Jim Cairnes was an English guitar maker, born around 1946 in Bournemouth, UK. Cairnes moved to Teeside as a child, and this is where he spent most of his life. Cairnes taught himself the electric guitar as a teenager and made his first one at the age of 16 in the early 1960s. By 1970 he had opened a guitar making factory with Brian Goodhall in Cumberland Road, Middlesbrough. Early on they launched the Colt Peacemaker (a revolver shaped guitar) in 1970 as a eye catching design to get publicity for their business, but Jim made many other great original guitar and bass designs including the Starguard and Stud electric guitars and the Stag bass. Cairnes also made his own pickups and supplied pickups to other UK guitar and bass makers. Jim Cairnes died in 2011 aged 65, he was still working on guitars until illness forced him to stop.

Source: Tributes paid to Middlesbrough guitar maker. Dave Robson. Teeside Live. 30 June 2