Upgrading pickups in Epiphone Inspired by Gibson 335

Starplayer91

I Recently got an Epiphone inspired by Gibson 335. Very well made guitar, can't get over how solid it feels for the money. I went into this with the idea of upgrading pickups and although they don't sound bad I'd still like to do it. 

I'd be interested to hear if anyone has upgraded the pickups in an epiphone 335 and if they much much of an improvement?

Specifically:  

What pickups work well in a 335?
Did you replace the wiring as well?  

Funkfingers

Low to medium output humbuckers work well in a -335 type guitar. 

The construction of the control wiring harness is such that the whole of it needs to come out just to change the humbuckers.

One cheat that will work is cutting the pickup output cables close to the baseplates, then, mounting replacement pickups via Seymour Duncan Triple Shot mounting surrounds.

TBH, if you are going to the time, trouble and expense of indubitably professional quality replacement pickups, they deserve to be hooked up to similarly high quality controls.

Heartwood

I have the same guitar, and ended up with Gibson 57 classics. Sounds great, much clearer and has a good vintage type sound. Also replaced the pots and wiring at the same time so how much of it is the pups or better/different pots is hard to tell. I know they use cts now, but there are different levels of cts. I can certainly tell a big difference overall.

There is a video by guitarista I think on YouTube who installed Montys, it also sounds great, just a bit more pricey than. I had in mind.

Starplayer91

Heartwood said:

I have the same guitar, and ended up with Gibson 57 classics. Sounds great, much clearer and has a good vintage type sound. Also replaced the pots and wiring at the same time so how much of it is the pups or better/different pots is hard to tell. I know they use cts now, but there are different levels of cts. I can certainly tell a big difference overall.

There is a video by guitarista I think on YouTube who installed Montys, it also sounds great, just a bit more pricey than. I had in mind.

That's good to hear, my only complaint about the guitar is the stock pickups are just a little too muddy and lack some top end. 

mark123

Here is that Guitarista pick up swap..a set of Montys pafs £280 alone before fitting and at the end he admits its "a little better but not night and day better".Also remember if you are getting someone to fit them you can stick on another £160 if you are lucky.

Heartwood

Starplayer91 said:

Heartwood said:

I have the same guitar, and ended up with Gibson 57 classics. Sounds great, much clearer and has a good vintage type sound. Also replaced the pots and wiring at the same time so how much of it is the pups or better/different pots is hard to tell. I know they use cts now, but there are different levels of cts. I can certainly tell a big difference overall.

There is a video by guitarista I think on YouTube who installed Montys, it also sounds great, just a bit more pricey than. I had in mind.

That's good to hear, my only complaint about the guitar is the stock pickups are just a little too muddy and lack some top end. 

That's actually what I was looking for too. If I were to do it again I'd do the pots/wiring upgrade, and see if it's enough. You can always snip the old pickups and splice the new ones in if it doesn't do it for you.

Funkfingers

Starplayer91 said:

the stock pickups are just a little too muddy and lack some top end. 

Try a set of stainless steel wrapped strings.

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

I have Seymour Duncan '59s in neck and bridge in my 335-a-like, and they sound great. Not at all muddy, nice and crisp and articulate kinda sound.

Svartmetall

A set of Iron Gear Rolling Mills if you want it punchy, or Blues Engines for a mellower sound. 

Funkfingers

Dontgiveupyourdayjob said:

I have Seymour Duncan '59s in neck and bridge in my 335-a-like, and they sound great. Not at all muddy, nice and crisp and articulate kinda sound.

I have an SH-1N '59 with A4 magnet swap in the neck position of my old Hamer XT Echotone Roland GK Controller beast.

Starplayer91

mark123 said:

Here is that Guitarista pick up swap..a set of Montys pafs £280 alone before fitting and at the end he admits its "a little better but not night and day better".Also remember if you are getting someone to fit them you can stick on another £160 if you are lucky.

I've seen this one but is there a massive difference between the Gibson and Epiphone anyway? I haven't played a Gibson 335  but the finish and build of the standard Les Paul's I've played aren't much better than the Epiphone. 

Seziertisch

mark123 said:

Here is that Guitarista pick up swap..a set of Montys pafs £280 alone before fitting and at the end he admits its "a little better but not night and day better".Also remember if you are getting someone to fit them you can stick on another £160 if you are lucky.

The construction and the output of both the Probuckers and the Montys are roughly similar so there was never going to be a massive change, relatively speaking. If the issue is that the style/type of pickup is not suited to the sounds you are looking for, then changing to something different will potentially give much more dramatic results.

Also, the Probuckers are no slouch, I’d even go so far as to say I prefer them to Gibson 490s or some of the higher output Burstbuckers for example.

Starplayer91

Made a quick demo of the current pickups. Do you think they sound dark/ wooly?



This is my first 335 semi so not sure if this design of guitar just naturally sounds a little darker/ wooly than a solid body or if it's the stock pups? 

For those who have changed the stock pups would you say it made a noticeable difference? I'm on the fence about whether to keep it and do the pups and electronics upgrade (making the total spend about £1000) or go all in for a Gibson 335. 

Love the build, feel for the money and would be happy if a pup and electronics upgrade made the difference. If not, I'd probably rather put the money into a Gibson. I know this guitar will never sound exactly like a Gibson but I'd be happy with the Epiphone if it were just a bit clearer with more top end as finish and build feels on par if not better than some Gibson USA's I've played. 

335 into Boss Katana 

Thoughts appreciated 

Seziertisch

It sounds fine. One person’s “warm and smooth” is another’s “dark and woolly”.

