Gibson Historic R9 - tone help

[StevenS]

Hey guys.

I just got my first Historic, an 06 R9 to replace my 06 Standard and I have a question.
First of all the guitar is fantastic. It's by far the nicest Les Paul I've ever played. It just feels so alive and resonant. Plays like butter. Just an awesome guitar!
Except.....

I find the tone kind of muddy. My 06 Standard is a fairly bright guitar in comparison and I think this is what I'm missing with this R9. The wound strings (E,A, & D) especially sound.... I'm trying to think of the right description... muddy. I can't think of a better way to describe it. When playing bar chords up the neck it just doesn't have the clarity and crispness I was hoping for. I haven't used it in my band yet but I'm afraid I may have a real problem cutting through with it like this.

I play mainly through a Shiva but have a bunch of other amps (Vibro-King, 71 JMP, 83 JCM800, AC30TBX, AC15TBX, 76 JMP, Hot Cat30R, 1974X, TSL100) and even with the old Marshalls, which are pretty bright to begin with, it's still got this same character. The Shiva is a fairly compressed amp which probably doesn't help, but I've got the treble and prescence wound out almost full.

Can anyone suggest anything that might help me out here. Pickup adjustment etc.

I absolutely love this guitar and it's breaking my heart thinking I might have to sell it because of this.

[fretnot]

Replace the pots/caps...it definitely might help. Good luck!

[JLee]

Lower the pickup heights. It's not uncommon to have the neck pickup sitting below the pickup ring. Also try raising the polepieces, but remember to lower the entire pickup to maintain the proper distance between poles and strings.

[sanhozay]

I'd first try 50's wiring & a quad of new pots, caps, etc. The vintage or modern wiring kits from RS are essential to my Les Pauls open tone. And, while there are many, many great players plaing wonderful guitar with burstbuckers, I simply do not like them with Les Pauls. The are a nice arrangement for the SG but I think they can be flat & dull on the neck and too toothy on the bridge. There exists no short supply of exceptional vintage style PAF replacements pickups to waddle through. I've tried a bunch and after a brief wait received a set of Throbak SLE101 LTD's and can say with no reservations they are the most perfect pickup for me. I've had a lot of others that were fantastic but the benchmark for me is Throbak's PAF replica. I don't think he mops the competition but these pickups certainly raise the bar. Again, you'll wait for these and they are step three because the 50's wiring & new pots might fit the bill.

[billstets]

Are you talking about the neck pickup or bridge or both?

What kind of pickups were in the 06 Standard? Were they Burstbucker Pros? Those are alnico 5, whereas the Burstucker 1 and 2 in the Historic are alnico 2. The alnico 2 is not as bright.

How do you have the pickups set? You should lower the neck pickup quite a bit, down even below the mounting ring a little bit on the bass side, and then raise up the pole pieces maybe slightly above the cover.

Is it muddy wherever you set the guitar volume knobs? If the problem is more when you roll down the volume, add a treble bleed kit to the pot (cap + resistor) to bleed some highs back in when you roll down the volume.

Personally I think changing the pots and caps will only help if the pots are way out of spec. They should be 500K pots, but the pots Gibson uses have wider tolerances than say the ones RS sells. You'd have to remove them to measure them though, which is a bit o f a pain. Plus, I read recently that the pots Gibsons use in the Historics don't vary as much.

Last suggestion - post on the Les Paul forum. Those guys live and breathe LPs.

[GuitarsFromMars]

Caps are a cheap form of GAS...You can try different ones.Most of the guys I know like either PIO's or boutique caps(WCR brand I like).I have used both.Currently,500Kohm pots x 4,2 x .022 uf caps all WCR. I like vintage Sprague Bees, when they can be found...Dont forget to try the 50's wiring.

[mike patrick]

Hi stevens I made the mistake your about to make. DON'Tsell that axe you love every thing ,except the tone,there are pickups out th kazoo you can customize your tone but you can't like abad playing instrument,check out lollar guitar,manlius guitar .com,wolftone fralin just to name afew good luck mike

[StevenS]

Thanks for the tips fellas.

It's mainly on the bridge pickup. The neck pup doesn't seem quite so bad.

It stays constant as I roll down the volume as well. I use the volume knob a lot when I play as well so it's important to have the highs remain when I roll it back.

[Vegas Bob]

I tuned up my R8 with RS Supertaper pots and Vitamin Q caps, .022 on the bridge and .015 on the neck. Huge difference.