How many of you replaced Pickups ?

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Pickup change

  • Did not replace pickups, I am already a happy camper

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Replaced pickup, I am happy with new sound

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Replaced pickup, I am not hapy with the new sound

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    0
  • Poll closed .

Web Surf

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What did you change to ? Why ?


Was there a big difference in tone ?


Were you happy with the change ? Did you get the tone that you wanted ? Did you sound like the clips on the manufacturer's web sites ?


Did you install switches for split/single/double/parallel/series ?


( Just asking as I got a Tokai Les Paul 2 days ago and it ( obviously) sounds very different than my tele. I am considering a change to split humbucklers with switches to get some variety)

Please do add to the thread after voting, so that I learn a bit more

Thanks for your posts !!
 
I replaced the pickups on my main Tokai ('99 LS70F) twice. First time, I put a set of SD's in, a 59 neck & JB bridge. They sounded too cold & clinical for me, and I just didn't get on with them.

Tried out some Bare Knuckle Pickups at the local shop, and ordered a set there and then, they've been in a couple of years now, and still sound awesome!

EDIT: No switching installed, although I have had push/pull pots installed on previous guitars for coil tap/phase.

The stock Gotoh MkII pickups are good sounding pickups, but being unpotted, they're a bit prone to microphonic feedback (especially at loud volume/high-ish gain levels).
 
I replaced the pickups on my LS200 twice. The first time was about a week after I bought the guitar, because I had a clear picture in my mind of my perfect les paul and that picture involved the SD alnico II pro's I had in my epiphone at the time. I never really gave the Gotohs a chance but they weren't 4-conductor and I wanted to be able to split them, so they were out by default.

I had them in there for several years and was very happy, but when I got my tele this year I began hearing things in a different light and suddenly felt that the love rock's bridge pickup in particular was a little dark and underpowered. I wanted something vintage-y with a little more kick and brightness than the APH's so I bought a set of bareknuckle mules. WOW. I was happy enough before but I never knew what I was missing; this was a night-and-day transformation and I love my Tokai more than ever!

BK are trying to put together a clip gallery for their stuff but there's quite a few decent customer clips on their forum. None of it does justice to these pickups though.

My switching options are as follows - coil split for each pickup, phase inverter for those peter green moments, and a both-pickups-in-series switch which really fattens up and darkens the tone. A total of 22 non-redundant possible positions. The 4 switches are controlled by push-pull pots so unless you start pulling the control knobs you wouldn't see or hear any difference from normal. The splits need 4-conductor wiring but the phase and series can be done with standard 2-conductor.
 
The Dimarzios on my '85 LS150 fit the sound I like - together with the modern wiring ...

No regrets and no need to change them - big sound ... :wink:


Roger

BTW - it's a good addendum to my Edwards with Kloppmann's and '50s wiring.
 
How do you vote if you replaced pickups on one guitar but not on another and are happy with both?
 
On the two guitars I changed pickups on (Greco Super Real ES 175 and Orville by Gibson 61 SG), I put in Seymour Duncan Seth Lovers - the original PAF's. My favorite after market humbuckers.

Buttery smooth and impeccably balanced. Love these more than the Classic 57's and Antiquities.
 
I changed the pickups in all Tokais!

Reason: The stock pickups do not give me that quality, that I?m used to. I miss nice (that do not bite you in your ears) treble (the stock pu?s do not have enough treble to me) , dynamics, good bass and great attack! My english is?nt good enough to describe all these special things!
The changing of the pickups is a big step forward, and makes the Tokais sound way better!

I changed all of them against Haeussel Pickups, which are Top of the line PU?s! And they got a soul!

bye, "ACY"
 
Hi,

I changed the PUs in all my LP Guitars
(Tokai LS 150, Tokai LS 85, Edwards LTC 90, Epiphone Elitist Std+)
to H?ussel pickups.

For the same reasons as Acy stated above
(guess where I bought my H?ussels :wink: )

Andi
 
"What did you change to ? Why ?"

WCR Fillmore set - the stock PUPS on my LS75 were OK, but I wouldn't a more unique, boutique sound, plus I wanted to do the "Jimmy Page" wiring mod.


"Was there a big difference in tone ?"

Yes - hard to describe what the difference is exactly, but there is certainly more clarity with the WCR's and more of a honk that is cool for blues and classic rock.


"Were you happy with the change ? Did you get the tone that you wanted ? Did you sound like the clips on the manufacturer's web sites ?"

