A question

H

Helldogg

New member
Hi everyone. Here is how my Les Paul is wired. It has a 498t and 490r in it. I want to put a Gibson Iommi in the bridge. How would you guys suggest this. I have installed pups before but not in an LP like this.
​​​​Thanks!
 

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Helldogg said:
Hi everyone. Here is how my Les Paul is wired. It has a 498t and 490r in it. I want to put a Gibson Iommi in the bridge. How would you guys suggest this. I have installed pups before but not in an LP like this.
​​​​Thanks!
Click to expand...

The braided cable going to the pot/volume control in the lower left of the picture is the cable of your current bridge pickup.

Unsolder the braided cable from the back of the pot and unsolder the cloth covered lead from the terminal of the pot/volume control that it is soldered to.

Remove the current pickup and install your new one in exactly the same way as the current one was was installed.

Hopefully they'll be in phase. You can tell ahead of time by placing your new pickup against your current pickup face to face so that the screw polepieces are touching.

If they attract and stick together like a magnet they are out of phase and when the selector switch is in the middle position and both pickups are combined the sound will be thin and nasal and they are out of phase.

You can correct this by reversing the magnet in the new bridge pickup. Then try again and you'll find that when you touch the new pickup screw polepieces to the screw polepieces of your current pickup they repel. That's what you want.
 
Thank you! So if the Iommi has 4 wires I have the two green and white taped. The red wire (hot) goes to the lug the black and bare both go where the braiding is or do they have to be soldered to different places on the pot?
 
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I always wondered how an Iommi pickup sounded in an LP, so when it is installed, come back and please give a review.
 
Mincer,

The Iommi is a beast in the Les Paul. I just spent the last hour or so and so far here are my thoughts.

Very full and thick with out being flubby at all. The Les Paul sounds huge now. It had a 498t in the bridge before which sounded ice picky to me.

The Iommi has a really throaty midrange and a really nice high end that cuts, but does not at all sound ice picky. Cleans up really well too, can go from full on to crunchy with the volume.

First Gibson pickup I really like. The crazy part to me is on full gain you still can get note separation.

Very very cool pickup. Now I need to find another for the neck or at least something other than the 490r that is in it now....lol
 
Thanks for the review. It is probably close to his modern sound which is super thick with lots of mids. I am happy it is working for you!
 
This is great info. I am thinking about building an Iommi "Old Boy" clone as my next project and I am on the fence as to which pickups I want to use Birch or Gibson, thanks for the review.
 
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