[Smolder]

Hi Guys...

I loaded a pair of (new to me) dimarzio's into a les paul clone that I have. Last night I took it to jam practice. I did follow guidelines from discussions here regarding string to pickup distances of 10/64 and 14/64th. I was a little surprised by the results. The musicalness of my playing seemed seemed secondary to the other stuff... fingers and pics hitting strings etc. Also... with even the slightest bit of dirt everything turned gravelly and kind of nasty.

details... fender twin with post alembic mods... half power, single d120. This is exactly the same rig that I regularly play my les paul with jmrolphs through and it is silky smooth. The les paul copy in questions is a solid mahogany with no maple cap. I'm told that the maple cap is what allows les paula to handle hotter pickups... and that a mahogany slab requires pickups in the 7.8 or lower range.

Is this configuration this finicky? Does it take a while to get used to the super distortion (dual sound actually) pickups? Any help or insights would be appreciated.

[strumminsix]

I find mahogany guitar bodies to be more finicky than others. Not a preference for me.

That said, I'd use those measurements as a starting point and play from there. And no, I don't think a maple veneer across the top will really brighten things up enough to overcome the odd mid honkiness of mahogany. Again, my opinion.

[Smolder]

I find mahogany guitar bodies to be more finicky than others. Not a preference for me.

That said, I'd use those measurements as a starting point and play from there. And no, I don't think a maple veneer across the top will really brighten things up enough to overcome the odd mid honkiness of mahogany. Again, my opinion.

Thanks strumminsix. I've moved lots of pickups between my maple top les Paul and the SG... But nothing close to 13/14k. The SG seems to favor lollar low winds and T-tops.

[tcsned]

I have a 78 Les Paul that someone had put DiMarzios in before I got it in 82 and I hated them especially in the bridge position. It was way too bright and brittle sounding for me in that guitar. I gigged with it for about 5 years only using the neck pickup. I switched them out with some Gibson Classic 57s and it sounds like a dream. Those pickups sure worked for Jerry's guitar but it just may be a bad match for a maple/mahogany guitar if that's what's in your LP clone.

[strumminsix]

Right, right. Those are super hot! As I play more and get older, I favor single coils to hot humbuckers.

[Smolder]

yep... bought them with a jerrycaster in mind... but since that will be a project over the next couple of months I thought I'd stick em in the Agile (les paul clone). I think I'll leave em in over the weekend... but if I had to guess, they'll be out fairly soon and back in the box until the project commenses.

[joeriz]

...with even the slightest bit of dirt everything turned gravelly and kind of nasty.

Same experience here. I have a Super 2 (neck) and a Super D (bridge) in my Fender Showmaster and I find that it is very tricky to get that "just on the edge of breakup" overdrive sound with the Dimarzios even when run split. It's almost an 'all or nothing' kind of thing...at least so far. Whereas with the DAllens I recently put in my Strat I can easily get all different shades of clean through overdrive depending on guitar volume, touch, etc. I LOVE those DAllens...one of the best purchases I've made in a while.

Joe

[JonnyBoy]

I have a les paul I put dimarzio's in and I had pretty good success, but I routed for the third pickup in the middle. A Super in the bridge gives you some real power for sure. Inow use a maple core that has a thick mahogany top and back, making it almost equal maple and mahogany in total. It loves the Dimarzio's. Some of Jerry's early 70's tone is very hot, especially through the Les pauls, can't you compensate through your amp/settings?