I am happy with the change, though it was expensive. I don't know if I have found my dream tone yet - I still need to check out some other brandds, like Bare Knuckles. The PUP's sound close to the clips on the WCR site, but I mainly play through an Orange, which has a very particular tone, so there is a slight difference (most of WCR's clips were recorded with modded, vintage Marshall amps).

"Did you install switches for split/single/double/parallel/series ?"

Yep, the full Jimmy Page wiring mod.

- Chris
 
Changed the pickups on my LS85F to Lollar Imperials Humbuckers.... really happy with the result. They are really great... a bit expensive though (around 300 euros for the set ), but worth the price that was paid for them 8). They are handwound and not wax-potted (the original PAF?s were not waxpotted too)

Probably I will do the same to my LS120F someday, because since the change, my lower specs guitar (LS85F) became much better sounding than the LS120F :wink
 
jawilluk said:
How do you vote if you replaced pickups on one guitar but not on another and are happy with both?

My problem exactly. I like my Tele and I like my Tokai. ( They are a bit low on treble, but is that normal for a Humbuckler or are there brighter Humbucklers around ? )

But I'm trying to see how to make the Tokai more versatile and get more tones from it.

I really wonder what is more important : adhering to a vintage spec or moving ahead with technology / customer requirements.

I just understood that the EPI Elite series have 4 conductor pickups , but still no switch. Why not ?

Paladin2019 said:
My switching options are as follows - coil split for each pickup, phase inverter for those peter green moments, and a both-pickups-in-series switch which really fattens up and darkens the tone. A total of 22 non-redundant possible positions. The 4 switches are controlled by push-pull pots so unless you start pulling the control knobs you wouldn't see or hear any difference from normal. The splits need 4-conductor wiring but the phase and series can be done with standard 2-conductor.

I wish I had many switch positions to try and get many tones.

wow. 22 options seem to be even more than Fender's S-1 switching !!!

Do you have a diagram of how you wired your pups and switches.

Where does one buy the push pull pots and knobs ?

indravayu said:
Yep, the full Jimmy Page wiring mod.
- Chris

Which version did you do ? The one at http://www.deaf-eddie.net/ ?

Which out of the various positions are you most happy with ?



Tooooooooo many questions for the moment, I promise I will also "contribute" to the forum later on !!
 
Web Surf said:
My problem exactly. I like my Tele and I like my Tokai. ( They are a bit low on treble, but is that normal for a Humbuckler or are there brighter Humbucklers around ? )

But I'm trying to see how to make the Tokai more versatile and get more tones from it.

I really wonder what is more important : adhering to a vintage spec or moving ahead with technology / customer requirements.!!

I'd say the most important thing is YOUR requirements, which may or may not involve keeping to vintage spec. Personally, I always try to mix the best qualities of classic and modern design - for example, my tele has a vintage style 3-saddle bridge but a modern 22 fret neck.

If you want a brighter humbucker sound there are plenty out there, not everyone wants to nail the vintage PAF sound! Check out the Bareknuckle Black Dog, it's vintage style with a bit more output and bite.

Web Surf said:
I just understood that the EPI Elite series have 4 conductor pickups , but still no switch. Why not ?.

I'm not sure if this is true. If it is, then it just means that epi were future-proofing their product for mod lovers.

Web Surf said:
I wish I had many switch positions to try and get many tones.

wow. 22 options seem to be even more than Fender's S-1 switching !!!

Do you have a diagram of how you wired your pups and switches.

Where does one buy the push pull pots and knobs ?

Which version did you do ? The one at http://www.deaf-eddie.net/ ?

Which out of the various positions are you most happy with ?

Mine is a modified version of the Jimmy Page scheme. You can get the diagram from guitarelectronics.com and all the parts from an Allparts distributor. Your current knobs will fit push-pull pots.

I recommend the scheme that uses two CTS volume pots. Use audio taper for all the pots and if you're going to be re-doing the electronics than fit a switchcraft switch (LONG THREAD version) and jack at the same time. They'll last longer.

My favourite positions, ironically, are stock neck, middle and bridge! I like the tapped neck for jangly rhythm sounds. A split bridge pickup can sound like a tele with the outer coil on or a strat with the inner coil on. I really like splitting both pickups and putting them in series, which creates a humbucker that listens to both ends of the picking area!
 
