HOW OLD IS THIS VINTAGE ENCORE AXE?

[Col the Plunker]

Hi folks,

My latest  acquisition is this old Encore E76 Strat sporting Fender style headstock, and it's in really good nick.

This is a real piece of nostalgia for me as I bought an identical one second hand back in the early 90s. It too had the rare Fender style headstock. It still has that same spanky sound which turns raw and barky when overdriven...happy days!

So my question to fellow axe wielders is... with no distinguishing serial no, only the original shop logo on the back. Any idea how old  this immaculate vintage guitar could be. It may even have been made in Japan, but most likely India. Like when did Fender pull the plug on the copied headstock??? It's only the 2nd of that model I've ever seen. Bit of an ask I know, but like they say "if you don't ask..."

Lovely yellow aged pickups and knobs, and they're genuine as you can see the tidemark when the pups are raised up. It's pretty weighty...not plywood, looks to me to be ash which is a surprise as back in the day they cost half as much as a Squier.  Neck has  jumbo frets. Looks like the truss rod adjustment is in the end of the neck under the pickguard. The roller string tree is new. 

 

. 

 

Edited December 29, 2022 by Col the Plunker
Typo

[Skinnyman]

Putting a year to this will be hard without any sort of serial number to go on. 
 

Encore have been under the JHS umbrella since 1980 (there’s a little bit more of the brand history here; https://jedistar.com/encore/amp/) and I’d guess that a Strat copy with a Fender-style headstock has been a regular part of their catalogue from day one. 
 

There may be some clues in the pickup cavities, in the neck pocket or under the pick guard if you feel like stripping the guitar down - otherwise, all we have to go on is the aged appearance of the pickups and that, to my mind, puts it somewhere in the late eighties or nineties. 
 

Which is a wild guess on my part but with nothing else to go on….

[Col the Plunker]

Thanks Skinny man for your reply, and the info. I did as you suggested and stripped it down as the neck needed a shim anyway. So feeling a bit of a guitar detective, I took the plunge and offed the neck. Sweet FA unfortunately! I even forgot to see if the truss adjuster was in the neck-end. The body pocket still retained dark brown sawdust and blurred ink markings... nothing really to go on, but it was worth a peek. So I levelled the big jumbo frets and slapped it back up, added the shim and got the neck in true. Adjusted string height, freed up the trem and she was good to go. Trem is unbelievably good considering that I could only loosen the two most important outer pair of screws. The rest are seized solid with rust, but it returns in tune despite albeit careful dive bombing... so that is a bonus. 

At the time back along when I obtained the first  Strat, Encore were strongly promoting their guitars in many guitar mags. That's when I noticed the now softened headstock shape. This must have been around 1989 and must have as you mentioned, been a new drive under JHS. Even then I didn't know how old this first Strat was. I ended up giving it to my eight year old lad towards his birthday, but told him to flog it to me if he ever sold it as all the newer ones had the naff headstock. That fell on deaf ears. (boys will be boys). So when I saw this identical Strat all these years later, I just had to get it. Luckily it had just been in an older chaps collection that his mate was selling off for his now widowed Wife, and not road worn or knackered. The proprietor of my local guitar shop says that the first Encores were made in India from ash, and weren't bad quality wise. That it plays so well after all these years is certainly testament to that.

Thanks again for getting back to me on this subject.

Cheers and belated happy new year.

Cheers, Col.

 

 

Edited January 12, 2023 by Col the Plunker
Typo

[andrew.406]

I've got a Encore SG. Through a tube overdrive pedal and a tweed 5W tube amp it just nails Highway to Hell, Parisienne walkways, Cream, etc.

Talking of Cream the guitar has the creamiest of rosewood fingerboards - super smooth. It has a pre-Gibson injunction serial number 004508 with a direct copy of the SG neck, heel and body shape.

I changed the tuners to counteract neck dive, swooped out the knobs, lowered the Graphtech? nut slots (filed it down as well) and fitted a Nashville bridge (already had the smaller posts) to get the intonation spot on. The headstock logo has quite a classy fleur de lis.Prefer it to to a couple of V100s. Got it during lockdown with the tweed case for £90. I've got some new Wilkinson pups I toying with fitting.

