Pickup Replacement for Gibson L-5 CES

[silverfoxx]

Patrick2
Thank you for the information, I will ask for the African Blackwood
saddle you describe, having looked at the Guild Benedetto bridge assembly
more closely ,I suspect that it might also be African Blackwood? no grain and
highly polished. I will follow your suggestion and contact your supplier.


kind regards

[silverfoxx]

Kid335,

I think we are on the same page with this, I shall also follow
Patrick2 's suggestion and opt for the blank saddle , although
there have been a couple of other helpful suggestions too.
May I suggest that you also consider Jabberwocky's suggestion
anyway as an alternative for your ABR-1 bridge and change the
saddles on it to Nylon , or Graphtec as I suggested. You will notice
an appreciable reduction in string wear in addition to a different
(better?) tone.
IMHO you can't do better than asking a question here , I have
gleaned much from it on all sorts of issues.

[Ol' Fret]

One way to tweak the ABR-1 bridge, soundwise and visually (not too far away from the TOM design), is to adopt the upper part/saddle of the Teller No. 103 ebony bridge, which is sort of a "wooden ABR-1" design, to the original L-5 bridge base.
The post spacing of the Teller is about 2mm wider than of the ABR-1. You'll have to plug the post holes of the Teller saddle with ebony or any other hardwood plugs (or wood dust and CA glue) and drill new holes. It's easy to do...




The Gagnon archtop bridges are very well made also, but the diverse wood options are, IMO, a bit over the top. African Blackwood is, above all, more dimensionally stable (RH changes) compared to African ebony; that's why clarinet makers love it. The general density, stiffness and damping properties, etc., of ABW is not so much different from ebony; it all depends more on the selected piece of ABW, ebony or whatever wood, than anything else.

If you're looking for the "best" acoustic archtop guitar bridge (some German guys do... ), you could further reduce the weight of your bridge base and saddle, by using a routing cutter, and doing some further tweaking. This is no voodoo procedure...




Teller, AFAIK, does supply instrument makers and dealers only, though you can get, for example, the #103 bridge (ebony) on German Ebay for about $30.


Ah, before I forget it: Teller bridges are on the market for a longer time. The bridges they made in the 1950/60s were a bit smaller dimensioned than what they offer today. The actual #103 bridge demands for a common minimum height of one inch. Of course, it can easily be lowered, if necessary.

One tip for bridges using fret wire saddles: like with all frets on the FB they have to be checked for a perfect, full seat of the fret wire on the wood surface - which is certainly not always the case when you get a guitar from a regular set-up job...

[Hammertone]

That's very interesting to know that Guild sourced their bridges from Teller. During its Pre Fender history, Guild sourced many parts for their electric and archtop guitars from Europe including the signature harp tailpieces, adjustable metal bridges, and tuners. The saddle from #107 looks identical to the saddles on several of my Guilds but none have a two footed base. Guild are not known for neck elevation and angle to support such a tall base and mine from the 60s and 90s are all flat (full contact to body) bases such as shown in #240. Would you happen to know what years that Teller supplied Guild with bridges?

Mueller made their harp tailpieces
Mueller made their metal bridges
Teller made their wood bridges.
Van Ghent and Kolb made their tuners

I don't know the specific dates, but these are all distinctive-looking parts.

[Patrick2]

Hey kid335; be certain to take the depth of the saddle that Bill will be making for you into consideration. If it's too shallow, you'll have to really crank the thumb wheels up high to get to your desired action setting. That's not a good thing!! If it's too deep, it may not be able to be lowered enough before it bottoms out. That's not good either . . but, it would be very easy for a competent guitar tech remove some of the depth off of the bottom of the saddle.

Also, check your intonation on the guitar as it's currently set. If the intonation is good, take note of where the individual saddles are sitting . . particularly the B string. If you think you might want that saddle compensated farther at the B string (like Guild does it) then let Bill know that. Even better, if you believe the intonation to be as good as it can be, then take a good, detailed close up photo of the bridge and send it (email) to Bill before he makes your saddle. Once again, I would highly recommend African Blackwood over ebony.

[jzucker]

Don't have an L5CES, but play a similar Heritage Super Eagle. For what it's worth, I've always preferred Seth Lovers to the Gibson Classic '57s. I swapped to the '57s in a Les Paul to get more Gibson correct, and promply missed the Seths. I also swapped out the stock Schallers on my Heritage, which are supposed to be analogous to Classic 57s or SD 59s, for a Seth Lover. I just find the Classic 57's a bit dull, maybe it's the wax potting.

The 57s are a bit dull and I do believe it's due to the wax potting. If you listen to the 175 clip I posted recently of days and wine and roses, it actually sounds like the guitar is mic'd. In fact, several people mentioned that they thought it was a room mic and in fact, the recording was done direct with no microphone.

The newer guitars do not have this acoustic quality to the sound and I believe it's because the pickups are potted so you are only hearing the magnetic pickups and no acoustic quality.

[silverfoxx]

Can I point out that the VOS es175 '59 reissues have MHS. which I believe are unpotted pickups perhaps you can establish if that is correct? I recently acqured mine and believe that to be the case.

My L5CES 2014 has. Classic '57,s and as you will notice here , a number of owners attest that they suit this model

[Patrick2]

I like the '57s in my L5CES. They're just a bit hotter than I'd like them to be. For that reason I do like the SD Seths and the Schaller Golden 50s better. But, I'd not tamper with the originality of my 1994 L5CES just to achive what I hear as only a negligible difference.

