vpcnk

The other thing that nobody (including me) has even considered is the fact that if the old pots were linear taper and the replacements are audio taper, the 4-5 range on the new pots is about the same as the 1-2 range on the old ones. Since Gibson is notorious for using linear volume pots, that's a fairly likely scenario. vpcnk, do you know what the taper of those pots is?

that's interesting. the guitar tech at manny's music where i did the swap, had some no-name brand which had some marking as "cts" - which i hear is a reliable maker of pots.

not sure if it was linear or audio taper - would that have an effect in the loudness?

the gibson hawk i have was made in 1996 - would it have been linear taper?

but thanks for the pointer. i'm probably going to take it back to the shop and i'll ask them to check it out.

The other thing that nobody (including me) has even considered is the fact that if the old pots were linear taper and the replacements are audio taper, the 4-5 range on the new pots is about the same as the 1-2 range on the old ones. Since Gibson is notorious for using linear volume pots, that's a fairly likely scenario. vpcnk, do you know what the taper of those pots is?

btw i checked out the pots on the net - seems like current available gibson linear pots are only 300k. all 500k pots seem to be audio taper.

I agree they are being harsh.

try the 300K pots,

did you change the Cap as well?

My amp is insanly loud past 4, I allways use the guitar volume to level it out. Especially with my Super hot pickups.

no - i did not change the cap - if you mean the tone capacitator.

in an earlier thread i had asked if the cap too need to be replaced if the pots are being replaced - but i was told it was not necessary. so ...

hey i can understand that you can make anything work - on a relative level.

but my question was not about the pickups in themselves - but how they compared to the stock pickups/pots.

and my gibson ga-5 amp is as simple as it gets - it has only a single volume control and nothing else! so there's little confusion there.

the boom with the earlier setup existed even when i turned the volume up. the stock setup was significantly louder than the new one - so noticable that i felt the need to write about it here.

>You wasted your money on this one.

on which?

>Consider returning the guitar to stock.

the pickups or the pots?

appreciate the feedback.

Seriously, have you tried playing with the guitar wide open? That's the only way you'll ever know what your pickups sound like - turn your amp down if it's too loud. I've been playing for over thirty years, and I can count the times I turned my volume below 7 or so (while playing) on one hand. besides, since the noise level of your cables, pedals and amp is fixed (for any given situation), turning down the guitar is tantamount to turning the noise level up. Just my take on this - as always, YMMV.

i normally set the amp volume at 70% of the total volume so that i dont have to keep going back to it and adjust only the volume/tone of the guitar as i need it to be.

sorry guys i am quite new to the electric guitar - i played an acoustic for years - and so probably am not clear about the fundamentals.

actually i played it over the weekend and now feel that my initial reaction might have been a bit hasty.

yes the 'boom' is gone and the volume is lower - but the sound is clearer.

but if i raise the volume to 7 or 8, it is pretty loud.

and now i have clear sound distinction between the two pickups - the 59 and the jb.

if what crafty says is true regarding losing the lower end in the 500k pot, then i should say that the difference is very noticable between the 300k and the 500k pot - in terms of low end reproduction.

If you've got different pots in there the taper is bound to be a little different, the ramp in resistance change as you get close to zero.

It's not really normal, is it, to play live with vol set only at 2 or 3, well not for me anyway. It also sounds like the new pickups are maybe not as high output as the old ones. However, your amp is there for giving you volume, I certainly would not worry about this, but are you happy with the tone?

my concern was more about the loss of sound and volume. it used to sound full and thick - now it sounds weak.

can you elaborate more on your point about the pot taper being different. i thought that the 500k pots will open up the humbuckers than the stock 300k pots.

the seymour duncan jb and 59 are quite popular pickups and the gibson 490s are only moderate output pickups and not considered "hot" like the gibson 496 or 498 or dirty fingers.

btw what i mean is that the sound is now lower and weaker.

is this to be expect of sd pickups when compared to gibson pickups or is there something wrong with the installation?

i bought a gibson hawk a couple of months back. prior to that i already had a blueshawk with "blues" 90 pickups. when i got the hawk which had two 490R humbuckers the first thing i noticed when i plugged it in was that it simply "boomed". i dont know how to describe it - the sound was softer than the blues 90s - but it was louder and fuller. even with the volume set to 1 or 2 it was very audible.

but i wanted to improve on it. doing some research on the hawk i discovered that it used 300k pots. then i also heard about the seymour duncan jb and 59.

so off i went to a prominent shop in nyc and swapped the stock pots and pickups for 500k and sd jb and 59.

yesterday i got it back. i plugged it in. and the "boom" is gone. yes there's greater clarity but the loudness is gone. with the stock pickups even at the volume and tone set to 2 and 3, the guitar used to be loud. now to get the same level of sound i have to raise the volume and tone to double - 4 and 5.

what gives?

and i looked at the stock pots and pickups (now dismantled) - there's no indication as which model they are - 300k or 490R etc.

appreciate the feedback.

dont have a budget - but don't want to spend too much on it.

my current bridge is non-intonable - so anything intonable would be an improvement!

sorry if i am not being too clear.

but fire away with your opinion(s).

would like some options/choices.

i'm looking for a good quality wraparound intonable bridge.

nothing especially fancy - but a value for money bridge.

appreciate the feedback.

any idea whether all gibson factory installed humbuckers are two conductor wired?

what's the difference between 2 and 4 conductor wiring with humbuckers?

Construction-wise, there's no difference whatsoever - a 4-wire pickup simply has all four coil wires available, while a 2-wire has the coils jumpered internally. The extra two wires allow you to have switching options, like series parallel, and coil splits, or they can simply be tied together for standard humbucker functionality.

so if you're replacing them then can't 4 conductor wired humbuckers be used?