Tokai Guitars have a weak link, the pickups and pots. Which can easily be rectified, funds permitting with good quality handmade ones. The wood Tokai uses in their top level guitars is excellent.

My Breezysound Tele has Leosounds Mudcat Set - www.leosounds.de
Fantastic quality and tone - very good customer service too.

My '80 ST-100 Springysound has custom '54 pickups made with Alnico III magnets, handwound by David Barfuss - This guitar is clear as a bell.

My '80 ST-80 Springysound has Bareknuckle Apache Set - Incredible

My '79 Silverstar Strat has Bare Knuckle Trilogies - Awesome

My Love Rock II has got Bare Knuckle Mule in the Neck, and Micheal from Leosounds is just making me a Calibrated Bridge pickup to match it.

My Jap SRV Fender Strat has Bare Knuckle Irish Tour Set and nails the SRV tone.

My Bound Candy Apple Red Tele has a custom handmade P90 tele Bridge Pickup with underwound, normal wound and overwound coil taps !!

I haven't changed the pickups in my Sunburst ES-100. Ishibashi secndhand dealer on ebay hadn't realised they had been changed to Seymour Duncan '59's and the tailpiece had been changed to light aluminium.

Yesterday I changed the single coil pickups on my Tokai Presto to Bare Knuckle Mothers Milk spec ones.

I haven't changed the pickups on my Les Paul Reborn Retrospec. That's because as stock they came with handmade, scatterwound unpotted pickups by Harry Haeusel.
 
Never owned a guitar for more than a few months before changing PUs, at least not in the last 15 years.

Strat types, I like the Texas specials, or even SOAPBARS, Duncan or Gib, hear there are some other cool ones now too! Sound great in a Strat, if you don't mind cutting wood.

All my humbucker guitars get Burstbuckers (#I in the bridge; #II in the neck, I play mostly bass PU solos), or '57 Classics (The "+" model in the neck), by the Voldemort of guitar companies. The one thing they do right these days, for my tastes.

Occassionaly will use a stacked humbucker in the neck of a Strat. Again, I really want that neck PU on everything loud, and "howly". Makes resale impossible, oh well...
 
Web Surf said:
indravayu said:
Yep, the full Jimmy Page wiring mod.
- Chris

Which version did you do ? The one at http://www.deaf-eddie.net/ ?

Which out of the various positions are you most happy with ?

My guitar tech did the installation/wiring for me - I don't know which version he used exactly.

All the different positions seem cool to me - I most often use the coil splitting on the neck and bridge PUPs, but I am still playing around with the different tones and trying to figure out which settings work best for certain situations.

- Chris
 
I have two Diodatis, which are really Tokai LS-75s, from 2001. They came with Gotoh PAFs, which I loved, but which squealed on high gain settings.

I potted both sets in vinyl sanding sealer (trivial to work with when compared to paraffin). They sound the same, maybe a little darker, but no there's no squealing, and the feedback is extremely controllable and musical. :D

I'm not planning on changing anything about them, now. They are perfect (for my style). :wink:

Bill
 
I've mentioned here before that the stock dogear P90 in my Tokai double cut Junior wasn't great-sounding. In fairness it did sound good clean but it was impossible to get any raunch out of it. I replaced it with a Lollar and couldn't be happier.

For the record I spliced on some more wire and wound more turns on the Tokai P90 and it sounds great...it was just underwound.

Jim
 
I spliced on some more wire and wound more turns on the Tokai P90

How hard was that to do? Do you have a winder or did you do it literally by hand? How many times around the bobbins did you go? And, what guage wire did you use?

Thanks!
Bill
 
Hi Bill,

I cobbled together a "winder" of sorts. :) It's made out of a fan motor from an old tube reel-to-reel machine with wheel to mount the bobbin attached to the spindle. As there is no gear reduction I ran the power wires into the output of my Variac. :)

I used 42ga. wire and wound about another 2K in resistance to the pickup (it originally measured around 6.6K if I recall...it's posted on this site somewhere.) My turns counter didn't really work out and I wasn't looking for precision with this set up anyway so I basically just wound until the bobbin was full. Seymour Duncan I ain't. :)

Jim
 
Thanks to everybody, I am learning a lot here

A) I suppose Tokai LP's need "regular size" pickups and not "F sized" pickups


B) Right now my Tokai PAFs and the rest of the hardware is gold. Which replacement 4 conductor pickups are also available in gold covered boxes. I somehow dont like the exposed pickup look

Thanks again
 
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