A short tale o' 57 Classics

Geebson

New member
Let me first thank you all, for this great forum. I've been a 'lurker' here for a while and I've learnt a lot.

About that.

I have an es 339 that sports 57 classics. I love the guitar, tho' I have always thought it sounded a bit muddy.
So, yesterday i got this kick. What if I try to swap magnets in these, as well as taking off some windings on one coil (mismatched coils? May they open up a bit..

Decided to have a go at it. Popped of the covers, unwaxed and got to work..

My 57 classics had matched coils that read ~4.00r for the neck and a bit more for the bridge. Alnico 2.
Unwinded the neck slug coil to 3.75. Popped in an rough cast Alnico 5.
Took off 0.2r on the Bridge screw coil. Unoriented Alnico 5.

And the verdict;
Got to play these suckers loud tonight, and they sound a lot better. They have really brightened up, and the midrange has come to live. More P90'ish.

Overall they're more aggresive when required and there's more shimmer in the treble frequencies.
They've got this really cool double tone effect going as well.
Through a crancked Marshall there's a lot more clarity and note definition, especially at higher gain.

Got to play the pickups for a couple weeks, but I think I've just saved myself the extra bucks for boutique pickups.

Highly recommended 'mod'.
 
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Re: A short tale o' 57 Classics

yeh. A5s make 57s sound much better. Its pretty much the antidote for all the things i dont like about stock 57s.
Funily enough, with a set of SD 59's you can swap the magnets from them and put them into a set of 57s and vice versa (a2's for the 59s). And you have improved both sets of pickups IMO.
 
Re: A short tale o' 57 Classics

Welcome aboard!

Nice job on the mods. I put an polished A5 in my '57neck and 490R, big improvement in clarity.
 
Re: A short tale o' 57 Classics

I've been wanting to try A4's in my set of 57C's I pulled out of my R7.
 
Re: A short tale o' 57 Classics

Great job. It's nice when the experimenting pays off.

Not sure you needed to do the "unwinding" of the coil to get the shimmer back into those '57s, I think the mag swap to UOA5 or RCA5 would have accomplished it to a great extent. I guess mismatching the coils made the tone a little more complex? I haven't done any pickup winding myself so that's all over my head, but glad you have the know-how to get it done the way you want.
 
Re: A short tale o' 57 Classics

I like 'em stock. But then again, I'm not a mag swapper. No need for me to do so.
 
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