new gibson ccontrol cavity circuit board CRAP

[David Schwab]

I recently switched our company over from CTS made pots to the Bournes Pots (Duncan Branded).. The quality and smoothness of the pots is dramatically better than the CTS - Not even in the same ballpark. I have not done adequate testing yet on the specific taper of the pots (i.e. when turning down the volume does it go 10-9-8-2-1-0 or 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-0) but I am sure if I was un-happy with it Duncan would address it for me. I used to use the RS Guitar Works super pots because of the taper, but the bournes are just such better quality.

Duncan also got really smart and properly tinned the back of the pot making soldering SooooOoooo much easier.

Frank sent me a few of those pots. Great quality. I have been using the Bourns guitar pots for a while now, and I also like those. I'm not sure if they are any different, but they both seem of high quality.

[David Schwab]

Can you identify the Borns Pot that is equivalent?
I'm going to start selling Loaded PickGuards with 250k Pots.
Do they look anything like this?
[ATTACH=CONFIG]15742[/ATTACH]
I can get these at TubesAndMore at a pretty good price.
T

Those are the same ones I use. I get them either from CE Distribution (dealer version of Tubes and More) or Mouser.

[copperheadroads]

that looks like alpha pots
i like to have a few kicking around ,incase some customers dont want to upgrade & enlarge the holes for CTS pots
I have been paying $2 a piece for these here in canada ...i do find them ok

[big_teee]

that looks like alpha pots
i like to have a few kicking around ,incase some customers dont want to upgrade & enlarge the holes for CTS pots
I have been paying $2 a piece for these here in canada ...i do find them ok

No they are Bourns.
They are supposed to be better than CTS Pots.
T

AES - Parts Catalog

[Jim Shine]

Bournes always made a great pot. I especially liked the plastic ones like Schecter, Charvel, and Mighty Mite used to push in the 70's. I like Clarostat as well. But my favorites has always been the Stackpoles. I wish they were still made.

[Possum]

I just saw this thread, I can't believe GIBSON is putting this junk in their guitars. I would personally yank all that garbage out of there, with all the ROHS standards now anyway, likely in ten years none of it quit working anyway. Is Gibson the new "Epiphone" or what? Is Rickenbacker the only US company making actual good guitars anymore?

[David Schwab]

I just saw this thread, I can't believe GIBSON is putting this junk in their guitars. I would personally yank all that garbage out of there, with all the ROHS standards now anyway, likely in ten years none of it quit working anyway. Is Gibson the new "Epiphone" or what? Is Rickenbacker the only US company making actual good guitars anymore?

Dave, how is this junk? How would it be any different from wires? It isn't.

I think these are all knee-jerk reactions.

But I agree, Gibson stopped making good quality guitars a long time ago. But there's nothing wrong with a circuit board replacing wires in your guitar.

[Kindly Killer]

Tangent: do they make these boards themselves? Are they printed and stuffed elsewhere? Are there even board houses in USA at all? Just wondering how this weighs on their made-in-USA image, which is the main thing they sell...

On topic: I imagine it would be great for everyone if PCBs for guitars caught on because players/hot-rodders would get used to dropping a whole circuit into their guitar, which might open them up to doing things differently. A little engineering might be able to creep into the electric guitar! As it stands it's very hard to market anything for guitar that requires any understanding or any interest in developing a little understanding - you plug it in and it works/doesn't work; with PCBs the market doesn't have to change that attitude but manufacturers could drop anything in there.

[SpareRibs]

Circuit Board Delirium

Hello,

I am sure all of those new circuit designs would be (oh) so obvious ran through a preamp, five
different effects,and a cheesy Marshall clone. I doubt that even a select few of (The Anointed Ones)
could tell the difference. I am not a Gibson fan myself, but does everything they do have to be bad
for no other reason than it says Gibson on it? As far as tearing everything out and replacing it all,it
first has to be purchased. That in itself may become a major stumbling block!

[David Schwab]

Tangent: do they make these boards themselves? Are they printed and stuffed elsewhere? Are there even board houses in USA at all? Just wondering how this weighs on their made-in-USA image, which is the main thing they sell...

Well even if the guitars are US made, where do the parts come from, like the tuners? A lot of the parts Gibson has used was either from Schaller (Germany) or Gotoh (Japan). Same goes for pots and stuff.

Not a whole lot of parts made in the US anymore.

But Gibson does a whole lot of circuit boards these days with the Robot Guitars and the Firebird X.

On topic: I imagine it would be great for everyone if PCBs for guitars caught on because players/hot-rodders would get used to dropping a whole circuit into their guitar, which might open them up to doing things differently. A little engineering might be able to creep into the electric guitar! As it stands it's very hard to market anything for guitar that requires any understanding or any interest in developing a little understanding - you plug it in and it works/doesn't work; with PCBs the market doesn't have to change that attitude but manufacturers could drop anything in there.

Like I said, this is a good business opportunity for someone. And there's not a whole lot going on with the circuit boards, they are just replacing the wiring previously used.

