Here is a pic of my 1972 SG Special:
Notice to the left of, and slightly below, the selector switch there are two perfectly circular shapes in the wood.
I'm wondering if, at some point, a previous owner had a couple of mini-switches installed.
Or would these have possibly been done at the factory for installation of some electronic gubbins that were later removed (or not installed at all!)? I recall Gibson had a bit of a penchant for installing compressors and such in various guitars in the 70's...
Either way, they're quite well-disguised, with a good colour match to the rest of the guitar.
Another thing is that, between the bridge and the mini-humbucker, there is a rectangular fillet of wood that doesn't match the surrounding wood very well.
My guess is that at some point it's had a replacement pickup, possibly a full-size humbucker, and then been returned to standard spec.
I'd be interested to hear any alternative theories, or indeed confirmation of my guesses.
I should add that I bought this second-hand a couple of years ago, and have no provenance or proof of originality, but if I ever sell it I want to be sure I'm not misrepresenting anything.
TIA for any responses
Comments
I'm picturing someone who wanted an Alembic but really liked the feel of their existing SG...
The fillet is odd though - if they put full sized hum buckers in, where are the screw holes for the rings? If the rings were within what is now fillet, why fill in such a big fillet? Iyswim...
I don’t recall any SGs with onboard electronics, maybe because they were too thin, but then there was a great deal of butchery going on back then...
The rectangular repair next to the mini humbucker is of the correct size to have been a rout extension to accommodate a P90 or a mini-humbucker mounted via a P90 surround.
The large fillet behind the pickup will include where the extra screw holes were, probably because the hole was routed/chiselled quite crudely and that was the easiest way of making a neat job of repairing it.
What's it like at the neck pickup?
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Maybe it's just because I lived through the 1980s as a guitar repairer, but I find it amazing anyone doesn't recognise this!
If the neck pickup was always a single coil I would guess a coil-split or series-parallel for the bridge pickup, and a phase switch.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
@ICBM I just had a close look around the neck pickup, and there is no visible sign of any sort of interference. Mini at the neck and full-fat at the bridge?
@Philly_Q it is quite a tidy job, thank you - whoever did it matched the finish really well. Unless of course the whole guitar has been refinished!
*edit* I haven't looked inside recently and I can't remember what the wiring looks like, but I'll take the cavity cover off later and have a look.
You see filled mini-switch holes from that era everywhere if you look closely - commonly on Les Pauls between the knobs, SGs where yours are, Strats in various places... push-pull switches were not easily available and it wasn't thought wrong to drill holes in old guitars!
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
What you have thee is quite a mild 'mod' :-) So many poor Fenders got brass scratchplates, clunky brass bridges etc, DiMarzio even did replacement twin humbucker Strat bodies ... there was very little respect for the 'vintage'.
In a way the large pile of vintage pickups we had kicking around in our workshop was the inspiration for me doing what I do now ... I took them apart, measured them and worked out what made em tick.
Formerly TheGuitarWeasel ... Oil City Pickups ... Oil City Blog 7 String.org profile and message
I took the pick-guard off to have a look underneath, and discovered some crudely-engraved names etc. I made out the name "P Hudson", an address "Wigan Rd Leigh", the word "Raven" and a picture of a bird with an olive-branch in its beak. There was also, in the space that was left, the name "C Curbishley" and the band name "Fat Chance" and some other bits I couldn't make out.
Wigan Road, Leigh, is about 3 miles from where I live. A week or so later I was relating all this to a couple of mates in the pub, when one of them says "P Hudson? That could be Huddy from Leigh... I'll ask him if he remembers it".
Long story short, last night Huddy was here cradling his SG that he was given as a teenager in 1983 - his first "proper" guitar after learning on the usual suspects. He showed me a couple of pics of him playing it on stage at the age of 15, in his band "Raven".
It looked a slightly lighter shade of brown, but I'm putting that down to the age of the photos - he confirmed it had always been brown, not cherry faded out.
It was he who took a drill and chisel to it, to install a DiMarzio Dual Sound humbucker (good call, @ICBM ! ) with the associated switches.
The look on his face was absolutely priceless!