1976 Gibson Les Paul Deluxe - Wiring Repair and Pickup Swap:

Inspector #20

Inspector #20

Ambassador of Tone
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Wiring was shorting in and out and the owner wanted to get rid of the Seymour Duncan P90...

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Wire harness had lots of cold solder joints and excess solder.

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I cleaned things up and added grounding supports that hold the braid for the pickups in place:
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Install complete...

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The Seymour Duncan Antiquity Mini Humbucker specs out at about 7.5k. It's really bright and airy. Plenty of grit when pushed, and cleans up well when rolled back.

It was a direct drop in and fit the original brass inserts perfectly.

The guy bought this brand new in 1976 and paid $498.00 for it. It's the only guitar he owns and it's a full-time working guitar...

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I've started using "grounded supports" on the old braided conductor wiring. What I do is fashion a piece of push-back wire to cradle the braid and fashion the other end so it sits on a pot.

This allows me to not only ground the braid, but also create a kind of "stand-off" that keeps the braid from flopping around inside the guitar and making contact with hot connections.
 
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Nice work, Robert.

The timing of this thread is perfect because yesterday I tried to deal with a noisy issue that my LP started developing a few months ago. It is not hum that I'm hearing, but more like a grounding issue with excessive noise.

The amplified noise happens with either pickup selected or both selected. I think I got the source of the problem narrowed down to either the output jack or the LP's pickup selector. I have already cleaned up and resoldered the pickup's and selector's braided ground connections at the volume pots and their hot leads too: No difference! I redid the connections to the output jack: No difference! This does not rule out that something internal is goofy within the jack though.

Later today, I will try a new jack if I have one! If that doesn't clear up the noise, I'm going to focus on the selector switch... :confused2:
 
Damn that guitar is absolutely gorgeous. I've wanted a Deluxe for a long time so that is certainly firing up the GAS. (need a pickguard though)
 
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gball said:
Dan that guitar is absolutely gorgeous. I've wanted a Deluxe for a long time so that is certainly firing up the GAS. (need a pickguard though)
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I have several old Gibson's right now from the late 1950's and a couple of Stratocasters from the early 1960's in for setup and repairs. I have agreements with those clients not to post photos of those instruments.
 
Looks so much better with the P90 gone. I'm gonna sacrifice it to the fire gods...LOL

Sounds so much better too...no more insane buzz and reactivity to fluorescent lighting.
 
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@ivan H , @syscokid - Note how, on this stock Gibson wiring, the capacitors come off the same lug as the pickup 'hot' lead???

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Also, taping off the bare, unused lugs on each pot greatly reduced the amount of floor noise...
 
isnt that typical modern wiring?
I thought modern the tone cap goes with the pickup lead and 50's it goes on the wiper with the switch lead?
 
Robert Herndon said:
Maybe I'm just used to the older wiring style???
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The '50s style wiring is always my prefered style when it comes to humbuckers.

Update on my LP's noisy gremlins:
I'm still chasing the source of the excessive noise. I ruled out the output jack. It's not the pups either. It's not the caps. I closely inspected the Switchcraft 3-Way, and did not see any sign of corruption. However, I did not have an extra one to install just to be sure.

The LP is full of the stock braided cabling, from the pickups to the pots, then to the 3-Way, and from the 3-Way down to the jack. As I disconnected the braided cabling, I tried to clean up the globs of solder attached to the braids. At this point I noticed the black cloth insulation surrounding the cable's single conductor is falling apart in the vicinity of where the solder is in contact with the braiding. I think I'm going to order some new braided cabling... to be continued!
 
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