You see similar things on the bottoms of some Duncan and Dimarzio pickups too. I'm starting to use circuit boards in some of my pickups as well.

[copperheadroads]

There's someone making replacement control cavity circuit boards for Gibson's & even making them with the 50's wiring mod
here's a thread
Custom replacement gibson pcb's - My Les Paul Forums
& here's the product
Fifties Modern Switch

[big_teee]

There's someone making replacement control cavity circuit boards for Gibson's & even making them with the 50's wiring mod
here's a thread
Custom replacement gibson pcb's - My Les Paul Forums
& here's the product
Fifties Modern Switch

Too steep for my Blood!
T

[Sweetfinger]

Sure they did:

http://www.emgpickups.com/content/wi...0230-0166A.pdf

Where were you looking?

I was on the phone with EMG tech support. They did not have a switching diagram and AFAIK, still don't. That is not a switching diagram you've linked to, it is a layout diagram and would not have helped me much. They didn't have one of those diagrams that was close to doing what I needed either. Aside from the V+ through and IN/OUT terminals there are 18 terminals that do various switching tasks. I needed to know what was happening between all the terminals in all positions, something like this, only more complicated:


"The Gibson board: My guess is that some bean counter figured that they'd save enough time on installs by going to this thing. Since "common internet knowledge" says the first thing to do to any Gibson is remove the stock "crap" pots and caps, this makes it easy to remove all the offensive components in one action and keeps it in one monolithic unit for safekeeping until such time that it is considered a desirable source for vintage tone. The fun really starts when a customer asks how much to install a push/pull pot for phase or coil splitting and you have to quote for an ENTIRE harness rewire PLUS ALL new pots and caps. Sure, Gibson has been putting pots on mounting plates for decades, but now you can't really remove the pot without some serious effort."
-Sweetfinger

I disagree here. If you are a company building guitars, this is the way to go. This is the same reason that electronic devices are not hand wired, but use printed circuit boards. If you run a business, even a small one man business, you can't afford to not be a bean counter.

I don't get it. You say you disagree, then just reaffirm the facts I've stated.

Now the reason people might not like these circuit boards is because it makes it difficult to modify the instrument. But modifying the instrument means nothing to Gibson, and would likely void what ever warrantee it came with. Gibson doesn't want you to remove the pots. Why would they? This is not a platform to be built upon, and they were not intended to be altered in their eyes. But if you have any skill at all, you can change one of these to allow for easy rewiring.

I got skillz, Define "easy" rewiring.

Imagine you are installing something as simple as a push/pull pot for a coil split. Old method: Pull knob, unscrew pot, desolder wire connections to pot, remove pot, install new pot, resolder wiring, put knob back on. Done.
NOW- I have to desolder the string ground, remove ALL the knobs, remove four nuts, hope there's enough service length on the pickup, switch, and jack leads to allow me to remove the board. Probably not. Have to desolder all those as well. Now I have to desolder the pot connections to the board. This is all lead free solder BTW, and is a PITA to undo. THEN I get to wonder how the hell I'm going to fit the aftermarket pot into the board. Oh... It doesn't match up. Now I have to run jumpers, cut the circuit board, or both. Wait.... My customer wanted "50s wiring on the tone caps. On an older model you'd just change two connections. Done in 1 minute. Now I have to cut traces on the board and run jumpers. More like ten minutes. This is all starting to look really ugly with cut traces, jumper wires and a missing chunk of circuit board. Maybe the best thing is to yank the whole thing and just put discrete components in. It'll take less time, it'll look cleaner and more professional, and will be easily modded in the future. This is not my definition of "easy"

I know the reasons Gibson does this and I know that they don't care what people do to their guitars after the purchase. It doesn't change the fact that it makes my job much more difficult. The first one of these things that comes in for warranty on a pot is going to cost Gibson a lot of money because they're going to send me a whole new board AND they're going to pay me a crap-ton of money to do the entire switcheroo AND the customer is going to be without their guitar for a couple weeks, instead of a couple days... or hours. It's the same thing with amplifiers. It makes absolute sense from a manufacturing standpoint to put an entire amp on a single PC board. Easy assembly- but when you have to touch up a couple solder joints on an input jack you have to disassemble the entire amp.

I also don't see how the Duncan Liberator is not a good idea. Do you really think you won't get your so called "vintage" tone if you use one of those? Why wouldn't you?

