![ovation magnum bass 1978 ovation magnum bass 1978](https://www.myrareguitars.com/guitar-pictures/vintage-1979-ovation-magnum-ii-bass-guitar-featured.jpg)
Kaman offered to buy Martin guitars, but was politely turned down.Ī second offer was refused, but the idea didn’t die. Kaman’s helicopter blades were made of Sitka spruce, like Martin’s guitar tops, and with their expertise in precision tooling, he felt he could make guitars.
![ovation magnum bass 1978 ovation magnum bass 1978](https://electricbassmusic.com/photos/1978_Ovation_Magnum_1_Vintage_Electric_Bass_Guitar_Stereo_Mahogany_withohc_10_jr.jpg)
Kaman realized how he could put his skills to another use. Charles traveled down to Nazareth to get the guitar repaired and Fred Martin gave him a factory tour.
#OVATION MAGNUM BASS 1978 CRACKED#
As a result he ended up with lots of cracked backs, including one on a favorite Martin. He kept his guitars hanging on the wall, instead of in the case, so he could grab one if he felt like playing. Kaman continued to play guitar during his building of the helicopter business. This is where the roads came back together. He considered expanding the business into everything from surfboards to sailboats, candy packaging machines to Winnebagos, but these industries were all well-established and well-financed. Kaman was experienced in making items of wood, metal, and high-tech material requiring high tolerances. McNamara cancelled an order for 250 helicopters. Business thrived until, as the Vietnam war was heating up, Secretary of Defense Robert S. For two decades he built a successful business in military helicopters. Ideas in hand, in 1945 Kaman launched out on his own and started the Kaman Corporation.
![ovation magnum bass 1978 ovation magnum bass 1978](https://usedelectricguitars.org/wp-content/upload/Ovation_Magnum_Electric_Bass_Guitar_Vintage_1978_with_Original_Hard_Case_07_qkwy.jpg)
However, management was not interested in his ideas. Kaman helped come up with a solution that combined wood with a new synthetic plastic material that provided insulation.
![ovation magnum bass 1978 ovation magnum bass 1978](https://storage.bhs.cloud.ovh.net/v1/AUTH_e7d15450bedd40b9b599e075527df3cb/chautauqua/f1978_Ovation_Magnum_IV_bass__899_5c6b0741b061a.jpg)
Ironically, his assignment involved transmission of vibration from the wood rotor blades to the body. Which path does the son of a construction foreman pursue? The uncertain, fleeting glory of the entertainment industry, or the unknown possibilities of putting craft in the air?ĭorsey’s orchestra left town without Charles Kaman.Īfter graduating, Kaman got a job developing the Sikorsky helicopter. In one of those rare coincidences, Dorsey’s guitar player had just quit, and the next day Kaman was offered the job. Charlie was hot that night, and Dorsey took notice. Then, one weekend his combo got the biggest gig of its career – opening for Tommy Dorsey and his orchestra. Kaman subsequently attended the University of Washington, D.C., studying aeronautical engineering, and his guitar fix was supplied by playing clubs with a little jazz combo in his spare time. Guitar playing became one of Charles’ passions.Īnother passion involved the physical sciences. At 12 or 13, Kaman began playing an old Stella acoustic guitar, later switching to a Martin C-7. Kaman (rhymes with command), born in 1918, the son of a construction crew foreman. Ovation guitars are the brainchild of Charles H. It certainly worked that way for Charlie Kaman, whose choice of paths ultimately led to the synthesis (in more ways than one!) of Ovation guitars. Of course, as the philosopher, Hegel, so neatly noted long ago, the paths tend to join up again, and the resulting synthesis works out fine in the end. In a way, the Ovation story (to use Robert Frost’s famous metaphor) is one of roads not taken. Except for using Carter’s book to confirm some dates and a few details, most of the information presented here was gathered independently prior to publication of that book. More information on Ovation can be obtained from Walter Carter’s book, The History of the Ovation Guitar (Hal Leonard, ’96), although solidbody electrics are not the primary focus, and some inconsistencies exist between the text and the model tables (when in doubt, the text seems to be more reliable). Here’s the scoop on Ovation electrics (touching only briefly on acoustic/electrics). However, Ovation’s marketing failures do not mean it hasn’t made some pretty interesting – even innovative – electric guitars over the years, and these represent one of few areas in guitar collecting where you can find excellent, historically significant instruments, often at remarkably reasonable prices. Instead, Ovation finally purchased Hamer. No matter how hard they tried, Ovation’s repeated attempts to enter the solidbody electric area have failed. Instead, it purchased Guild.Īnother example is Ovation, the company that almost single-handedly created the acoustic/electric category and radically altered views about how acoustic guitars should be constructed. And Fender has never been able, on its own, to really succeed in marketing acoustic guitars. For instance, Martin has never been able to transfer its reputation for high-quality acoustics to electric guitars. Acurious phenomenon that ac-companies certain guitar compa-nies is an inability to translate success from one medium to another.