Low Z bass pickups

[jumbodbassman]

welcome david.  we look forward to your pickup knowledge.  I have seen some great reviews on your stuff. 

Jim

[Basvarken]

Hey David, any progress on the recreation of the Lo-Z Les Paul Bass pickups?

I got in touch with a Dutch pickup builder called Paul Hendrix.
I asked him if he could recreate these awesome pickups. He's studying them as we speak.

[dadagoboi]

enlightenment:

the bass pickup low z set that Greatdealz sells are original covers but the red bobbins that she sends with the covers are from the guitar low z pups and not the bass bobbins. turns out Les designed and Gibson wound the bass pickups without bobbins and potted them in the covers.

From both the picture and the drawing it appears to me the pickups DO have bobbins.  In the picture they look like clear plastic and in the section drawing they look like ][

[SGD Lutherie]

Hey David, any progress on the recreation of the Lo-Z Les Paul Bass pickups?

I got in touch with a Dutch pickup builder called Paul Hendrix.
I asked him if he could recreate these awesome pickups. He's studying them as we speak.

I had someone loan me a LP Triumph pickup, and an Epiphone Casady pickup. I haven't had much time to study them, but I will be getting to it soon.

Both pickups are pretty straight forward.

[SGD Lutherie]

From both the picture and the drawing it appears to me the pickups DO have bobbins.  In the picture they look like clear plastic and in the section drawing they look like ][

The top photo shows the coil wound directly around the magnet. This is fairy common for some older pickups to not use bobbins, like Burns Tri-Sonics. That was a prototype pickup made for Les Paul for one of his personal guitars.  But I think it was established here that the Triumph pickups did have some kind of bobbin.

The bottom illustration is for the LP Recording pickup, and that did use bobbins. They look like this:



That's a Triumph cover, but Recording bobbins.

[Basvarken]

I had someone loan me a LP Triumph pickup, and an Epiphone Casady pickup. I haven't had much time to study them, but I will be getting to it soon.

Both pickups are pretty straight forward.

straight forward?
eight leads coming out of huge stacked humbucker with absurdly thick wire inside a big oval black casing and weird chrome mount ring...

Wow, I wonder what your definition of "different" is 



(by the way: the JCS pickup is pretty lame IMHO)

[Pilgrim]

(by the way: the JCS pickup is pretty lame IMHO)

It sounds pretty darn good!  What do you see as its shortcomings?

[Basvarken]

Oh maybe I should have said tame.

In comparison to the original Gibson LP Sig it lacks authority.
The Electar just isn't there.

The Lo-z Gibson pickups have unsurpassed dynamics where the Electar sort of gets stuck at 80%


I'm glad I put a Gibson Lo-Z in it. It brings the JCS to life.

[SGD Lutherie]

Oh maybe I should have said tame.

In comparison to the original Gibson LP Sig it lacks authority.
The Electar just isn't there.

The Lo-z Gibson pickups have unsurpassed dynamics where the Electar sort of gets stuck at 80%


I'm glad I put a Gibson Lo-Z in it. It brings the JCS to life.

That looks great!  Is the rotary switch selecting the taps?  The early LP Sigs looked just like that.



The JC pickup isn't even the same as the real Les Paul Signature pickup, which used thinner wire and was designed by Bill Lawrence.

Hey, maybe your the guy that sold the Electar pickup to the guy that loaned it to me (along with a Triumh pickup)?

[Basvarken]

Haha that picture gave me the idea for this mod!
Yes, the rotary switch is the tone selector.

I don't think I'm that guy 
(I sold it to a fellow Dutchman)

[Pilgrim]

Oh maybe I should have said tame.

In comparison to the original Gibson LP Sig it lacks authority.
The Electar just isn't there.

Hmmm...fair enough.  One could suppose that the pickup sounds just the way that Jack wanted it to, since he evidently was very involved in its development.  Different strokes, and all that.

[Basvarken]

Yeah, it always puzzled me how Jack Casady wound up with this result after that much work 

[SGD Lutherie]

Haha that picture gave me the idea for this mod!
Yes, the rotary switch is the tone selector.

I don't think I'm that guy 
(I sold it to a fellow Dutchman)

This guy was in Sweden, named Victor.

[Basvarken]

He contacted me too! First he wanted an Electar and then he wanted a Triumph pickup

[SGD Lutherie]

He contacted me too! First he wanted an Electar and then he wanted a Triumph pickup

He got one of both from someone. I have both pickups here.