[mmcquain]

I have finally finished my pickup upgrade in my 2000 Les Paul Custom Premium Plus AAA honeyburst. This guitar, along with my 2004 Gibson CS-356, are my two "keepers" that I never plan to sell. The CS-356 has stock Classic 57 pickups for that classic humbucker sound. So I wanted something a little different in the Les Paul and I really like the sound of P90 pickups after trying them in a Les Paul Studio 60 Tribute. However, I didn't want to cut into the wood of the Les Paul Custom and I hate the hum you often get with P90s. So the quest was on to find the right replacement pickup...

I ended up going with Lindy Fralin P92 (hum-cancelling P90 in a humbucker size) after considering the Fralin TwangMaster, Duncan Phat Cat, and several others.
http://www.fralinpickups.com/humbuckers.asp#p92

I also upgrade the pots and caps with a RS Guitarworks kit.
http://store.rsguitarworks.net/PREMVINTKITL.html

I've noticed a few things since upgrading:

1. The guitar is much brighter and snappier sounding. Leaving the tone control full on gets me a brighter, Fender-ish sound that can be good for country, chicken-picken, etc. (at least as much as you can get a Gibson).

2. Rolling back on the volume does not muddy the tone (thank you 50's style wiring)

3. Rolling back the tone to about 7-8 gives me back the warmer/fatter more tradtional Gibson tones so now I've got a lot more different tone options without having to change guitars as often.

I also set the neck pickup volume control a little higher than the rest so that the knob is in a better spot for my pinky to grab onto. I want to learn to do the volume swells (ala Hughie Thomasson and Roy Buchannan) from the guitar. Right now I do them all from my volume pedal like Mark Knopfler does (which is a great way in itself).

Here are the before and after pics. Oh, I decided to try top-wrapping, which I am really liking!

Before (with Gibson 480R/498T):





After (with Fralin P92 - 8K Neck/9K Bridge):