Huh? where did you get any idea about tone? It's a terminal block, it won't affect tone at all. It isn't a bad idea, just one with very limited appeal. I view it as the same sort of labor saving device as a commercial disk-blade meat slicer. Most people making a sandwich or two at home are not going to clear some counter space, whip out the machine, zip off a couple slices of ham, then take the half hour to disassemble and clean the slicer before putting it away. Its intended user is someone who is cutting a lot of meat. Everybody else is going to have their meat sliced for them, or they're going to do it "old school" with a kitchen knife.
Same with the Liberator. 99% of people who are buying and installing pickups are not going to have any use for the Liberator. The remaining 1% are either going to devise their own terminal block/quick connect system, or might purchase the Liberator. A certain percentage of people will not be able to use it simply because of logistics- either their instrument does not have a good place to install(like an F-hole archtop) or doesn't have enough room left in the control cavity.
Basically, the potential customer for this is a pickup winder, guitar builder, or hobbyist who really, really loves to sit around at home endlessly futzing with their gear. Of those, how many have already got a system that they're using? Of the remainder, how many will actually pop for the unit? My guess is that Duncan is not moving a whole lot of these. Despite the fact that you can't swing a dead cat on this forum without hitting one of those few "potential customers", when you look at the overall customer base for aftermarket pickups, it is almost negligible. Frank, how many are you guys moving? It would be interesting to know.

As far as replacing the "crap" pots, they look like Bourns pots to me, which are not crap pots. What are you going to replace them with, CTS? Why? "Vintage" correct? This isn't a vintage guitar, and all the wishful thinking won't make it so. And the pots won't change the tone. So unless you open the control compartment every day to look at the parts, who cares?

The caps don't matter unless you are going to convince yourself that they do. How are the parts offensive? Because some moron at one of the Les Paul forums said so? (personally I wouldn't buy a new Gibson if my life depended on it, but that's another story). Think for yourself. This isn't some big clique.

As far as "common internet knowledge" goes, most of the people posting about caps and vintage tone and this stuff don't have a clue what they are talking about. A perfect example is that guitarnutz web site. People believe all this nonsense because they also don't have a clue, and if it's on the internet, it must be true!

So if you think removing this circuit board and replacing the parts with equivalent, but different parts will make the guitar sound better or "vintage" you are fooling yourself. It's like a guy over at TalkBass that swore that when he put clear nail polish on the exposed magnets on his Jazz bass, it made the pickups sound duller with less highs. People think they hear things that aren't there.

All this stuff sounds more about insecurity on the player's part than anything that can lead to a better tone; i.e., "I need X gear to get X tone so I can play like X, otherwise I suck rhino wrench". I guess these are the same people who spend $100 for a pickup ring.

The "" marks around the phrase "common internet knowledge" should tip you off that I consider that stuff to be, as you described, "nonsense". Unfortunately I have to deal with people who believe it. I know Gibson pots aren't "crap", but people come in all the time wanting the harness changed. Am I going to lecture them on how stupid they are and tell them to go away? No. I may try to educate them a bit but the correct answer is going to be "yessir". Then I have to name a larger price than they, or I would like, simply because they have chosen a guitar from a manufacturer who is more concerned with ease of assembly than long term serviceability. Ever change an output jack on a Parker Fly? Same thing. An hour of my life gone on a job that takes 5 minutes on a Strat. ....AND the original Switchcraft jack on the Strat will be working fine well after the Fly's expensive barrel jack has worn out and been replaced twice(the connections/tines in those crap out. No amount of cleaning or treatment helps).

BTW you say that changing the pots won't change the tone. You have incorrectly assumed that players are replacing the pots with the same value and taper. They are not. Usually it is changing the 300K to 500K. Cap values are often changed as well.

[Possum]

Its a matter of opinion, basically now we have printed circuit guitars with computer connectors. Its come back to would you rather have a point to point hand wired amp or a printed circuit amp. I'm sure David you'll say there is no difference but I've played plenty of both and the PC board amps lack a certain organic warmth and musical transparency, I'm talking guitar amps, not bass amps. I also dislike guitars wired with real thin plastic coated wire, it ends up sounding shrill and not very transparent/organic as well. PC board circuits are super thin, a big fat wire just sounds better, there is also the issue of weird capacitance things that happen on PC boards that a wiring harness doesn't have. I can see that eventually Gibson will probably have a complete drop in PC board that contains all the wiring as etched circuits. Sure, if you're playing with alot of distortion then maybe it sounds ok, but plug into an unforgiving hand wired Silverface amp played clean and compare to a real wiring harness and I bet the PC board stuff will be lacking. Gibson is trying to cut costs and quality is going down the toilet with it. Those little switches just don't last, a good Switchcraft monster will last you what 60 years now? ;-)

I have seen plenty of evidence of the horrible quality of Gibson pots, cracked carbon traces, 300K pots etc. etc. Its so hit or miss I do recommend owners replace them with known quality, known values, and dump the fake bee caps. If I'm selling PAF repro's I make sure they are going into a known harness so if there's a problem I can tell them how to fix it, a stock wiring harness can kill good pickups, good pickups can't give their best thru a harness thats killing the good stuff. I expect some are going to argue endlessly against what my opinion is, but I deal with harnesses on a daily basis thru customers and in my own guitars, this is coming from actual experience and not something I read on the internet or someone's theories. High technology doesn't necesserily mean high musicality, thats for sure.

[Possum]

I think a good reality check here would be if you bought a vintage 1959 Les Paul, would you put a printed circuit control panel and computer quick connections for the pickups in it?