Trying to match the sound of something.

Anyone know of a pickup that is close to a set of Gibson Super Humbucker type 3s? They were made with indox 7 magnets and came in the L6-S back in the 70s. I can't find any info on indox 7 to try and match it to a more modern magnet, though. All I know is that Indox 5s were the equivalent to Ceramic 8 and that Indox was produced solely by Indiana General Corporation.

I'm trying to get something close because I've got a guitar coming next month that's a match for the L6, aside from a bolt on neck and the fact that it wiring is a standard 3 way. I want to try putting together an L6 wiring setup as my first real work and I figure I may as well try and get a similar sound if I'm gonna put together a more complex circuit.

Oh, and one final thing I think I remember hearing about these. They were supposedly wound with 1 bobbing at about 6k ohms and the other at about 3.3k ohms. I think.

I tried checking ebay for tarbacks and they do have three, but they're $220-$300 and no guaranteeing that they're the right type.

The Gibson L6-S was Bill Lawrence's baby.

Contact him and I'm sure he could give you a bunch of info on it.

I'm a big fan of the L6-S shape, but not the maple body so I whipped this up a few years ago. It's mahogany and sounds just like an SG.

http://i914.photobucket.com/albums/ac345/Telenator/L6-S%20Project/aL6-SProjectIII010lo-res.jpg

http://i914.photobucket.com/albums/ac345/Telenator/L6-S%20Project/aL6-SProjectIII036lo-res.jpg

http://i914.photobucket.com/albums/ac345/Telenator/L6-S%20Project/afL6-SProject007lo-res-1.jpg

Ah, was afraid I might have to. Biggest problem for me is finding similarities between an old mid-range guitar an newer cheap pickups. It i really hard to get a job that's willing to work around your school schedule.

Marauder too maybe?

I don't want to run your party down but as far as I loved my old L6-S I can't remember any positive thing about the pups. They sounded lifeless and bland. The rotary selector was kind of interesting though. Finally sold the guitar and I still wonder if a pickup swap would have done justice to this nice guitar... It was long ago and since then I've realized that maple guitars with ebony fretboard have that something special I don't like for clean sounds.

I don't want to run your party down but as far as I loved my old L6-S I can't remember any positive thing about the pups. They sounded lifeless and bland. The rotary selector was kind of interesting though. Finally sold the guitar and I still wonder if a pickup swap would have done justice to this nice guitar... It was long ago and since then I've realized that maple guitars with ebony fretboard have that something special I don't like for clean sounds.

Mine's my '75 Midnight Special. I changed out the bridge in the early '80's, the neck is original. My pickups were/are very wide range and sounded bad in the bridge and great in the neck.

http://i914.photobucket.com/albums/ac347/studioguy457/mid-spec.jpg

Well, can anyone recommend a set of, let's say, inexpensive pickups that would sound nice together when put through the 6 way switch?

For those unaware, it's:
Both parallel, both in series, one, the other, parallel out of phase and series out of phase.

Preferably something without adjustable poles. I really like the smooth look on the stock ones. Or, if there are adjustables, preferably one of the weirder looking sets.

I'd go for a set of 2.8H/4H, or 4H/6H Twin Blade (AlNiCo V) L90's for the L6-S. Call Bill & Becky at Wilde in the vendor list to ask which is best suited for the L6-S. Accept for something like the L500 and a few others, Wilde PUP's generally have a wider "Q factor" than most Hi-Z PUP's. That produces smoother, less exaggerated upper mids/highs which can be interpreted as "flat", or "sterile" when compared with the average Hi-Z PUP. With it's softer attack and richer mids/highs, the L90 is just the improvement the L6-S should need over the "harder" sounding Gibson SH PUP's.

I have the same issue with Maple bodied guitars. The type of Maple makes an enormous difference. Rock Maple is very dense and not very elastic. Sugar Maple is about the weight of Mahogany, but less elastic. Big Leaf Maple is lighter than Alder, but has good elasticity like Alder. I think The L6-S may have been made with Big Leaf Maple. The neck had a special lacquer/pressure/time treatment for increased rigidity and long term stability. I can see how an Ebony FB may have been a bit too hard sounding, particularly with the Gibson SH PUP's.

Bill Lawrence, designer of the L6-S and its electronics, reissued the Super Humbucker design as the L80 2-3 years back with much higher production standards than Gibson had. If you call Wilde and ask nicely, they might be able to do something for you, and you'll have better results than with the original!

I tried to email them and ask which kind of pup would match the old super humbucker but they haven't gotten back to me, thus far. And thanks, Narcoleptigon, I'll look into those. I'm not actually sure what wood my guitar's made out of since it seems impossible to find much info on Encore guitars except for two youtube videos put out this year and some info on a couple strat clones they had way back.

