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NVGD 1958 Custom

JJ Blair

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 9, 2011
Messages
3,462
Yeah. Thanks. The reason why I ask is that I suspect my middle PUP was fudged with, and I'm trying to put this dispute to rest to people who insist that the polarity is reversed.
 

Wally

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
The only way to put that debate to rest for that particular guitar is to pull the pickups and check the originality of the wiring, ime. I only know that I have seen/worked/heard on a 100% original, 'non-fudged' 3-pickup Custom with a middle position arrangement that yielded a lower output than either the bridge or neck p-up alone yielded...both to the ear and to a meter. Were all of them done that way??? I have no way to know that.
 

Rev.WillieVK

Active member
Joined
Jul 26, 2002
Messages
9,268
IMO until we get information from people with undeniably 'virgin' 3-pickup PAF Customs, the debate will continue. :salude

I guess part of the debate is whether Gibson had any other guitars with magnet-flipped PAFs as factory spec and therefore had a supply of the magnet-flipped pickups already made up and ready to be installed into guitars.

:hmm
 

retrobob

Member
Joined
Dec 1, 2002
Messages
735
When I first got my LPC the middle pickup was so nasally sounding, I didn't like it. So, (since the pickup covers had already been off) I flipped the magnet.
It now sounds like a strat pickup in the middle position. Which I like a lot!


Also, how about some more pics of the OPs 58 LPC.
 

Wally

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
When I first got my LPC the middle pickup was so nasally sounding, I didn't like it. So, (since the pickup covers had already been off) I flipped the magnet.
It now sounds like a strat pickup in the middle position. Which I like a lot!


Also, how about some more pics of the OPs 58 LPC.

This would indicate that indeed your middle pickup was out of phase with the bridge pickup. By flipping the magnet, you put the two pickups in phase. That middle pickup does not operate by itself when the toggle is in the middle position. A resistance measurements before after the flipping would have shown that the middle position had a lower resistance than did the bridge position. After the magnet flip, that resistance in the middle position is a higher resistance than is the bridge position....and is likely to be quite a bit more powerful than a Strat middle pickup.
 

58burst

Active member
Joined
May 11, 2002
Messages
2,176
This would indicate that indeed your middle pickup was out of phase with the bridge pickup. By flipping the magnet, you put the two pickups in phase. That middle pickup does not operate by itself when the toggle is in the middle position. A resistance measurements before after the flipping would have shown that the middle position had a lower resistance than did the bridge position. After the magnet flip, that resistance in the middle position is a higher resistance than is the bridge position....and is likely to be quite a bit more powerful than a Strat middle pickup.

How would flipping the magnet change the DC resistance, I wonder?
 

Wally

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
58 burst, flipping the magnet changes nothing in that one pickup. The one pickup in the middle still shows the same resistance that it did before you flipped the magnet. IT---the flipping of the magnet or the reversing of the wires.... does however change the way that pickup relates to the other pickup. And...that middle position puts that middle pickup into a relationship with the bridge pickup. That relationship went from out of phase...the thin sound that you did not like...to in phase...a bigger sound that you do like. That famous 'burst that Peter Green and Garry Moore played had the neck pickup changed in that manner in order to achieve that B.B. King type of out of phase sound that Gibson Stereo wired guitars yield....because they are wired OOP. When one changes the relationship from in phase to out of phase...or vis-a-versa....the resistance measurement when the two pickups are running together will change. The in phase relationship yields a larger resistance and more output compared to the OOP relationship.

Fwiw, Gibson is building a lot of modern L.P.'s and Es-335's with OOP middle position wiring these days.

PHase is interesting...I have had my ES-345TDC since it was new...bought it in 1967. The middle position is OOP. The two channels of a Fender two channel reverb amp are out of phase. IF I plug one pickup lead into the Normal channel and one pickup lead into the Vib Ch, the result is that I have an ES-335 response....the pickups' OOP relationship running through the OOP channels results in an in phase signal coming out of the OT. That sound is bigger than if I run each pickup through the Vib channel of two identical Fender Reverb amps.....the sonics will be out of phase....thinner and less powerful. I have tow identical amps that I use with the guitar. IF I want OOP, I leave the amps as is. IF I want in phase, I can flip the phase of one pickup lead before it gets to the amp, or I can reverse the wiring on the speaker of one amp and achieve in phase results.
 

T.Allen

Moderator
Joined
Sep 11, 2014
Messages
2,662
Actually, I think it is a case of one of the pickups being out of phase with the others.

It is easy to test: take a loose humbucker, hold it upside down against the pickup you're testing and line it up (slug-to-slug, screw-to-screw) and see if it is magnetically attracted or repelled. If you do this test to the 3 pickups of a PAF LPC, I think you'll get 2 pickups that attract/repel the same, and one that does the opposite.

At least it did with the '59 that I tested, though the pickups had the covers off and on over the years so I don't know if a magnet was flipped aftermarket.

I checked this on my '57 LPC today. All three pickups tested the same. They all repelled. I don't get an out of phase sound to my ears, so that is what I expected.

What's this all mean? I have no idea.
 

57gold

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 14, 2005
Messages
692
Just took some photos of my 1958, source from Mr Winterflood who said some Thin Lizzie player owned it and it appeared on the cover of one of the UK guitar mags...never verified, but Gary seems to be cool. Have a guy interested in her.

IMG_0792_zpsbsgeyqas.jpg


IMG_0800_zpshzfzsqr3.jpg


Refret w/1959 wire by UK luthier back in the day and Grovered, have the waffle backed Klusons in case...
 
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