Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

5

54stratlover

New member
I was sitting here looking over my guitars, and it struck he I have done nothing but change pups in my L.P. I was wondering what people consider the essential upgrades in the "GUTS" and hardware of the guitar. Sprague Caps? Orange drop caps? give me the low down. Thanks in advance!

Craig
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Straplocks :smoker:

Everything else is personal preference. Although I like those featherweight tailpieces, but I haven´t found one in Black , yet ;)
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Locking tuners for added stability, bone nut, tone pros locking bridge, nickel covered HARDENED steel stop tail, upgrade to CTS pots or similar and orange drop caps.
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Over on the LPF everyone talks about the RSRelic kit. It consist of pots, hovland caps, and a special wiring mod.
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Jeff_H said:
Locking tuners for added stability, bone nut, tone pros locking bridge, nickel covered HARDENED steel stop tail, upgrade to CTS pots or similar and orange drop caps.
Click to expand...

The Tuners I probably should have added, as they are finally available in all formfactors so drilling is no longer an issue if you buy the right ones.

But the Tailpiece and Bridge are already 2 items where opinions spread, for example. I feel that a steel tailpiece doesnt sound "open" or "woody" enough, so I use aluminum tailpieces like Gibson did in "the day". The locking bridge fattens the tone and adds sustain, but also (to my ears) warms up the whole shebang compared to an ABR-1 or similar. But I´m not looking for a "modern" LP tone, but prefer to get as close to the "old specs" as possible. I´m also a firm believer in keeping instruments like LPs that will someday appreciate in value as stock as possible.

IMO the stock electronics on most are adequate ;)
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

I don't know about essential, but my Les Paul has one of the nickel plated aluminum tailpieces from GOTOH too, and which look like and sound like the aluminum tailpieces Gibson used until 1962 when they switched to zinc pot metal. Zinc is three times heavier than the original 50's tailiece Gibson used on all of the 50's Gold Tops and Bursts and gives the guitar a steelier tone, IMO. Like Zerb, I prefer aluminum. I think it gives a Les Paul a little more open mid range voice and little more resonant and woody tone, as Zerb mentioned. The other mod I did to my Les Paul, other than change the pickups, is the 50's mod to the tone controls. Just look inside and check if the tone capacitors are not attached to the middle lug of the volume pots. If they're not, unsolder them from the volume pot and move then to the middle lug of each volume pot and see if you like it better. You'll lose less treble when you turn down the volume control...I prefer it. I like Hovland Oil N Foil caps...but I don't hear any major difference between them and Sprague Orange Drop caps in a guitar's tone circuit. I do hear a diff when the Hovlands are used in an amp's tone circuit...but not much diff at all in a guitar's tone circuit. While you're at it, make sure your pots actually measure 500K...some LP's have 300K pots which gives a muddier tone, IMO. I have to say that I don't have alot of respect for many of the opinions expressed on the LPF...or much respect for the LPF in general. Just my opinion. Lew
 
Last edited:
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

LEW, Side note: Can YOU get the aluminum tailpieces in black? Found every other color imaginable (Nickel, CHrome and Gold), but no black :(
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

I would also list an ABR-1 bridge as an essential upgrade. I just swapped my heavy tailpiece for an aluminum one today, and it didn't improve the tone half as much as changing the Nashville TOM to an ABR-1.
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Essential - sweat. Everything else is just candy until you put that into it.

I prefer OD caps and CTS pots but I mostly run my LP wide open. I guess a proper set of pups are in order at some point but which they'd be a of a highly personal preference and to follow up on what Zerb said I use the Schaller Straplocks.
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Zerberus said:
LEW, Side note: Can YOU get the aluminum tailpieces in black? Found every other color imaginable (Nickel, CHrome and Gold), but no black :(
Click to expand...

