Les Paul P90 conversion

DaiCapp

I have a Gibson Les Paul 50's tribute that plays beautifully but I have more of a need for a humbucker loaded guitar than a P90 loaded...

I'm pretty sure that I can't straight swap for humbuckers without a chunk of routing work which I don't want to do. Does anyone know if I could put in a set of Firebird or normal mini humbucker pickups without major surgery on the guitar...

Cheers

DC

OilCityPickups

Firebird or minis will drop straight in ... in the normal mini humbucker surrounds ...they were originally made by cutting the tops out of P90 covers anyway!

I quite like these

earwighoney

Creamery do some P90 sized (with the screws in the same position too) hum buckers

I saw on his FB he has a standard P90 sized Wide Range pickup to be released soon as well. 

OilCityPickups

The trouble with a Wide range design is the tone relies on the size of the bobbins ... which are much too large to fit inside a humbucker case, let alone a P90 one.The creamery use I believe two Telecaster neck size bobbins for the P90 humbucker. When you change the bobbin dimensions to fit the space, you change the tone ... it's physics.

earwighoney

TheGuitarWeasel said: The trouble with a Wide range design is the tone relies on the size of the bobbins ... which are much too large to fit inside a humbucker case, let alone a P90 one.The creamery use I believe two Telecaster neck size bobbins for the P90 humbucker. When you change the bobbin dimensions to fit the space, you change the tone ... it's physics.


Yep, the Creamery chap stated "Geometry dictates not an exact tonal replica but through testing, and testing I got close. A little brighter, a little more focused but true to the clarity & definition of the original."

Look nice from the picture though! 

Brize

Dimarzio also do some P90-sized humbuckers that will drop right in. I'd buy a set of Gibson mini-humbuckers though.

OilCityPickups

The Dimarzio ones are truly abysmal ... especially the almost 18k ones!

Depends what you want. Mini humbuckers are a different sound to Firebirds by a long way. 

DaiCapp

You guys are top drawer - many thanks. I loved the mini's in my old firebird but looks like there's a few options to explore

Danielsguitars

What about a stacked p90

darcym

how funny, I'm looking at doing the opposite and converting something from humbucker to P90.

either way, it doesn't seem to look visually right with small humbuckers, or big p90's