sounding Strat I've ever played in my life.

While my ST80 is amazing, light weight and toneful as you said, my 65 Custom shop is so close in fit, finish, feel and sound to the real deal that I'm blown away - I've done an A/B comparison between it and the original and the only difference is the weight. The output of the pickups are almost exactly the same, the neck profile is identical, three way switch, and so forth.

Personally, I try to compare a reissue to the real thing to determine it's accuracy - that's what I was after with mine. My ST80 stands on it's own. It's the best Tokai strat I own - without question. But it's not a better guitar than my reissue - they both stand on their own. If it's a matter of economics, absolutely the Tokai is a "better" guitar in terms of what you get for the money.

Well said.

That's one of the best break downs on the whole "lawsuit guitar" thing that I've seen and I think it applies pretty generally.
 
I wasn't referring to the new Fender US re-issues - the ones that start off with a poly undercoat. I was talking about the 82 to 87 or 88 US re-issues that were all nitro. The 86 models often used Fullerton bodies (mine does - different body shape on the contours) and were virtually handmade, as only a small number of US guitars were made in 86, and none at all in 85. In my opinion, these 80s reissues are as good as more recent Custom Shop models, except that you don't get the flamed maple necks that some of the better Time Machine models have. They are comparable in quality, playability and sound.

If the Springy ST80s are seriously as good as these, I really must get one with a rosewood board, though we very rarely see them for sale in the UK. There are probably too many stuck in cases owned by collectors who never play them. What a waste....

Mike
 

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