My guitar collection - G&L
After G&L changed the name from Broadcaster to ASAT in April of 1986, and with more colors available, particularly those with Black finishes became colloquially known as the “Poor man’s Broadcaster”. To show the name change did not affect available configurations in any way, shape, or form, even the Broadcaster with a Kahler™ 2320 flat mount fine-tuner vibrato has its counterpart among these early ASATs. Otherwise it shares the soft maple body, plastic pickguard, Broadcaster wiring harness on a black powder-coated control panel, 2 Jumbo Magnetic Field Design (MFD) single-coil pickups, hard-rock maple neck, 7½” radius maple fingerboard, and black chrome tuning machines with its predecessor. The Kahler bridge, adding $160 to the MSRP for this guitar, is about as uncommon on an ASAT as on a Broadcaster especially when combined with a maple fingerboard. Of the 15 ASAT with Kahler guitars currently registered in the Guitars by Leo (GbL) Registry only 4 have a maple board, an even smaller absolute number than for the Broadcaster w/Kahler & maple board!
ASAT w/Kahler & maple fingerboard
The story behind this guitar
Year:
Serial number:
Neck date:
Body date:
Strings:
A month or so after a deal for a “Poor man’s Broadcaster” with maple fingerboard fell through, this guitar showed up on Reverb. And I happened to be familiar with it this time. GbL member Steve Goodman (aka Sprinter 92) had posted about this guitar in 2013. As seen in the pics, it has more nicks, dings, and chips than most instruments in my collection but it is well-loved and taken care of. And it has something which was not yet present on any other ASAT in my collection when I purchased this instrument: a Kahler vibrato. Taking off the neck forced me to learn a lot about this contraption. I had forgotten to secure the ball ends and they all popped out. Putting on a fresh set was more efficient than trying to herd the cats so to speak. But a capo and tensioning the strings were needed to make sure the ball ends did not pop out while putting the winds on the posts. Next creating the proper amount of travel in the fine-tuners needed solving. After some experimentation I found that screwing them all the way in, back them out 2 half-turns, stretch the new strings well, tune the strings to proper pitch, and finally clamping them behind the nut worked great. When playing, this vibrato was a revelation; the guitar stays in tune very well. As for my other mid-1980s Broadcaster/ASATs, the sound is again to die for. The volume and treble provide so much control one can get anything with ease, from deep warm jazz tones to piercing Tele-twang to the gorgeous combination of both pups working together in the middle. The more I know about these guitars, and the more I have been able to play (them), the less I understand why this model is not a better known entity in the music world.
The story behind this guitar
1986
G019091
OCT 1 1986, second stamp SEP 1986 (no day visible)
none, marked ’2’
