Golden Eagle vs. Johnny Smith

[Keith7940236]

Can someone tell me what the differences between the two are? I was curious if there are differnces in scale length, bracing, pickup placement, etc.

 

Thanks,

 

Keith

[ingeneri]

With the caveat that any GE, like any new Heritage, can be customized:

 

Johnny Smith: x bracing and 25" scale fretboard

 

Ge: parallel bracing and 25.5" scale

 

Of course there was much more difference between the original Gibbie JS and the L5C. In addition to the changes noted above, the JS had the inlay style and headstock from the Super 400. Also, obviously the guest model to sport a floating mini-humbucker (JS pickup) as opposed the old single coil after market Dearmonds. I think the JS was the first standard 3" deep archtop, as opposed to the deeper L5, but amnot sure. Smears the JS specs were enshrined by Benedetto in his book and seem to be the modern industry standard for at least carved top guitars.

 

The original Guild JS had a Les Paul/175 shorter fingerboard. JS refused to play it, according to the Guild book, because the company refused to do the cut out after the mould as JS had seen D'angelico do it. But Jimmy D'aquisto said

D'angelico only did it that way because they were too lazy to invest in doing a new mould, and confirmed that, contrary to Smith's concern, there was no effect on volume or tone. Not sure if he made same insistence with Gibson or Heritage, but seems unlikely Gibson would have agreed to waste the wood and raise labor cost.

[pressure]

Why yes, yes there are differences in scale length, bracing and pickup placement.

The big difference is that the Johnny Smith model is fully acoustic with floating pickups and of course no longer made.

Do a search this question is asked often.

[DC Ron]

For the Heritage JS, scale length is the main spec difference. According to the 93 catalog both are stock with x-bracing and floating pickup. My 93 GE (now Gitfiddler's) was x-braced and a very fine acoustic archtop in its own right. Appointments are otherwise very different wrt inlay shapes, inlay materials, tailpiece, pickguard, etc. Oh, and the GE isn't personally signed by JS.

[MartyGrass]

Here are some price lists.

 

 

 

 

There is no significant difference between the Gibson and the Heritage Johnny Smith. Both are X braced, 25" scale, have a floating pup, and have 1 3/4" nuts.

 

The Heritage has a pup suspended on the PG while the Gibson had a neck mounted pickup.

 

 

Both were Kalamazoo built.

 

Some of the Gibson and Heritage Johnny Smiths were tap tuned, others not.

 

The Golden Eagle has a slightly longer scale and narrower nut. Smith did not like the cupid's bow at the end of the neck and thought it reduced tone by minimizing the neck to body contact area. The Golden Eagle has that bow.

 

 

 

The Heritage Johnny Smiths were named after his wife, Rose. It almost always has black hardware and a rose headstock inlay.

 

[SteveHoffman]

Looks like the Johnny Smith is $600 more than the Golden Eagle in the 1990's. That ain't hay.

[Keith7940236]

Thanks for the information Mark, I appreciate it!

Keith

[light01]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts! I've been wondering about the same thing

[DetroitBlues]

Um.... One is nice and the other is nicer?