Gibson ES-165 Herb Ellis with floating pickup

[TH]

I like the floater, it has a response to my fingerstyle touch that is unique.
But players who like the floater will have their reasons. They will tell you why their choice is better.
Players who like the set in will have their reasons. They will tell you why their's is the best.
They made two different types. You ought to try them both and trust your membership in one faction or the other based on your tastes.
I think...
David

[Longways to Go]

I'll bet you'll see more recommendations for the full size humbucker model.
If I was out shopping, that would probably be my first preference too.

But I am haunted by a 165 with the floater that I let slip away a few years back.
I didn't have much money at the time, so I didn't buy it, but I still remember how great it sounded and felt.
The only thing I didn't like was the big knob on the pickguard!

If another one shows up, it will definitely grab my attention, and probably my pocketbook too.

[vernon]

It seems to me that the benefits of a floater would be somewhat diminished in a laminate top archtop. I have a 175 with the set in pickups (which sound great), as well as a KA wound floater on a carved top Heritage Eagle. The floater + carved top work together to produce a more acoustic tone, while the set in pickups of the 165/175 + laminate top provide the characteristic thunk and feedback resistant tone. Both are great... you just have to know what you want and go for it.

[docbop]

It not which is better it what sound are you looking for? I personally like the humberbucker, but I already have a guitar with a floater.

[NSJ]

I like the floater, it has a response to my fingerstyle touch that is unique.
But players who like the floater will have their reasons. They will tell you why their choice is better.
Players who like the set in will have their reasons. They will tell you why their's is the best.
They made two different types. You ought to try them both and trust your membership in one faction or the other based on your tastes.
I think...
David

I have a Gibson laminate that has a floating pick up, it's a 1974 Gibson Howard Roberts custom oval hole. And I generally play finger style as well . I think this guitar is fantastic, especially after the refret I just had done ( thank you Max4605, I use the same gold EVO frets that were placed on his Johnny Smith, and the result is amazing, absolutely amazing -- guitar almost plays itself ).

I've generally heard that the set in Humbucker is the better version, but you've given me something to think about.

[Rob MacKillop]

You can get floating humbuckers...

[docbop]

You can get floating humbuckers...

Most the floaters easily available are Mini humbuckers and different sound than a floating full size humbucker. I recently went thru the quest for a full size floater and they are hard to find and expensive when you do. The early Epiphone and Gibson Howard Roberts models (and copies) had a full size floater. Peter Bernstein's Alden Zemaitis guitar I found out has a pickup from an old Howard Roberts guitar. The least expensive full size floater I found was Seymour Duncan Custom Shop, but they only make a full depth version not a thinner one like a Johnny Smith or the original Howard Roberts PUP.

[TH]

You can get floating humbuckers...

?
I don't understand this statement. But I agree, you can get them. The BJB that the 165 comes with is a really nice humbucker.
On the thoughts pertaining to the combination of laminate top with a mini humbucker...
I have a semi hollow Ibanez AM50 that I put a Johnny Smith bridge pickup on, screwed it to the top. Now many would say that defeats the purpose, but if you decide that the purpose of flour is to make bread, then yes, it's wrong. It ain't bread.
The purpose of a guitar is to create music. It's the chemistry of any particular instrument in an individual's hands to make music. Sure a laminate top guitar with a small mini humbucker is going to sound "unconventional". It's not bread, but it might just make a sound that allows you to be a better, more fully realized player. There's a variety of laminate types, there's a difference of sound qualities in terms of attack, sustain and decay.
See the two 165's as two points on the spectrum and weigh the differences intelligently.
Or am I in the wrong kind of bakery here?

David


One laminate guitar. Two types of pickups, and I'll be honest, I love the sounds of both. That's a Gibson PAF in the set-in position. I do use the floater more, but that's my love for the attack transients on that pickup.