What's MHS???

[jzucker]

the mhs humbuckers are what they're using in the historic series are are reportedly (no confirmation) unpotted, underwound pickups. The seth lovers are also unpotted I believe.

[silverfoxx]

The abbreviation by Gibson MHS stands for Memphis Historic Specification and is as near as dammit to PAFs.

[2bornot2bop]

Here's a 16" in African Blackwood Bill Gagnon made for me. Highly recm'd.

[Teddyfm]

Here's a 16" in African Blackwood Bill Gagnon made for me. Highly recm'd.

Do you think he will make me one? Its for my ongoing "Make my (lefty)Gretsh 6196 sound more like a ,dont laugh, L5". project.

Sorry for the hijack.

[kid335]

I actually spoke with my tech about the Graphtecs and it turns out that he stocks them. He set one aside for me and will install it next week when I bring my guitar down. I changed out the round wound DDs that came with my guitar for some TI flats and developed a "ping" on several of the strings afterwards. Not sure if it is coming from the nut or the saddles but my guy will be able to remedy it pretty easily.

[kid335]

Hey kid335; be certain to take the depth of the saddle that Bill will be making for you into consideration. If it's too shallow, you'll have to really crank the thumb wheels up high to get to your desired action setting. That's not a good thing!! If it's too deep, it may not be able to be lowered enough before it bottoms out. That's not good either . . but, it would be very easy for a competent guitar tech remove some of the depth off of the bottom of the saddle.

Also, check your intonation on the guitar as it's currently set. If the intonation is good, take note of where the individual saddles are sitting . . particularly the B string. If you think you might want that saddle compensated farther at the B string (like Guild does it) then let Bill know that. Even better, if you believe the intonation to be as good as it can be, then take a good, detailed close up photo of the bridge and send it (email) to Bill before he makes your saddle. Once again, I would highly recommend African Blackwood over ebony.

Hey Patrick,
I can't thank you and the others here enough for your solid advice. Since my tech is going to install some Graphtechs next week, I may ask him to take down some notes that I can send to Bill. Intonation on the low E string is one of the items that I am hoping can be improved from a basic set-up and saddle change. Right now the low E string actually hits the intonation screw when I move it into the position that should be just about perfect intonation. It may have something to do with the saddle being just about maxed out where it sits now. Basic stuff for a tech but would drive me crazy if I tried to remedy it myself.

[Jabberwocky]

This is what a Roger Sadowsky intonated-for-wound-G wooden saddle ($50 direct) looks like:



Edit: Yes, and wishing you speedy and full recovery from your surgery, kid335.

[silverfoxx]

Kid335,

Your description of the undesirable "ping" is exactly what occurred when I first put
TI,s ,12-50 on the L5CES and led me to replace the saddles with Graphtecs.
I ,and I'm sure other members, here will be pleased to hear of your opinions when you
acquire the new saddle from Bill Gagnon, I have emailed but expect a wait as I reside
in England (UK).

[kid335]

Hi Dave.
I acquired my new L5CES a year ago ,having been the top of my
must have list for 30 years, and it is all its cracked up to be.
Mine has Classic ;57s which suit the guitar very well, for me ,I did
consider an ebony bridge but discarded that idea and instead changed
the saddles only to Graphtec which reduce the undesirable metallic
"ping" with the standard ABR-1 bridge saddles. I tried a Wesmo side by
side with it, spoilt for choice , like Apples & Oranges I finally chose the
L5CES.
You can't go wrong with a Wesmo or an L5CES, IMHO. they are both the
cat's whiskers,( and I have a number of high quality archtops.)
I hope you enjoy yours,in fact I'll be very surprised if you don't !


kind regards

Bumping this thread to say that I had my tech install a Graphtec Resomax bridge top and saddles. He happened to have one laying around, so I was able to A/B it with the stock saddles. To my ear the Graphtec is a bit warmer but still sounds very much like the stock saddles. The intonation is definitely better and the "pings" are now gone. All in all, it was a definite improvement. Thanks for the suggestion.

[edh]

When you say "Graphtec Resomax bridge top and saddles" I see only the saddles?

[silverfoxx]

Hi Dave

I am glad you have managed to resolve the issue with the new bridge assembly,
are you stilling pursuing the AB bridge thru' Bill Gagnon? He has quoted prices
to me for either Ebony or AB and was pleasantly surprised ,expecting a
significantly higher asking price.

[teleman3726]

Randy Woods is going to do some minor work on my '34 L-5 and I wanted to ask him to install a floating pup in the process. Any suggestions from experience?

I'd love to throw on a D'Armond but can't find one; StewMac has one by Benedetto.

[rabbit]

It's your fiddle, but I'm a little uncomfortable enabling this sort of thing with a '34.

[icr]

If you ask me...

[neatomic]

monkey on a stick!!..as pointed out above^, new repro dearmonds available from cordoba/guild shop



cheers

[Longways to Go]

This is what my '34 L7 came with. A Bill Lawrence acoustic humbucker
installed who knows when . . .



This guitar came to me this way. It sounds fantastic.
In a perfect world, I wish it had a volume control, but hey, I'm not complaining.

[wintermoon]

Nice L7 longways, glad you like.
If you don't want to install a knob, just use a volume pedal.
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