NGD - My First Les Paul .. and advise needed?

mrleon83

So, I did a trade last Sunday with a nice chap from my PRS to this Les paul!

https://imgur.com/a/NHYHgKy

I feel like I've struck lucky as it seems perfect .. so happy..

Anyhoo, my OCD is going nuts on the knobs! .. so do I get four top hats or four speed knobs? .. I kinda prefer to the look of the top hats but the colour of the speedy ones.. what do you think?

Also , it's been loaded with Bare Knuckle pickups, they seem super hot, so I'd be looking at maybe swapping these over with lower output pickups, unfortunately I have no idea what model they are, is there any way to find out? if anyone has some PAFy pickups they'd like to trade by all means get in touch..

Anyhoo, i'm super happy with this....

usedtobe

Knob wise, can you get a set of each? Shouldn’t cost that much in the scheme of things..? 

mrleon83

usedtobe said:

Knob wise, can you get a set of each? Shouldn’t cost that much in the scheme of things..? 

oh man, you're right I'm being stingy ! wis'd

terada

I’d go for top hats. 

Looks lovely btw, congrats!

relic245

I don't know the answer to your question but I like your guitar! Lovely colour. 

Enjoy playing it and don't worry about the knobs. Youll figure it out at some point. 

skullfunkerry

Personally, I'd go for the top-hats as I really don't like speed knobs... there might be some in a lighter colour you could get?

Great-looking guitar, congrats!

roberty

Nice guitar!  I prefer retro knobs but then I'm an old knob myself

FelineGuitars

I like the look of top hat/bell knobs but much prefer using speed knobs

mrleon83

cheers guys, it's weird how it worked we both were looking for something rather particular amazing when that happens... so on the lookout for light gold tophats... any ideas where is best to obtain them ? .. i've been looking but most places seem to be out of stock..

DannyP

Amber hats and Oil City Forces Sweethearts would be my preference (because that's what I've got!)

designerseye88

Love the top hat knobs, with regards to the pickups I have a pair of low output Mojo PAF's which are excellent. You'll find alot of pickup makers on here. If you describe to them what you want they would probably be able to suggest a set or even make one to your spec. 

mrleon83

designerseye88 said:

Love the top hat knobs, with regards to the pickups I have a pair of low output Mojo PAF's which are excellent. You'll find alot of pickup makers on here. If you describe to them what you want they would probably be able to suggest a set or even make one to your spec. 

good call, I'll probably need to sell the bareknuckle's first.. I'm not sure how I'd go about that  not knowing what they are.. I can see this being a trip down trying to get it as vintage accurate as possible.. Oh dear  :-)

timmypix

If you can get a multimeter reading, you should be able to ask Bare Knuckle themselves for some help identifying the pickups.

TTBZ

Top hats look better but I find speed knobs easier to adjust for whatever reason.

roberty

My multimeter was £9 on Amazon, does the job!

guitars4you

timmypix said:

If you can get a multimeter reading, you should be able to ask Bare Knuckle themselves for some help identifying the pickups.

measure them and chances are you can equate what they are by looking at the various specs on the BK web site

ESBlonde

Have you thought of lowering the present PUs in thier surrounds to reduce thier output? It's subtle but may surprise you. Although I too like low output PAF types so I understand your 'need'.

crunchman

guitars4you said:

timmypix said:

If you can get a multimeter reading, you should be able to ask Bare Knuckle themselves for some help identifying the pickups.

measure them and chances are you can equate what they are by looking at the various specs on the BK web site

The quick and easy way to do this is to just put a jack lead into the output and measure the resistance between the barrel and tip on the other end of the lead on the individual pickup settings.

Because of the resistance of the pots in parallel, the reading your multimeter gives will be very slightly low.  E.g a 9kOhm pickup will give a reading of 8.84kOhms with a 500k pot in parallel.  That's more than close enough to get an idea of what the pickup is so I wouldn't worry too much about the discrepancy..

If you are a pedant and want to be exact then the formula is here:

https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/resistor/res_4.html

Edit: Speed knobs are much easier to use

mrleon83

ESBlonde said:

Have you thought of lowering the present PUs in thier surrounds to reduce thier output? It's subtle but may surprise you. Although I too like low output PAF types so I understand your 'need'.

I'll give that a go, I'm waiting for some switch cleaner to come through from amazon as the pickup selector is rather noisy... it's a great idea, especially as I'm crap at soldering! 

hotpickups

I like the look of the top hats but prefer the speed knobs for functionality. 

Voxman

FelineGuitars said:

I like the look of top hat/bell knobs but much prefer using speed knobs

+1