I know people usually bitch about the ol V7/V8 combo sucking ass and replace them straight away. I've got this old RG570 that I reworked the electronics a year or so ago. I had it going from the jack to a kill switch to a single 500k German MEC volume pot and a Schaller (also MEC) three way blade. I had swapped the magnets on the pickups around so the bridge is ceramic and the neck is alnico v. I swapped before changing the wiring. Now I'm thinking about selling this guitar so I put back the stock electronics and holy shit does it sound so much worse. I changed amps around the time I changed electronics so I attributed the better sound to the new amp. I had the gain at around 10 o'clock and got a nice tight chug sound. Since I put it back to stock I've had to bump up the gain to like 3 o'clock because the pickups feel so much weaker. Like wtf? Why would they use this system?
Is Ibanez wiring really that bad?
- Thread starter Nightside
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TheBlackBard
SS.org Regular
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Because it's cheap and gets guitars out the door. Also, you could say the same for a lot of in house wiring and pickups. A lot of it is simply sub-par, because again, it gets guitars out the door. Keeps cost down for them.
The longer the path, the more stuff in that path, the more capacitance. Throw in some other variables like wire thickness, tolerances, wear and tear, quality of solder joint, etc. and it's easy to see why the best mod you can usually do is gut the electronics and replace everything with the best components you can in a configuration that's simple and realistic as to what your needs are.
It's not as sexy as new pickups or amps, but as you can see it makes a big difference.
It's not as sexy as new pickups or amps, but as you can see it makes a big difference.
groverj3
Bioinformagician
Yep.
My best sounding guitar is a JB/59 set with a 1meg volume pot, no tone pot. Second favorite, Custom/Jazz with a 1meg volume and a no load tone pot (which stays on 10 at all times).
TedEH
Cromulent
Why put it back to stock in the first place? Does anyone seek out "stock" v7/v8 wired guitars?
If it were a 1527 w/v77's/78's possibly me
Because a modded guitar is less valuable than stock. I'll keep my expensive electronics for another guitar.
I seriously wired it back to stock and then did it again because I was sure I must have done something wrong but no, the stock setup just sounds like ass compared to good parts with simplified wiring.
TedEH
Cromulent
I was always under the impression that stock vs. mod made no difference to resale value unless you bodged the upgrade or something.
That's the point. Save the upgraded pickups for another of your guitars and then sell the stock guitar for the same price as you would no matter what pickups are in it.
TedEH
Cromulent
I guess that's fair.
Damn, and I been feeling proud of the long pickup leads I can fit in the cavity lol. Would shortening them to appropriate length make a difference at all?
On its own? Probably not. But stack a foot of extra wire per pickup on top of lousy pots on top of poor soldering, and yeah, definitely not ideal.
