Gibson Magnets

[JGundry]

They bought magnets no one else wanted to save a buck.

Gibson was cheap but I think the cheap magnet thing is a myth. Magnets are made to order. Magnet houses require a drawing for orders. There are customer tweaks within an Alnico mix. A magnet house will have maybe two standard A5 mixes and then have sub mixes within that to meet customer needs. The cheap magnet thing does not hold water. What does make sense is that Gibson used many magnet makes because they had a bad reputation for paying on time so they spread the wealth or lack of it around to different magnet makers. Different magnet companies had different mixes which had different tones and held different levels of charge. That explains the variation in Gibson magnets.

[LtKojak]

Gibson was cheap but I think the cheap magnet thing is a myth. Magnets are made to order. Magnet houses require a drawing for orders. There are customer tweaks within an Alnico mix. A magnet house will have maybe two standard A5 mixes and then have sub mixes within that to meet customer needs. The cheap magnet thing does not hold water. What does make sense is that Gibson used many magnet makes because they had a bad reputation for paying on time so they spread the wealth or lack of it around to different magnet makers. Different magnet companies had different mixes which had different tones and held different levels of charge. That explains the variation in Gibson magnets.

What I think Possum is talking about here is Gibson buying magnets not by specs or formula, but by the bulk offered by "brokers" for the lack of a better word, that were surplus stocks, with all the shortcomings that may imply.

Gibson have never been big in aftermarket p'ups... most sales are generated by people that can't afford an instrument, but wants to have at least "something Gibson" in his/her instrument, buying the brand and not the sound for the application required.

I see this happening even to this day.

[JGundry]

What I think Possum is talking about here is Gibson buying magnets not by specs or formula, but by the bulk offered by "brokers" for the lack of a better word, that were surplus stocks, with all the shortcomings that may imply.

Everything Gibson ordered was drawn up with specs. spelled out IMO. I have seen pre Norlin Gibson drawings for magnets and size, tolerances and metal mix is all spelled out. A foundry does not make magnets on spec.. Whether it is for Gibson or a broker. They make magnets to a specific specification for a specific customer. Both a broker and the foundry would want to maintain a reputation of offering a high quality part. The idea that there was a broker shopping around magnets that were sub standard that just happened to be of the size that Gibson used seems very unlikely. What I think happened is Gibson used many magnet makers and QC and metal mixes varied between these different foundries.

[Possum]

...

Talk to Jim Wagner, why would a magnet salesman say Gibson bought their reject magnets? It wasn't a rumor.

[JGundry]

Talk to Jim Wagner, why would a magnet salesman say Gibson bought their reject magnets? It wasn't a rumor.

The guy I talked to was also a magnet salesman. I met with him face to face at my office. He and another guy told me a bout General Magnetics of Indiana's poor QC. I never hear of General Magnetics before they mentioned them.

[Possum]

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Have his salesman contact Jim's salesman and they can duke it out :-) I'm sure in their entire history they didn't just deal with one guy.....

[LtKojak]

Gibson has always had a reputation for being cheap. They moved Epiphone from Korea to China at the expense of quality. When price versus quality comes up its always price with them.

Well... I fully agree with you, Possum; but in this particular case I think Gibson made the right move building a factory in China, as they could have complete control of the production line plus the QC is tighter than working on commision with the Koreans.

After seven years of making, I think Epi guitars coming out from Qingdao today are at least up to pair if not better than the ones built by Samick or the other Korean factories. If they only used BETTER p'ups... those Sam Sung I've seen are truly horrible. Mud City all the way, baby!

Having said that, I still wonder WHERE all those chinese counterfeit Gibsons come from... all from the same factory, or there are OTHER factories doing just that? I think we'll never know for sure, will we?

[Possum]

....

Well, I have a Chinese Epiphone Plain Top, and I can tell you the Korean ones are much better made. Samick makes some very nice guitars. I do have a nice Michael Kelly archtop made in China that is almost totally flawless. I wouldn't buy any Epiphone again unless its an older Korean made one. They may be getting better at it, but man the LP was unplayable when I got it about 2-3 years ago.