If T. Wilkinson did the PUP's, they are probably very good. I guess he was involved with Encore. I'd try it out before you spend a lot of money upgrading. The main thing is to use a cable of the right capacitance to get a sweet sound from the PUP's.

You can set up a similar wiring with 5-way Super Switch, and you won't have to route for a 6-way. HOoP (Half-Out-of-Phase) sounds much nicer than full OoP. Just skip the series OoP option. It's just loud, tinny mid-range. Maybe you can do an outer, or inner coils in series instead of the standard parallel option? It would be more consistent in tone/output with the other options, and more defined sounding than both PUP's in parallel. The only louder setting would be both PUP's in series. You might opt to just tap one of the neck, bridge coils for the series option. For a well balanced PUP set, tapping just one neck coil would be more of a bridge tone, while tapping one bridge coil would be more of a neck tone.

I can't wait until I actually get my hands on the damn thing. It's sitting in the back room at Guitar Center right now and it's on layaway for another 3 weeks.

And a pic, because I haven't put one in this thread.

http://www.vintageguitars.net/images/products/107362262_el.jpg

Oh, it's got a Gibson Toggle. Guess you'll want the 6-way switch, then. Make sure you get a decent one so it doesn't snap off on you. Can't help you with that. One of the best things you can do for tone is make sure the bridge is quality. Again, Wilkinson hardware may be just fine -- as long as it's not zinc. Gotoh is good cheap stuff: Aluminum for nice bright sweet resonance, brass for a darker sustain, stainless for a more metallic sustain. You could also replace the tailpiece with Aluminum for a little more bass resonance (less body damping), but that's a more subtle improvement. The L6-S also had one volume and a bass and treble...whatever works for you.

Yeah. Looking for compromises on the wiring, I wasn't sure if I really needed the mid boost or if I should keep the independent volumes. Even if I can find a nice setup, it'll probably be like this for a good while because I've never even handled a soldering iron before. Once I get my insurance payment made for my motorcycle, though, I'm considering buying the starter kit from BYOC that comes with the booster, as something to practice with.

Wow. That's a good looking iron in that kit. I wish I had known about them. I just ordered another iron. It's good to start with quality tools. Not sure about the quality of the Confidence Booster preamp. It's mostly in the quality of the included IC. An engineer I know says IC's often have slew rate issues. No doubt some are better than others. AFAIK, all IC's clip harshly. Not an issue if you don't overload them, but may sound horrible as the battery starts to die. You'd also need to consider capacitance and resistance load on the pickup before the preamp, so the signal isn't too bright, lacking in "bite", or whatever. Those issues can be reasons not to bother with an on-board buffer.

I was gonna throw the booster into a little cigarette carton or something. My mom smokes some vanilla cigs that come in a nice looking gold box and I think there'd be enough room for everything in one. If not then I can find something else that looks nice enough.

Yeah. It's should be a fun project. Definitely worth doing. Maybe it will sound just fine. If you make use of it, bear in mind that it's the cable before the first preamp that provides the C (Capacitance) load on the PUP's, which in turn tunes the resonance. If the Booster is a "true bypass" device, the C of cable before the next preamp will ad with the C of cable before it when it's bypassed.

I don't actually own any pedals, so I'd only really have another 6 inches of cable in the chain. Being both cheap and poor I'm not looking at anything expensive and the local GC doesn't actually have any of the cheap danelectro pedals in store for me to try out.

I have a Seymour Duncan Custom V in the bridge and a '59 at the neck. I bought the plain covers from AllParts. Gives the guitar a vintage look.

I love these pickups for that classic 70's rock sound.

I don't actually own any pedals, so I'd only really have another 6 inches of cable in the chain. Being both cheap and poor I'm not looking at anything expensive and the local GC doesn't actually have any of the cheap danelectro pedals in store for me to try out.

I wasn't suggesting to get any pedals. I was just drawing attention to how cable C tunes the circuit resonance. If you use a 6" cable before the Booster, you may find the sound to be like an acoustic guitar: very smooth extended highs, which can lack definition in certain scenarios. If you use the 6" after the Booster, it should be fine. Ultimately, the idea is to tune the bridge PUP to a certain frequency with the cable. That's why it's good to know the inductance of the pickups.

Yeah, the idea was to just put the booster on top of the amp, next to the handle or something, and run my usual cable to the booster, then a short one from the booster to the amp. The not owning any pedals thing was just to say that I'd only be using the 2 cables, not putting more and more in series. I mostly understand how this stuff works. Kinda. Actually posting this while my teacher discusses inductance in my electronics class.

Well, finally got the thing today and it sounds great. Not sure if it's quite the same as the original, but it's definitely a lot louder than my telecaster.