[TH]

Most the floaters easily available are Mini humbuckers and different sound than a floating full size humbucker. I recently went thru the quest for a full size floater and they are hard to find and expensive when you do. The early Epiphone and Gibson Howard Roberts models (and copies) had a full size floater. Peter Bernstein's Alden Zemaitis guitar I found out has a pickup from an old Howard Roberts guitar. The least expensive full size floater I found was Seymour Duncan Custom Shop, but they only make a full depth version not a thinner one like a Johnny Smith or the original Howard Roberts PUP.

Absolultely right there docbop. The mini humbucker is a sound all its own and the pickup in the JS. I did get Duncan to wind me mini humbuckers for neck mount and pickguard mount. This was about 10 years ago and they went on a GB10 and a Guild AA. I dealt with MJ, and she was an angel. Seymore actually wound them for me and my certificate is signed by him, kinda neat.
Curiously enough, a friend got a full sized humbucker floater, not full depth, not thin, but also curiously enough he didn't like the sound. There was a lot of pull on that much magnet and it really accentuated any flaws in his technique... like a body mount guitar set too close to the strings.
I sold him my old Ibanez GB10 and he was thrilled with the results.
David

[Greentone]

Either Gibson Herb Ellis model is a nice guitar. For my tastes, I would prefer the set in pickup model, but I played the old, single-pickup ES-175 for years and years. (a 60s single humbucker model). You know, the ES-175 WAS the single-pickup guitar version from 1949-1971. If it had two pickups, it was technically an ES-175D.

The suspended pickup ES-165 is perfectly viable. As mentioned above, the laminated version of the Howard Roberts oval hole guitar, i.e., the _Gibson_ Howard Roberts, rather than the Epiphone Howard Roberts (that was a 60s guitar), featured a suspended Gibson humbucker and a laminated body. It was and is a great guitar.

As ever, play some examples if you can, and see what you like.

[sgosnell]

I think that whether a floating or set pickup is better is entirely subjective. It's what you prefer. Personally, I like the sound of a set humbucker and the interaction between the movements of the strings and the pickup vibrating with the top. But that's not the only valid opinion.

[ptchristopher3]

The world is weird.

Sure floaters were arguably designed to preserve the acoustic purity of some archtops.

Then we all loved laminated archtops.

Then they were sometimes not responsive to individual voices via the fingers.

Sooooooo,...

Yes a floater on laminate can seem historically odd.

But have you played one?

It could be just the perfect combination of an unflustered top and an expressive electric voice.

It happens. I have played both and was surprised by the floater 165. It makes no sense. But having boobs when not having an infant child make no sense either.

Sorry for the sexist caveman analogy, but it gets to the point most directly.

The guitar played with the forgiving (to my ham-fisted right hand) style of a laminate but had a voice that is hard to find in a fat HB top mounted PU.

Chris

[TH]

Hey why didn't they ever make an acoustic version of the L4C with a floater. Wouldn't it just make sense to have a niche in the spectrum for a 16" archtop that has the decay of a solid spruce top and the benefit of electronic output? For many years, the 16" guitar retro fitted with floating pickups was common. Is there one in the Gibson lineup like this? I've tried a student's L4C acoustic from the 50's. I think he put a D'Armond on it. It was a near perfect union.
Why hasn't this been done?

David

[lawson-stone]

Here's a fun comparison. On the right a hand wound Kent Armstrong 12 pole JS neck mount floater; on the left is the neck mounty floater on my Peerless Monarch. It's really close to being a full depth humbucker. And the tone is much more like a set-in pickup. This is a very chunky-thunky sounding Archtop to look so elegant and refined.



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[floatingpickup]

Hey why didn't they ever make an acoustic version of the L4C with a floater. Wouldn't it just make sense to have a niche in the spectrum for a 16" archtop that has the decay of a solid spruce top and the benefit of electronic output? For many years, the 16" guitar retro fitted with floating pickups was common. Is there one in the Gibson lineup like this? I've tried a student's L4C acoustic from the 50's. I think he put a D'Armond on it. It was a near perfect union.
Why hasn't this been done?

