The main features of the Starfire bass are summarised in the table below. It remained a feature of the Starfire throughout it's production run, with only a slight shape change in 1968. The Starfire's bridge was also made by Hagstrom, and consisted of a metal baseplate with rosewood saddles. Later (1966), these were reversed, with the pickup moving to the neck position (see a 1968 Starfire Bass I, also left). The earliest single pickup Starfire basses had a single pickup in the bridge position, with finger rests positioned above and below the strings in the neck position. These are really great pickups, but for some reason, instruments fitted with these humbuckers are not as desired by collectors as older examples fitted with Bi-sonics. The Bi-sonics continued to be fitted to Guild Starfire (and JS) basses until 1970, when Guild finally replaced them with their own brand new humbuckers. Hagstrom had been fitting them to their Coronado solid body bass from 1963, but by 1966 had moved on to a new smaller unit. The Hagstrom Bi-sonic was a single coil unit, with a very unique design. In fact it was the clarity of response of these pickups that meant Alembic kept these in place when modifying the circuitry of the Casady / Lesh basses of the late 1960s. The Starfire pickups of the 1960s were made by Hagstrom ( Bi-Sonic), and were very highly regarded.
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