[EdwardMarlowe]

I heard some of the early ones were nice. The really collectable ones now are the first range of 'Vintage' brand guitars from JHS which were styled "Encore Vintage Series". These were the ones that Trevor Wilkinson first worked on and where the Wilkinson version of the Fender trem first dates from - 1995. Not long after that the Vintage brand started in earnest. I see on JHS's website now the Encore brand still exists - actually looks like it's more of a range than I think there's been for a long time. Vintage has been lifted right up to be challenging the MiM Fender range (with the sort of online following Harley Benton has in these parts), and now even has its own lower-priced range, the Vintage Coaster Series (priced somewhere between the Vintage and Encore guitars).

My first electric was a Marlin - they had a brief moment in the sun in the very early 90s when for just one year they outsold Squier in the UK... 

[randythoades]

44 minutes ago, EdwardMarlowe said:

I heard some of the early ones were nice. The really collectable ones now are the first range of 'Vintage' brand guitars from JHS which were styled "Encore Vintage Series". These were the ones that Trevor Wilkinson first worked on and where the Wilkinson version of the Fender trem first dates from - 1995. Not long after that the Vintage brand started in earnest. I see on JHS's website now the Encore brand still exists - actually looks like it's more of a range than I think there's been for a long time. Vintage has been lifted right up to be challenging the MiM Fender range (with the sort of online following Harley Benton has in these parts), and now even has its own lower-priced range, the Vintage Coaster Series (priced somewhere between the Vintage and Encore guitars).

My first electric was a Marlin - they had a brief moment in the sun in the very early 90s when for just one year they outsold Squier in the UK... 

I have also heard that. I did have an Encore very similar to the one in the original post and it was very nice, certainly for a beginner guitar. I carried on playing it even after I had progressed onto a Fender, it was just as good to my inexperienced ears. I only sold it because I became embarrassed by playing it instead of my Fender.

I am not as worried by that image now and take a great delight in playing my homebuild Strat with Squier neck and a couple of Vintage VZ99 Zip guitars from the mid 2000s, one like a Danelectro with lipstick pickup, and another the same but with a humbucker. Brilliant guitars, irrespective of price and I love it hen people turn their noses up at it and then I play it with the band and you get a grudging shrug of 'it's actually pretty good...'.

So to sumarise, the Encore and Vintage brands are good quality overall and perfectly nice guitars.

[ezbass]

25 minutes ago, randythoades said:

I have also heard that. I did have an Encore very similar to the one in the original post and it was very nice, certainly for a beginner guitar. I carried on playing it even after I had progressed onto a Fender, it was just as good to my inexperienced ears. I only sold it because I became embarrassed by playing it instead of my Fender.

I am not as worried by that image now and take a great delight in playing my homebuild Strat with Squier neck and a couple of Vintage VZ99 Zip guitars from the mid 2000s, one like a Danelectro with lipstick pickup, and another the same but with a humbucker. Brilliant guitars, irrespective of price and I love it hen people turn their noses up at it and then I play it with the band and you get a grudging shrug of 'it's actually pretty good...'.

So to sumarise, the Encore and Vintage brands are good quality overall and perfectly nice guitars.

Those Zips were a nice guitar and refreshing look, even though still basically an LP Junior.

[EdwardMarlowe]

On 24/11/2023 at 14:43, randythoades said:

I have also heard that. I did have an Encore very similar to the one in the original post and it was very nice, certainly for a beginner guitar. I carried on playing it even after I had progressed onto a Fender, it was just as good to my inexperienced ears. I only sold it because I became embarrassed by playing it instead of my Fender.

I am not as worried by that image now and take a great delight in playing my homebuild Strat with Squier neck and a couple of Vintage VZ99 Zip guitars from the mid 2000s, one like a Danelectro with lipstick pickup, and another the same but with a humbucker. Brilliant guitars, irrespective of price and I love it hen people turn their noses up at it and then I play it with the band and you get a grudging shrug of 'it's actually pretty good...'.

So to sumarise, the Encore and Vintage brands are good quality overall and perfectly nice guitars.

I loved those Zip guitars. Would have bought at least one, but they didn't do a left hander. Pity.... maybe HB will pick up the torch there!

[Encore E76]

Hi there, this was made in in India in 1994 alongside the LTD76, LTD83 and the first Encore guitars of the Vintage range. The following year they changed the headstock shape and released the upmarket Custom Deluxe and Vintage Standard with the Wilkinson hardware.