David

It has been done. Here's a recent L4C with a BJB pickup.
Keith

[Stringswinger]

Does anybody know if Herb Ellis ever played the floating PUP version?

[silverfoxx]

Hey why didn't they ever make an acoustic version of the L4C with a floater. Wouldn't it just make sense to have a niche in the spectrum for a 16" archtop that has the decay of a solid spruce top and the benefit of electronic output? For many years, the 16" guitar retro fitted with floating pickups was common. Is there one in the Gibson lineup like this? I've tried a student's L4C acoustic from the 50's. I think he put a D'Armond on it. It was a near perfect union.
Why hasn't this been done?

David

Could not agree more David , my late tutor Cedric West for years played an old late forties
or ealy fifties L4C with a De armond "on a stick pick up, The tone from it was absolutely
superb , unfortunately he sold it to another ex student just before he passed away.

[jazzbow]

If anyone's interested, shadow made Zoller humbucking floating pickup...

[vinlander]

Not sure if it was mentioned, but the floater also sits right at the base of the neck, that will obviously sound different than the set in location farther from the neck. Which one is better? the one that pleases the player the most of course

[Jabberwocky]

As does EMG, a fave of Ron Escheté's:

[lawson-stone]

Does anybody know if Herb Ellis ever played the floating PUP version?

Not sure- you know he went on to endorse Aria, so maybe not, I'm not sure.


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[Max405]

I had the one with the set in humbucker. I loved it and it sure is not starved for love at the current time.
But, I have had a secret crush on the floater 165 for a while now. Especially the tea bursty flame a mundo one that no disclaimer has for sale on this very forum. I've heard they tend to sound just a tad thinner than the set in model. That absolutely would not bother me at all. Every guitar has a different hot spot that I always enjoy finding. That guitar would be a very welcome addition to my wall.
The only downside would be the position of volume knob. But that is trivial and could be easily remedied..
Joe D

[Stringswinger]

Not sure- you know he went on to endorse Aria, so maybe not, I'm not sure.


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Lawson,

I first saw Herb live in the mid 70's and he was playing his 50's 175 that had been modified with a single Humbucker (He was playing through a Polytone mini-brute at the time)

I saw him use the Aria in the 80's (still through a Polytone).

I last saw him live in the mid 90's. He was using the ES-165 (and still was using a Polytone!) with the set in bucker.

Herb died in 2010 and due to Alzheimers was not performing in the last few years of his life. The model was modified to the floater version in 2004. I wonder how much input Herb had in that decision and whether he actually played the floater version.

I have played both versions of the now discontinued ES-165 and greatly prefer the earlier version. That said, I think the later version is a fine guitar and can see how some might like it's looks and sound better. There is no right answer to the "which is better" question about many guitars. Just as there is no right answer to the question of which is better between chocolate and vanilla.

[floatingpickup]

Lawson,

I first saw Herb live in the mid 70's and he was playing his 50's 175 that had been modified with a single Humbucker (He was playing through a Polytone mini-brute at the time)

I saw him use the Aria in the 80's (still through a Polytone).

I last saw him live in the mid 90's. He was using the ES-165 (and still was using a Polytone!) with the set in bucker.

Herb died in 2010 and due to Alzheimers was not performing in the last few years of his life. The model was modified to the floater version in 2004. I wonder how much input Herb had in that decision and whether he actually played the floater version.

I have played both versions of the now discontinued ES-165 and greatly prefer the earlier version. That said, I think the later version is a fine guitar and can see how some might like it's looks and sound better. There is no right answer to the "which is better" question about many guitars. Just as there is no right answer to the question of which is better between chocolate and vanilla.

Well said Stringswinger. My post about the built in pickup was really just about my personal preference, based on owning that version for a few years. Others may feel differently, and I am certain both models are fine guitars.
Keith

[PMB]

You can get floating humbuckers...

"... but you can't make them sink".

Can't really complain about my early '90s lefty 165 with a built-in pickup. Like some others here, I find the idea of a floating pickup on a laminate counterintuitive but I'd be curious to hear the results.