bobwise
Active member
I recently got an '80 LS-120 Love Rock. It has amber gold top hats but the design is different than Gibson's -- the numbers aren't molded into the bottom surface of the knobs and filled with white paint. The inner surface is smooth and the numbers are just painted/silkscreened onto the smooth inner surface.
All four of the knobs are like that, but two of them have a different font than the others. Two have round-top "3"s and have serifs on "1" and "10" -- the other two have flat-top "3"s and "1" and "10" are sans-serif. ("Serif" may be the wrong word -- on one pair the "1"s are just straight lines, on the other pair the "1"s have the little hook at the top.)
Looking at pics of other Tokais from that era, some tophats look clear/gold and some look amber/gold. None of the pics get in close enough to let me see if the numbers are "flat" or molded (it's pretty subtle -- I've had it for 3 weeks and just noticed it last night). The differing fonts make me think that at least two of mine are replacements, but maybe the factory just randomly used different knobs. They don't look old though -- they look newer, like the replacement truss rod cover (it's got a Gibson-style bell cover but you can see a ghost on the headstock from the original pointy cover).
It's got enough wear and minor mods/issues to make it a "player grade" piece rather than a "collectable" piece -- I'm just asking out of curiosity. I'll probably put some clear/gold knobs with molded numbers on it even if these knobs really are the originals.
All four of the knobs are like that, but two of them have a different font than the others. Two have round-top "3"s and have serifs on "1" and "10" -- the other two have flat-top "3"s and "1" and "10" are sans-serif. ("Serif" may be the wrong word -- on one pair the "1"s are just straight lines, on the other pair the "1"s have the little hook at the top.)
Looking at pics of other Tokais from that era, some tophats look clear/gold and some look amber/gold. None of the pics get in close enough to let me see if the numbers are "flat" or molded (it's pretty subtle -- I've had it for 3 weeks and just noticed it last night). The differing fonts make me think that at least two of mine are replacements, but maybe the factory just randomly used different knobs. They don't look old though -- they look newer, like the replacement truss rod cover (it's got a Gibson-style bell cover but you can see a ghost on the headstock from the original pointy cover).
It's got enough wear and minor mods/issues to make it a "player grade" piece rather than a "collectable" piece -- I'm just asking out of curiosity. I'll probably put some clear/gold knobs with molded numbers on it even if these knobs really are the originals.