No, they're drop-in replacements - they'll just have to be wired up slightly differently.

but is there a case where a guitar was originally configured for 4 conductor wiring and then a humbucker with 2 conductor wiring will not fit in?

if the above is not true, then will 2 conductor wired humbuckers work as replacement in any humbucker guitar?

what's the difference between 2 and 4 conductor wiring with humbuckers?

apparently gibson factory installed humbuckers come with only 2 conductor wiring.

so if you're replacing them then can't 4 conductor wired humbuckers be used?

appreciate the feedback.

Any reason why you want to change the pots? A change to the pot value WILL change the sound the pickups output, because the electrical load of the pot effects the pickup is some rather complicated ways.

The pickup itself has a fairly high impedance that is very inductive, and a resistive load accross the pickup forms a "tone" circuit in itself. Changing the resistive load will change the nature of this "tone" circuit, and will affect the sound.

Guitars come from a factory with different values of pots because they come with different types of pickups. Generally, the pot should be matched with the pickup, so check the specs of the pickup to see what is recommended.

Of course, if the pickup is active, and has a pre-amp actually built into the pickup itself, then the loading effects of the pot won't affect the pickup coil, so any value can be used.

Steve Exton.

i plan to change both the pickups and the pots.

i want to install seymour duncan 59 and jb.

so ...

guys thanks for the feedback on the pots.

any similar suggestions regarding humbuckers?

appreciate the feedback.

i recently bought a gibson ga-5 tube amp on ebay.

when i plug in the guitar it seems to emit a kind of hum - more like a slight distortion.

then i plugged out the guitar alone (so the wire was still inserted into the amp) but the hum still persisted.

when i removed the chord, it becomes silent.

i have two chords - tried it with both and got the hum.

what's happening?

appreciate the feedback.

Are you sure you have full size humbuckers?

i only ask because the only thing i can find on them

shows they have P90's or slanted humbuckers.

the gibson nighthawk comes with a mini-humbucker and a slanted humbucker (and on the three pickup model, with a single coil as well).

the blueshawk comes with "blues 90s" - similar to p90s i guess.

but the hawk comes with two regular 490 humbuckers.

this is the one i bought on ebay recently :

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...A%3AIT&rd=1

'Buckers generally have 500k pots, so I'm pretty sure that is the case. I don't see why they would be long shaft on this guitar, so I'm assuming they're just common pots.

but even 500k pots seem to come in either long shaft or short shaft.

> If you're not happy with the intonation, you can upgrade to an intonatable bridge which will help, but it'll > still be a wraparound.

so are you saying that a wraparound can only be replaced with another wraparound?

not tune-a-matics which can replace the wraparound?

appreciate the feedback.

i've a gibson hawk which has a wrap around bridge.

first off i'm not very comfortable with the fact that the strings pass over on a piece of metal before they get to the frets. when i do bends etc i feel that the strings are scraping on the metal. also i feel that the tuning and intonation is bad with this bridge.

why did they design the bridge this way at all?

why pass the strings from the inside, wrap it over the bridge?

if the bridge were inverted then instead of wrapping it around, it would simply go straight to the fretboard, would it not?

so are my concerns regarding scraping, intonation valid?

and if i replace the bridge would it need any physical modification on the body of the guitar?

appreciate the feedback.

i'm trying to change the humbuckers and pots on my gibson hawk.

i decided not to do it myself and give it to a pro.

but i might have to buy the humbuckers and pots seperately - before/when i take it to the pro.

i see that there are short and long shaft pots.

and also humbuckers with different wire connection configurations.

without opening the guitar, is it possible to know what type of pot and humbucker the guitar uses?

appreciate the feedback.

i plan to change the 300k pots on my gibson hawk to 500k pots.

one of the earlier posts on pots mentioned capacitators as well.

do i need to change them as well?

if so, why?

and what should i look for in terms of power/measurement etc for the capacitator.

appreciate the feedback.

"+1 on the Duncan JB"

what does +1 mean here?

the sd 59 and the jb - do they have pickup covers on them or are they open?

that's the combination i have in mind too as replacements for my gibson hawk.

appreciate the feedback.

i've bought a gibson hawk and want to replace the humbuckers and change the 300k pots for 500k ones.

my question basically is how easy it is to replace stock pots/humbuckers?

i've never used a soldering iron before.

though i understand the concept having seen it in use.

with a soldering iron we can melt lead or some such soft metal and use the melted metal to connect two pieces of metal - like wires with metal etc - right?

so even if i have never done it before i guess i can experiment with it on some pieces of metal and gain a bit of expertise before actually trying it on my guitar.

i guess that the wiring on the guitar connect to the humbuckers and the pots.

so i would have to use the solder to disconnect the wires from the humbuckers and the pots and reconnect them to the new humbuckers and the pots.

and is there any issue in removing the old humbuckers and pots? are they connected physically to the guitar apart from the wires which connect them?

i checked with guitar center - they want 150 bucks to do this! sam ash wants 125! i think it is highway robbery! the lowest quote i could get was $70 for a midtown nyc used guitar shop.

but if it is not an easy job, i would rather spend the 70 bucks than screw up the guitar.

also i've only heard that the gibson hawk uses 300k pots. how can i identify if the pots are actually 300k?

also the usual prescription of 500k pots for humbuckers, does it apply to both volume and tone pots?

appreciate the feedback.

in harmony central, for gibson 490r humbucker reviews, one reviewer notes as to how the sound totally opened up when he removed the pickup covers.

if a metal pickup cover due to its natural quality (hardness, thickness) etc is a hindrance, how about a cover of other materials?

strat pickup covers seem to be plastic/nylon?

emg pickup covers seem to be plastic?

any ideas/suggestions of these?

my specific area of interest is humbucker covers.