I have not...only gold or nickel. I'm glad you like the aluminum tailpiece too...now I know I'm not just hearing things as your description is exactly what I hear too! I hear it as giving the guitar just a slight acoustic type tone...livlier, woodier, and less steely...as you may have mentioned. I'm surprised more people haven't noticed that improvement, but it's one reason old 50's Les Paul sound the way they do and 99.99% of the reissue Les Pauls don't really sound like the old ones. There's other reasons too, of course, but the aluminum tailpiece is a must, IMO. It'd be nice to retrofit all of the reissues with Brazilian rosewood fingerboards too...but that ain't gonna happen! Lew
 
Last edited:
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

My Goldtop has the most mods, but you'd never know by looking at it.
I had the pot plate taken out and had to do a little bit of routing to fit the
pullup tone pots, which split the Custom 5/59 in nickel.
I also had a bone nut installed, as well as Schaller direct fit Kluson copy tuners. Those Schaller Kluson copies have a better tuning ratio and are a little stiffer to turn. That guitar stays in tune, is intonated beautifully,
and is the most versatile Paul I have. I often wonder why Gibson never made
splitting pickups stock. The sound of the full bridge and split neck sounds
great for clean tones. I left the stock caps in it.

All the rest of my Pauls have just gotten the Custom 5/59 treatment,
and that's all a Paul needs IMO. I may look into different caps in the future,
but I'm not that concerned with it.
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

I think since my 58 RI already had the lightweight tail piece, the tone pros set up was the most significant upgrade after the pups. I put some 500k cts pots in, the guitar got too bright for me, but I just adjusted the orange drop cap value to compensate. Now it's purrrfect.

and, us schaller straploks are highly recommended.
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Thanks for all of the tips guys!! I am going to have to look for the aluminum tailpiece, and some caps. Lew, do you have those things? Send me an IM if you do. I am thinking of trying the fishman powerbridge. After trying the slash signature paul, I am hooked!, It sounded great mixing the magnetic pups and the fishman on an overdriven marshall, kind of like a distorted resonator with huge balls. :bigeyes: Made for some mean sounding slide. Hey
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Lew pretty much nailed it for me. I use good, measured CTS pots, Hovland caps and '50s wiring scheme. Those were the biggest changes in the sound for me. Those mods, and a set of Timbuckers turned my '54 Oxblood into a monster! I find I like the '50s wiring better than the RS Relics wiring. I've had both, swapped the RS around to '50s on my LP Pro.

The aluminum tailpiece was too subtle for me to notice, but since I had it... :D
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

ALF....I'm having the RS kit installed right now (as well as the aluminum tailpiece), what didn't you like about the RS wiring?


J
 
Re: Essential L.P. upgrades! Curly, Lew, Zerb, Jonesy?

Alvin Lee Fan said:
Lew pretty much nailed it for me. I use good, measured CTS pots, Hovland caps and '50s wiring scheme. Those were the biggest changes in the sound for me. Those mods, and a set of Timbuckers turned my '54 Oxblood into a monster! I find I like the '50s wiring better than the RS Relics wiring. I've had both, swapped the RS around to '50s on my LP Pro.

The aluminum tailpiece was too subtle for me to notice, but since I had it... :D
Click to expand...


Could someone explain to me the 50's wire scheme, what it changes? And possibly link me to a schematic?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

I
Cap/tone pot combination suggestions
Replies
13
Views
592
Clint 55
Clint 55
brentrocks
1988 GIBSON LES PAUL SHOWCASE EDITION SILVERBURST
Replies
3
Views
263
brentrocks
brentrocks
Z
  • Locked
H/H/H wiring
4 5 6
Replies
109
Views
4K
Zaakkk
Z
W
Wiring: Neck Pickup reads with multimeter, but no sound in amp
Replies
19
Views
1K
freefrog
freefrog
Deathviper1777
2018 Gibson SG makeover. Pics....
Replies
16
Views
816
Deathviper1777
Deathviper1777
Back
Top