When and why did G&L switch to a four-bolt neck?

[Craig]

The four-bolt neck joint was introduced in approximately mid-1997; prior to that, a three-bolt "tilt-adjust" design had been used exclusively. G&L's Purchasing Manager had the following to say about the switch:

"The change was made by John McLaren, Jr. before Sales had even seen it. When we started making the Invader, our necks had improved to a point where we could go without the three bolt micro-tilt system and return to Leo's original design of the four-bolt neck. We surprised Marketing with this design and after some initial hesitancy, they were very happy with the new design."

One of the reasons Marketing was likely won over by the new design was that the three-bolt design had (quite incorrectly) developed a widespread reputation as being "unstable". This ill-founded rumor had mainly been perpetuated by those who had had experience with three-bolt Fenders of the '70s. What these folks were missing was that the instability seen in those '70s Fenders was due not to an inherent weakness in the three-bolt design itself, but rather to the sloppy, careless construction techniques used to build those instruments. Despite the fact that G&L's three-bolt neck was extremely well-executed and offered plenty of stability, the move to a four-bolt neck has proven quite beneficial in terms of eliminating initial "customer skepticism" from shoppers new to G&L.

The switch to the four-bolt neck was gradual; as mentioned above, it first appeared on the Invaders. The first non-Invader four-bolt G&L was a stunning one-off ASAT Classic with a quilted maple top; G&L's Plant Foreman, Ed Sebest, built this guitar for Dave McLaren (Export Sales Manager), in order to demonstrate to Dave that the four-bolt concept was viable on the non-Invader models as well. Upon examining this guitar, Dave gave the "go-ahead", and so began the use of the four-bolt neck on the entire line. The earliest guitars had plain, unstamped neck plates, but soon the G&L logo was added.