Greco AP-1000

Greco AP-1000 / Greco AP-850

A video of me playing some Jimi Hendrix on my Greco AP 850 /  AP 1000. Pictures and information below.

Greco AP-1000 Acrylic Guitar (Click to enlarge)

This is my Greco AP-1000 / AP-850. I use both AP-1000 and 850 designations as based on my current understanding 1000 and 850 relate to the price the guitar cost in Japanese Yen at the time the guitar was produced. So in 1990 if you paid 100,000 yen you bought yourself an AP-1000 and in 1992 the list price was 850000 yen, you were the proud owner of an AP-850; I'm pulling these years and prices out of the clear blue sky just to illustrate an example.

The AP-1000 as it appeared in the Greco 1994 instrument catalog

Well, you don't have to be much of a guitar expert to know where Greco has taken its lead from with this guitar as it is a dead ringer for the guitar designed by Dan Armstrong and subsequently made famous by Keith Richards. The photo below shows a certain James Marshall Hendrix examining Keith Richards original Armstrong acrylic guitar.

However there are some differences:The original Armstrong designed guitar featured a slot so that it was possible to use interchangeable pickups. Also, the bridges on the Armstrong were of a different design and did not feature individually adjustable saddles.  The pickups were also visually different. 

The Greco AP-1000 features five individually adjustable saddles

                                           

Bridge on an original Dan Armstrong acrylic guitar