1982 S-500 Series 1 Neck

Hello all! Long time owner of G&L’s, bought my first ASAT Classic back in the mid 90’s, owned many off and on since. I just recently acquired an ‘82 S-500 with a Series 1 neck. Were these special order only? Hard to find any info about them, and promo stuff from the era only mention the series ii specs. Probably not too many out there? I’m surprised there isn’t any buzz about them, it’s an amazing neck and is probably my favorite guitar. I was also wondering about the markings in the neck pocket. The neck is obvious with the date stamp, but not so clear with the body. It just has 7-26, or maybe 7..26. Excited to be here, thanks in advance.

Hey there,

The only difference between the Series I and Series II necks for both basses and guitars from that era is the fretboard radius. Series I is 12", Series II is 7½".

- Jos

P.S. For more info on vintage G&L's like yours, you can check out Greg Gagliano's website or (shameless plug) my own at yowhatsshakin.com.

Also, see this post in our G&L Knowledgebase forum in the G&L Specifications and Options sub-forum:
What are the USA neck size options, past and present?

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the response you guys. I do know about the radius, I have an ‘82 series ii. I was wondering how many of these may be floating around, for myself finding a mahogany S-500 with a Series i feels pretty lucky. Outside of the “Out Stratting theStrat” article I don’t see it even mentioned anywhere else.

Here is a link to the Registry for S-500.

This will give an idea of those out there.

http://www.guitarsbyleo.com/AUTOREG/interact2.php3

This is the page with estimated production

http://www.guitarsbyleo.com/FORUM/viewt ... le=desktop

Hope these give a little insight

I only see one other Series i S-500 other than mine. I did a ton of digging on these and they are hard to find.

I stand corrected. After a more extensive search I found one more.

Added series 1 to registry search there are 5 registered

http://www.guitarsbyleo.com/AUTOREG/interact2.php3

Thanks! I’m new as a member, but I’ve been a visitor for years. The registry is amazing. Any info on the neck pocket markings?

Post pics of neck pocket, we can better attempt decoding with pics

https://photos.app.goo.gl/7fJuwk6yorp393nr7

After spending a few hours on five or so photo hosting sites, memorizing the photo tutorial, I give up. Sorry

After spending a few hours on five or so photo hosting sites, memorizing the photo tutorial, I give up. Sorry

You almost got it in the test pic you did. You just had the img post with two sets of img BBcodes instead of 1 set.

Code:

[img][img]https://i.ibb.co/S7bvjpL/82-S-500.jpg[/img][/img]

Here is what it should look like:

Code:

[img]https://i.ibb.co/S7bvjpL/82-S-500.jpg[/img]

And here is your picture:


My guess on the "726" is that it is the builder's id number. They were paid by the number of necks/bodies they worked on.

Thanks so much for all the info.
LJ