Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

[KLINKDETROIT]

I notice that older L.P.s dont have the metal ground plate thing in the pickup connection cavity. If I hooked it up without the plate like the older ones would it be a more direct connection? I also notice the toggle wire is 4 conductor and I know that thicker vintage type 2 conductor sounds better on a pickup so I am assuming it would be better for the toggle and input jack/ pot connections? Less is more line of thinking. Am I right? The middle connector or relay would be out of the picture wouldnt it? I would assume that would be a more direct connection. I realize this is a minor upgrade but I am running out of things to improve lol. Let me know what ya think

 

[martinsixstringcustoms]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

I can't really see any noticable improvement in tone...

 

[ErikH]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

All it is is a common ground plane for all the pots. This eliminates the need to run a wire from one pot to the next. The bridge ground is usually soldered to the plate as well. Smart idea actually. I thought about fabricating one when I get around to rewiring my Epi LP.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

I think Gibson mostly did it to save time. They could lay 100 or so of those plates on a work bench and wire them all up and then stick them in the guitar cavity. Much more efficient way to do it.

Pain in the butt to work on years later though...and you have to use long shaft pots.

 

[ErikH]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

Yeah, there is/was that drawback of having to yank the whole thing out to replace one pot. The way I'm thinking of doing it would be to lay one in the cavity (much thinner though) and then just run the pots through it and bolt 'em down like normal. I wouldn't have to pull the whole thing out to change a pot if I had to.

 

[KLINKDETROIT]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

I know that companies sometimes do things for a profit that dont always have the customer or tone in mind. I wonder if keeping the plate as is for the ground properties but wiring the pots directly from the input jack with the 2 conductor (thicker) braided cable would sound better as it does with pickups 2 conductor vs 4 conductor. Minor difference but about 5% improvement in tone. Anyone have a schematic to do something like this?

 

[some_dude]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

Did you ever get that expensive power cable for your amp?

 

[KLINKDETROIT]

Re: Les Paul cavity plate. Hinder tone? Direct wiring better?

Not yet but I may if I can sell some stuff I have on the trading forum.