2006 MIK Epiphone Broadway - This is getting to be a problem...

[rolijen]

Hey Roli… don’t you have a nicer natural now to play with? ??
jk

Indeed I do! Thank you, jk, for making it possible! I’m working on an NGD post about it. Suffice it to say, it is the pinnacle of what a natural, two-pickup Gibson archtop can be. Side by side, there is no comparison between these two naturals.

Here is a teaser photo (I’ve been playing for 47 years and the guitar on the left is without equal. It’s easily the nicest Gibson I’ve ever owned and the fulfillment of a very long quest). NGD post coming soon.



Roli

[Little Jay]

Per Little Jay’s suggestion, I replaced the gold pickup ring mounting screws with black and it looks a lot better.

Attachment 101061

Yesss!! It does look much classier!
The devil is in the details…..

[Little Jay]

Indeed I do! Thank you, jk, for making it possible! I’m working on an NGD post about it. Suffice it to say, it is the pinnacle of what a natural, two-pickup Gibson archtop can be. Side by side, there is no comparison between these two naturals.

Here is a teaser photo (I’ve been playing for 47 years and the guitar on the left is without equal. It’s easily the nicest Gibson I’ve ever owned and the fulfillment of a very long quest). NGD post coming soon.



Roli

Oh wow!! Gongratz!!

I am eagerly awaiting the comparison now ;-)

[RyanM]

Where did you get the pickguard? I want to put the same one on my Broadway.

is any tailpiece like that going to be a drop in replacement?

[lawson-stone]

I agree fully. But these pickups sound really bad. Since I’ll be doing the work of replacing them, I’ll put in CTS pots and a Switchcraft jack and switch. I’ll grab a few capacitors from my parts bin and experiment. I like the non-linear volume drop/treble attenuation inherent in the old Gibson circuit, so I’ll use that.

At first I put a Seymour Duncan Seth Lover in the neck slot of my MiK Broadway, but then I replaced it with the much cheaper StewMac PAF and was delighted with the sound. The StewMac PAF is half the price and is a very fine pickup.

[Little Jay]

At first I put a Seymour Duncan Seth Lover in the neck slot of my MiK Broadway, but then I replaced it with the much cheaper StewMac PAF and was delighted with the sound. The StewMac PAF is half the price and is a very fine pickup.

I had a similar experience with my MIK Sheraton: Seymour Duncan 59s did not cut it at all in that guitar! The StewMac Golden Age buckers I replaced them with do a much better job! The fatter mids of that pickups work well, the scooped SDs probably do a great job brightening up a dark sounding Les Paul, but in the all maple Sheraton they actually sounded worse than the stock pickups….

[TAA]

#54/Ryan,

i bought that same pickguard for my L-5C this past summer. Never used it. Thought I would be able to use it in a slight modification when adapting a single Johnny Smith pickup but there wasn’t enough room fir the U-bracket under the fingerboard, so that project died!

Bought it on line, about $80. It has the same gold bracket as seen in the two guitars in the photo. The protective film, that is eventually removed, is still on the pickguard.

Tom

[rolijen]

Where did you get the pickguard? I want to put the same one on my Broadway.

is any tailpiece like that going to be a drop in replacement?

The pickguard is a very good reproduction, made in Japan and sold by Allparts. Here is the link.

Be very careful cutting or drilling this tailpiece as it is very brittle. Some of the binding may come off as you cut out the notches for the pickups. Super glue works great if that happens. Slow and steady wins the race.

That said, I’ve used this exact pickguard on at least 4 repairs/upgrades in the last several years and each has turned out beautifully. It’s a high quality part. Not as nice as some of the best custom-made repro guards, but way nicer than the ones in the same price range. The current price for black is just over $80 and just over $100 for tortoise.

Allparts also has a Gibson-style pickguard bracket for around $20 in gold. It looks very close to the Gibson part but has a domed, “acorn” nut on the outside where a genuine Gibson has a flat nut. Apart from that small difference, the Allparts bracket looks and works fine.

The tailpiece is a basic eBay special. There are many options like this. And, no, it was not a drop-in replacement. I filled the original tailpiece mounting holes and drilled new ones for the new tailpiece. The tailpiece has been rock solid and a dream for string changes (unlike the E, A, and D string length challenges with the Epiphone Frequensator tailpiece).

Good luck on your project.