In terms of pickup upgrades there are other more affordable options out there other than Monty’s. Fletcher and Catswhiskers both come to mind. Contact them directly, tell them what you are looking for and they will advise accordingly. 

I recently put a Strat pickup (wound with heavy formvar) in HB format into the neck position on a Les Paul belonging to a friend of mine and we both loved the result. It matches perfectly with the PAF style pickup im the bridge, with both producing a lovely jangly chime. Both pickups were made by Q Pickups in Croatia, and again were very affordable. 

lovestrat74

I believe they come with CTS pots but from what I can remember,  changing the harness was a big improvement in the Guitarista vids.

I didn't realise there were "grades" of CTS pots. When you see CTS pots you automatically think, quality,  but obviously not...

Funkfingers

Starplayer91 said:

This is my first 335 semi so not sure if this design of guitar just naturally sounds a little darker/ wooly than a solid body or if it's the stock pups? 
 

335 into Boss Katana  

Have you tried the Epiphone guitar through any other amplifiers? 

nacnudnai

Don't underestimate the power of the used market for pickups. I'm spend an excessive amount of time and money buying pickups, and if you bide your time and keep an eye on eBay, Reverb, et al., you can find some bargains (I snagged some SD Custom Shop Antiquity humbuckers for £121, for example).

Tbf, your current pickups do not sound bad. But pickup swapping is a bit more than that - new pickups can noticeably alter the feel/response of your guitar and will interact with your amp differently. That's hard to convey with online sound clips, and it can be sometimes a challenge finding those pickups which are an ideal match to a specific guitar.

Regarding for a 335, I feel you could go two ways. One is the early PAF ('57 type) sound. Usual descriptors such as sweet, airy, woody, smooth apply. A good A2 set below 8K DC would do this nicely, and for that I would personally recommend a used SD Seth Lovers set. I much prefer them over 57 classics. There are tons of A2 sets around though that are fantastic, so my recommendation is purely personal preference and not to say they are the absolute best.

You could also go the T-Top route of the 60s onwards (DC ratings vary wildly, but A5 mags are the order of the day). Trebly, bitey and more aggressive. Some of the new 335s come with the Gibson "T-Type" pickups - personally, I don't like them. Bridge pickup is good, but I just cannot deal with the neck. For something at a great price, I would absolutely recommend the Oil City Scrapyard Dogs (not the pluses, though they kick ass too). I've tried them in a few guitars and I love them - plenty of bite but also super clear. Dimarzio 36th Anniversaries are good too, and pop up cheap. They are slightly darker than the Scrapyards, but they just work really well. The A5 pickup market is massive though, so loads of other good options too. 

Sorry for the essay, I am in bed recovering from surgery and need something to occupy my mind! My recommendations are based on being somewhat affordable used, I could easily have praised Monty's, Sunbear, Radioshop, OX4 and all of the other very talented UK winders out there.

Starplayer91

Moving towards the SD Seth Lovers. This guys seems to sound great in his Epi dot 

Petepassion

I had Montys PAFs and wiring/ pots and was a big improvement. But Tonerider are also a big improvement for a lot less money.

markj

mark123 said:

Here is that Guitarista pick up swap..a set of Montys pafs £280 alone before fitting and at the end he admits its "a little better but not night and day better".Also remember if you are getting someone to fit them you can stick on another £160 if you are lucky.

Thomson guitars charged me £50 earlier this year for changing pickups in my 345 and they were done the correct way by unsoldering not cutting the cables.

markj

nacnudnai said:

Don't underestimate the power of the used market for pickups. I'm spend an excessive amount of time and money buying pickups, and if you bide your time and keep an eye on eBay, Reverb, et al., you can find some bargains (I snagged some SD Custom Shop Antiquity humbuckers for £121, for example).

Tbf, your current pickups do not sound bad. But pickup swapping is a bit more than that - new pickups can noticeably alter the feel/response of your guitar and will interact with your amp differently. That's hard to convey with online sound clips, and it can be sometimes a challenge finding those pickups which are an ideal match to a specific guitar.

Regarding for a 335, I feel you could go two ways. One is the early PAF ('57 type) sound. Usual descriptors such as sweet, airy, woody, smooth apply. A good A2 set below 8K DC would do this nicely, and for that I would personally recommend a used SD Seth Lovers set. I much prefer them over 57 classics. There are tons of A2 sets around though that are fantastic, so my recommendation is purely personal preference and not to say they are the absolute best.

You could also go the T-Top route of the 60s onwards (DC ratings vary wildly, but A5 mags are the order of the day). Trebly, bitey and more aggressive. Some of the new 335s come with the Gibson "T-Type" pickups - personally, I don't like them. Bridge pickup is good, but I just cannot deal with the neck. For something at a great price, I would absolutely recommend the Oil City Scrapyard Dogs (not the pluses, though they kick ass too). I've tried them in a few guitars and I love them - plenty of bite but also super clear. Dimarzio 36th Anniversaries are good too, and pop up cheap. They are slightly darker than the Scrapyards, but they just work really well. The A5 pickup market is massive though, so loads of other good options too. 

Sorry for the essay, I am in bed recovering from surgery and need something to occupy my mind! My recommendations are based on being somewhat affordable used, I could easily have praised Monty's, Sunbear, Radioshop, OX4 and all of the other very talented UK winders out there.

I didn’t like the T tops in the latest version of Gibson Es335/345 either.
Swapped for a set of Sunbear 57PAF’s with A2 mags, they sound heavenly.