Pickup change?

tubuie · Mar 19, 2010

Hi there guys!I've got an LS 85 (2007) model.Just wondering,do I really need to change the pickups?I mean,is it going to be such a big difference on the tone?A luthier told me "stick with the Tokai stock pickups otherwise if you really want to change the pickups you must be ready to buy some really expensive ones (like 250? each) to hear the quality of them,and not the common brands like S.D.,Dimarzio,Gibson,ect, they will not offer you anything better than your stock ones". Is that true?

marcusnieman · Mar 19, 2010

tubuie said:
Hi there guys!I've got an LS 85 (2007) model.Just wondering,do I really need to change the pickups?I mean,is it going to be such a big difference on the tone?A luthier told me "stick with the Tokai stock pickups otherwise if you really want to change the pickups you must be ready to buy some really expensive ones (like 250? each) to hear the quality of them,and not the common brands like S.D.,Dimarzio,Gibson,ect, they will not offer you anything better than your stock ones". Is that true?

"Do I really need to change the pickups?"....... that's entirely up to you. Are you unhappy with them? What are you looking for in terms of tone and output - rock, blues, out of phase, crunchy, mellow, etc.

Stock MKII pickups are great but everyone is different - I've never swapped out any of mine - yet I have replaced Gibson pickups with Seth Lovers........ go figure. You can certainly tweak your amp settings to fine tune your tone and you can do alot with your tone / volume settings on your guitar

tubuie · Mar 19, 2010

Ok!The thing is that the stock pickups are pretty decent,but they don't have four conductor wiring that I was looking forward too.I really want to have more tone versatility for coil splitting.So, what do you think? p.s. I play rock,hard rock,blues

JohnA · Mar 19, 2010

Rock & hard blues, you would hardly ever use the coil-taps, IMO coil-taps never really work well enough to make them useable anyway.

tubuie · Mar 19, 2010

I feel the need to make my guitar more twangy some times to get that sort of a P-90 tone out of it!Thats why I was thinking for a coil splitting thing!

JVsearch · Mar 19, 2010

Maybe you could put that humbucker sized P90 in the bridge or neck position, or maybe even try a pair of them?
Fralin does a couple, called P92 and Twangmaster, have a look:
http://www.fralinpickups.com/humbuckers.asp

marcusnieman · Mar 19, 2010

JVsearch said:
Maybe you could put that humbucker sized P90 in the bridge or neck position, or maybe even try a pair of them?
Fralin does a couple, called P92 and Twangmaster, have a look:
http://www.fralinpickups.com/humbuckers.asp

Yup.... fits right into the humbucker routing.

Diamond · Mar 19, 2010

Your luthier is a very clever man, listen to him.

JohnA · Mar 19, 2010

Diamond said:
Your luthier is a very clever man, listen to him.

Very true, the stock tokai pickups are right up there with duncans etc.

LuBee · Mar 19, 2010

If you want the best of both worlds humbucker and p90/single coil when split, you could try something like Seymour Duncan P-Rails.

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/progressive/prails_shpr1/

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/prails_hot/

JohnA · Mar 19, 2010

LuBee said:
If you want the best of both world humbucker and p90/single coil when split, you could try something like Seymour Duncan P-Rails.

[urlhttp://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/progressive/prails_shpr1/[/url]

[urlhttp://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/prails_hot/[/url]

LuBee, have you tried the P-Rails? Sound like a great idea, would be good to know if they deliver!

Anonymous · Mar 19, 2010

LuBee said:
If you want the best of both world humbucker and p90/single coil when split, you could try something like Seymour Duncan P-Rails.

[urlhttp://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/progressive/prails_shpr1/[/url]

[urlhttp://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/prails_hot/[/url]

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/progressive/prails_shpr1/

I looked at those when they came out - it did seem like the Holy Grail - HB, P90 & Strat all in one. But...to get all the sounds you need a 3 way mini-toggle, a push-pull pot will only give you two of them, which kinda misses the point. But it's an intriguing idea. Anyone tried them?

LuBee · Mar 19, 2010

Never tried them personally but have seen some pretty good videos.

The first is from Frank Falbo of SD http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZhJXcSVnfs&feature=related

The next are from a guy off the SD forum

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9q9VkER0dmw&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbDVlvyYry4&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSJ7D9IXfrg&feature=related

JohnA · Mar 19, 2010

Thanks LuBee, I'll check them out later, off out for a beer now

Mike, what about a 3-way rotary switch in place of a tone control, and re-wire so you have a master tone?

Anonymous · Mar 19, 2010

Well that's fine if you know where to get a 3 way rotary switch. But anyway that wouldn't help if I fitted one to the neck position of my Tele - nowhere to put the 3 way switch.

JohnA · Mar 19, 2010

stratman323 said:
Well that's fine if you know where to get a 3 way rotary switch. But anyway that wouldn't help if I fitted one to the neck position of my Tele - nowhere to put the 3 way switch.

Yep, wouldn't work on a tele

LuBee · Mar 20, 2010

I think if every I fitted a set I wouldn't go for all the options - I's just go with two fo the options probably the P90 and humbucker.

Leaving the strat tones to a proper strat a strat!

singemonkey · Mar 20, 2010

I wonder about this issue a lot. Diamond would have me believe that I'd be committing a mortal sin to replace any mk IIs

He's got a point. The bridge pickup at least is very musical. I have no problem believing that these pickups are as good as your average Duncans or Gibsons or whatnot. They sound better than the Gibson PAF 57 reissue I have in a different guitar (which means the comparison isn't good).

But - and I say this in the spirit of speculation, not because I'm dissatisfied - what about the crazy boutique pickups? I have Lollar P-90s on my other LP, and they're some amazing pickups. But you can't compare them to hums accurately. What about say, bare knuckles? People keep saying about them, "tried everything else but these brought me to my knees..." or something like that.

Oh... Stratman323, at the risk of being a dick, I don't think it's an ancient proverb. I think Bertrand Russell said that

Diamond · Mar 21, 2010

singemonkey said:
I wonder about this issue a lot. Diamond would have me believe that I'd be committing a mortal sin to replace any mk IIs He's got a point.

I was at Andy McGibbons yesterday.
We were talking about ES335s.
He said he's only ever heard and played one better ES335 than the Tokai ES185 he now has, it was an early 60s Gibson ES335 that he had in for a refinish and repair.
That's one heck of a compliment to the MK2s.

Guitarists and their GAS is borderline insanity, they'll change anything to attempt to improve what can only be improved by practise, technique, skill, and of course, soul.

There, I said it.

:lol: :roll:

btw, he showed me a set of these, not too expensive, R 4,000.00 for the set.

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/custom-shop/humbuckers/p_green_humbuck_1/

Anonymous · Mar 21, 2010

singemonkey said:
Oh... Stratman323, at the risk of being a dick, I don't think it's an ancient proverb. I think Bertrand Russell said that

Well Bertrand Russell counts as "ancient" doesn't he?

:wink:

Anyway, I was thinking about chaging it.

Pickup change?

Help Support Tokai Forum:

Member

Well-known member

Member

Well-known member

Member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Anonymous

Guest

Well-known member

Well-known member

Anonymous

Guest

Well-known member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Well-known member

Anonymous

Guest

Similar threads

Join the conversation!

Join today and get all the highlights of this community direct to your inbox. It's FREE!