Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

I

Ivan.ddt

New member
Hi everyone. I have an SD Vintage Blues set customized with 4-conductor cables coming in in about 2 months time (don't ask me why...) to be put in a bone-stock (pickups, PCB pots and all) Gibson Les Paul Tribute with Humbuckers. In Cherryburst of course. I use it mainly as any Les Paul owner would for a full, thick and powerful sound for blues-rock, classic and hard rock, sometimes going into old-school metal like Metallica.

My question would be: If I want to have the option to sometimes get in the ballpark of a Strat neck pick up tone, what kind of wiring configuration should I go for? I was thinking all 500k pots (linear for the tones, audio for the volumes), 0.47uf tone cap, with coil-splitting push-pull for the neck screw coil and bridge slug coil. Anyone with experience coil splitting and parallel wiring on 59Ns in Les Pauls? Vintage or modern wiring? I'm looking for a more 'woody', 'spanky' sound like Jimi Hendrix/ SRV.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

You won't really get the sound of a Strat by splitting your humbuckers the way you describe.

But splitting the coils the way you describe is still the simplest method to get you as close as you can get, using what you have to work with.

I'd install push/pull tone pots to split the coils.

The sound will be weaker and thinner than a Strat when you split the coils.

But that's still the way most folks do it to get "close".
 
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Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

I would add that a switch to make your neck humbucker parallel instead of series might get you close to what you're looking for too. The effect is in the same ballpark as coil splitting, but the pickup will still be noise canceling.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

My Les Paul is wired with Jimmy Page wiring and a Custom/59 set. While no one would mistake the split 59 for a Strat, it's a nice contrast to the full neck. (Brighter and lower output so you get less distortion and chimier tone). Both split with phase switch pulled and messing with the volumes can get a little bit of a quack, but again it's no Strat 2/4.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Ivan.ddt said:
Hi everyone. I have an SD Vintage Blues set customized with 4-conductor cables coming in in about 2 months time (don't ask me why...) to be put in a bone-stock (pickups, PCB pots and all) Gibson Les Paul Tribute with Humbuckers. In Cherryburst of course. I use it mainly as any Les Paul owner would for a full, thick and powerful sound for blues-rock, classic and hard rock, sometimes going into old-school metal like Metallica.

My question would be: If I want to have the option to sometimes get in the ballpark of a Strat neck pick up tone, what kind of wiring configuration should I go for? I was thinking all 500k pots (linear for the tones, audio for the volumes), 0.47uf tone cap, with coil-splitting push-pull for the neck screw coil and bridge slug coil. Anyone with experience coil splitting and parallel wiring on 59Ns in Les Pauls? Vintage or modern wiring? I'm looking for a more 'woody', 'spanky' sound like Jimi Hendrix/ SRV.
Click to expand...

Sell the 59n and put in a StagMag with Triple Shot Pickup Ring or Push-Pull Pot
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Just get a Strat. If you really want that quack, there's no substitute for a Stratocaster. I have a LP with Page wiring too. Split coils just don't sound quite the same.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Split won't do it, parallel is probably your best bet. I have 59s in triple shots on my LP Standard. But it still won't sound like a Strat neck Pup.


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Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

thebingopete said:
Just get a Strat. If you really want that quack, there's no substitute for a Stratocaster. I have a LP with Page wiring too. Split coils just don't sound quite the same.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

I have been playing a Les Paul since 1979. I been through it all, in this pursuit. A Strat was not an option to me. I do not like the body shape and the neck radius. I also have a very limited call for that tone, so to waste money on a guitar that I will play very little (had a start for 4 years, didn't get much love). So I understand the OP's quest.

I finally accomplished it with the above modified LPJ.

If it is just the neck tone he is after, the Stag Mag split is gonna do it. It also sounds like a great LP neck pickup in humbucker mode.

The quack will only happen with the physical middle pickup!!
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Les Pauls have bloody 4 knobs. Put a master spin a split in. Adjusting the split on the neck pickup mismatches the output of the coils and makes them quack without too much of a volume drop. You'll also get more sounds out of your middle position. If I had an LP, I'd wire it either with 2 volumes, master tone and master spin a split; or master volume, master tone, master bass cut, and master spin a split.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Master spin-a-split as in dual ganged for each pot? A concentric pot, one for each pickup could be good.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

In addition to all the above, I've found the best Strat quack I could get out of a Les Paul was when I put the pickups out of phase with each other in the middle position, and rolled the volume of one of the partway down, so they were not equal parts out of phase. Also does reasonably well with both out of phase and split to slugs. Gets a kind of Mark Knopfler / Sultans of Swing tone.

Hotter humbuckers work better for this - this is one case where a JB (or equivalent output pickup) in an LP really helps, the volume doesn't drop hardly split to slug and combined out of phase in the middle position, it cleans up for Strat-like sounds perfectly.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

beaubrummels said:
this is one case where a JB (or equivalent output pickup) in an LP really helps
Click to expand...
JB split to slug coil is great. I came this close ->||<- to mentioning a 59/JB hybrid; except that a lot of you have panned it in the past.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

I bet the DiMarzio Transition set would work pretty well.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

You can absolutely make a Les Paul sound like a Strat. You will need: 3 250k pots, a five-way switch, 3 single coil pickups, a pickguard and backplate, a tremolo bridge with tremolo arm, a Strat neck with tuners and a neckplate, A strat body with input jack and springs in the spring cavity, and possibly a Fender sticker to put on the headstock. Switch all these parts out with your Les Paul parts and you will nail the Stratocaster tone.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

One of John Mayer's new PRS guitars is loaded with bridge and neck HB pups. No push pull pots that I could see in use (big screens were close up on him a lot with Dead Co this summer). It had a very Stratty tone somehow. Research his current rig and you may find a solution.

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Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Get a humbucker that has Alnico rods in both coils (StagMag) or just one coil.
 
Re: Les Paul Wiring for Strat-like Neck tones?

Zhangliqun said:
Get a humbucker that has Alnico rods in both coils (StagMag) or just one coil.
Click to expand...

So to make a humbucker sound more like a single coil you have to compromise the humbucker so that it no longer sounds like a classic humbucker.

Ridiculous.

As long as I've been playing guitar, about 50 years, people have been wanting some magic mod to make their Les Paul sound like a Strat.

IT CANNOT BE DONE!!!

The solution is to own both a Strat and a Les Paul. That's the only solution without serious compromise.
 
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