Floating p90 Pickup by TK Smith?

[pingu]

Looks like Whit Smith added a cutaway to his vintage L5
no binding on it either !

Is that legal in the US ?

[Mike Anderson]

Looks like Whit Smith added a cutaway to his vintage L5
no binding on it either !

Is that legal in the US ?

I don't know Gibson history, but if that's what happened, holy cow...talk about not caring what purists think. Some might call it butchery and wonder why not get something else with a cutaway, loads of great vintage archtops to choose from, but there must be something about that guitar.

There are pics of him with completely unaltered L5s out there in the webosphere too, as well as one with a Super 400, so when I started seeing videos of Whit with that guitar (which seems to be his main if not exclusive one now) I thought it must be some rare but stock instrument! I can't argue with his tone or chops though.

[rabbit]

Can't find it (Youtube) but I remember Whit stating that he got the guitar in it's abused state.
On his site he describes another old and abused guitar he's acquired and is rehabilitating.

Whit strikes me as too smart to disfigure a great classic and wise enough to ignore
the weak cosmetics of a great player's guitar.

[Marty Grass]

I spent part of this afternoon in the shop of the guy who builds the current version of Heritage's floating pickup. While he has a "real" day job, he's been a winder for many years and is quite smart.

He wound a couple of pickups for me to try today on my Heritage Johnny Smith. One is a humbucker with 43 gauge wire on the bobbins that is overwound with alnico V magnets. It's almost impossible to know the resultant tone from the specs. So he taped it to his 1950s 175 near the neck. It sounded sort of like a BJB, which I find to be on the warm side of floaters.

The second pickup is P-90 inspired. The space constraints don't allow the true P-90 configuration. He used alnico V rod magnets centered in the coil that had 43 gauge wire that was overwound to give a 7.3 ohms read. He taped that near the neck of the 175. It sounds wonderful. It has that single coil sparkle with a solid midrange. There was the expected slight hum, but it was not noticeable while playing.

He's installing the P-90ish pup now and will let me try it out at home for a couple of weeks. If I want to swap to a humbucker or a lower wind single coil, he'll do it.

It's like having Kent Armstrong as your friend and neighbor.

[Mike Anderson]

Can't find it (Youtube) but I remember Whit stating that he got the guitar in it's abused state.
On his site he describes another old and abused guitar he's acquired and is rehabilitating.

Whit strikes me as too smart to disfigure a great classic and wise enough to ignore
the weak cosmetics of a great player's guitar.

Thanks rabbit for reminding me Whit has his own site, haven't looked at it in years. Yep, it's his "rescue dog" guitar as he puts it. And I found out Hot Club put out another album last year I didn't know about, and jumped on it, so more joy.

[neatomic]

I spent part of this afternoon in the shop of the guy who builds the current version of Heritage's floating pickup. While he has a "real" day job, he's been a winder for many years and is quite smart.

He wound a couple of pickups for me to try today on my Heritage Johnny Smith. One is a humbucker with 43 gauge wire on the bobbins that is overwound with alnico V magnets. It's almost impossible to know the resultant tone from the specs. So he taped it to his 1950s 175 near the neck. It sounded sort of like a BJB, which I find to be on the warm side of floaters.

The second pickup is P-90 inspired. The space constraints don't allow the true P-90 configuration. He used alnico V rod magnets centered in the coil that had 43 gauge wire that was overwound to give a 7.3 ohms read. He taped that near the neck of the 175. It sounds wonderful. It has that single coil sparkle with a solid midrange. There was the expected slight hum, but it was not noticeable while playing.

He's installing the P-90ish pup now and will let me try it out at home for a couple of weeks. If I want to swap to a humbucker or a lower wind single coil, he'll do it.

It's like having Kent Armstrong as your friend and neighbor.

good stuff mg

that 2nd pup is like leo fenders take on the p90..the jazzmaster pickup...used magnet polepieces instead of screws and bar magnet..great sounding underrated pups


enjoy

cheers

ps- you should tell him to try one with #42 wire..you'll get maybe to mid 4k-5k resistance..but the proximity of the magnets to the strings will still give it some power...and a clean wide open tone

[christianm77]

My god that thing sounds fantastic.

Eddie Durham vibes.