Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

[Old Ghost]

Well, we all know that the string spacing on a current Gibson LP is F-spaced. Gibson makes their Bridge pickups bobbins exactly the same as a regular standard sized humbucker but the pole pieces are wider apart to line up with the "wider" string spacing on the bridge. This way, both pickups fit perfectly on any standard sized pickup mounting ring. This is not the case with the SD Trembucker pickups which has an oversized bobbins and is significantly larger than a standard SH-4 JB which doesn't make any sense to me. I've known this since the Trembuckers were first introduced. I have them on some of my LP's that have wider string spacing on the bridge. They barely fit on the standard mounting ring. But I manage to fit them. I've always wondered why SD chose to do this while Gibson had the same bobbin size and only the pole pieces spacing is different. Just doesn't make any sense to me. The TB-4's that i had didn't have covers that's why I managed to fit them on the mounting ring. Now, i just decided to go with covered Pickups on my LP's and bought the TB-4's with nickel covers. Well, i totally wasn't expecting to see an "Oversized" Humbucker because i thought, well, the TB-4 should be in a standard sized pickup covers but the spacing will be wider apart (kinda like Gibsons').
Cont'd....

 

[rombola]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

all gibson lp's are regular spaced

 

[Old Ghost]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

So to make the long story short, the "Oversized" TB-4 w/ cover did not fit the standard mounting ring. Have any of you gentlemen experienced this before? Am I the only one that thinks it's not necessary to have the bobbins and the pickup itself to be longer to have a wider spaced pole pieces? I was very disappointed. I'm a loyal SD pickup junkie and if couldn't have the JB on my LP's, i'd rather not have any at all. Duncans are dead on with the tone i've searched for for years and found it in the Jazz/JB or '59/JB and recently PG/JB. Now i'm going to have to return all 5 TB-4 pickups for exchange. I'll have to settle with the regular spaced SH-4 JB on the bridges of my F-spaced LP's. Gibson, Lindy's, DiMarzios are not my cup of tea. I've tried them all. It'll be an easy fix to line up the strings to the regular pole spacing of the SH-4 JB. I'll just get a couple of new un-notched saddles for my ABR-1 to move the Low E and A closer to line up. But the reason for my rant is why SD chose to have the overall size of the pickup to be oversized when they can just have the same standard sized humbuckers and put wider spacing pole pieces. This way people won't have to be forced to use the "Oversized" mounting ring that are included with the trembuckers which is really thin and only come in black! I'm not about to install it on my LP's just so i can fit the trembucker. You know how goofy and stupid that'll look?!
Cont'd....

 

[Old Ghost]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

all gibson lp's are regular spaced

Check again Bro. They're not.

 

[Old Ghost]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Now that i got that out, i sure would like a comment from Evan about this. Evan, if you're around Brother, please comment. I would really appreciate it. Thanks. :burnout:

 

[Nite_Maresz_25]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

all gibson lp's are regular spaced

Only the pre-1995(i think could be 96 or 94) are not f spaced.

 

[Old Ghost]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Only the pre-1995(i think could be 96 or 94) are not f spaced.

You are right Bro.

 

[theodie]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

I belive Pre 95 LP's are standard spaced and the rest are trem spaced. I might be wrong but, I think the high end LP's are still standard spaced though. Please correct me if I am wrong on the high end part.

 

[Jeff_H]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Holy poo....I didn't know LP's were trem spaced. Learn something new every day. I'm off to look at my LP.

 

[Jeff_H]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Cripes....ok. I have a standard spaced C5/Seth in my LP currently. The pole pieces at the bridge line up almost perfectly, but the neck DOES NOT line up. My high E is almost completely inside the pole piece, and the bass E is about 2/3 inside. Is my nut not cut right?

Sorry for the hijack....I'd like more info on this also!

 

[ranalli]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Is there a retro-fit piece to bring it back to regular spacing??

Why would Gibson change that anyway?? I like the closer string spacing....everything is closer together and more economical as far as picking.

 

[rspst14]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Cripes....ok. I have a standard spaced C5/Seth in my LP currently. The pole pieces at the bridge line up almost perfectly, but the neck DOES NOT line up. My high E is almost completely inside the pole piece, and the bass E is about 2/3 inside. Is my nut not cut right?

Sorry for the hijack....I'd like more info on this also!

It's been my experience that a standard neck pickup should always line up perfectly. If the neck polepiece alignment is off, then yes, you could have an improperly cut nut. As long there is no buzzing on open strings, the action is good, the polepiece alignment is close, and you don't notice any dropout when bending, I wouldn't worry about it. But if you notice any of those problems, a new nut might be in order.

Ryan

 

[rspst14]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

http://www.fretsonthenet.net/

This guy will make you a custom pickup ring to fit a wider spaced pickup. Might want to try that before you send all those pickups back.

Ryan

 

[Mr 9finger]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Dude, I don't know how or where you found that website ^^^^^ but that's a god send for me!

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR POSTING THAT!

 

[theodie]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

I have delt with fretsonthenet.com numerous times and he is AWSOME to deal with!!!!!!

 

[TheArchitect]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Only the pre-1995(i think could be 96 or 94) are not f spaced.

Not true. My 2000 Standard is not F-Spaced. Standard spaced pickup is right on the money.

 

[TheArchitect]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Check again Bro. They're not.

Both LP's I have are in fact standard spaced. No ifs ands or buts about it.

 

[TheArchitect]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

Cripes....ok. I have a standard spaced C5/Seth in my LP currently. The pole pieces at the bridge line up almost perfectly, but the neck DOES NOT line up. My high E is almost completely inside the pole piece, and the bass E is about 2/3 inside. Is my nut not cut right?

Sorry for the hijack....I'd like more info on this also!

Your fine Jeff. Don't worry about it.

 

[rinse_master]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

all gibson lp's are regular spaced

My '00 LP Studio is F spaced, but I have a regular spaced pup in there and it works fine...

 

[Tony_H]

Re: Learned the Hardway:TB-4 JB w/ cover.

My former 92 LP Studio had an F-spaced bridge pup. I know because I compared it with an F-spaced DiMarzio PAF and the spacing was the same.

My latest guitar - the semi-hollowbody Lucille-alike - has standard-spaced pups (APHs) and there are no problems even though the strings and polepieces are not perfectly aligned. The signal from individual strings is balanced although both e-strings lie at the edge of the polepiece.

On a side note, I also wondered why SD makes oversized bobbins for the TB pickups. I think the answer is somewhere in the Support section of the SD website, though I'm not sure.
Personally, I think the quality of tone that SD can give you more than offests this little quirk of SD pups.