Gibson Les Paul Special Pickups/Wiring

[Charvel1975]

Hello all, I was at our rehearsal spot last night with my other guitarist and plugged in my 1998 Gibson Les Paul Special into the Boogie MK V 90 watt head into a Harley Benton G412A Celestion V30's and the guitar just doesn't have any girth and clarity, it's thin and low output. Guitar is in standard E tuning with .010 - .046 nickel wound strings. I'm in a 2 guitarist covers band playing 70's/80's/90's Rock/Classic Rock/Heavy Metal/Hair Metal.


Below is what's currently in it and all of it done some years ago:

Grover Deluxe 135 Nickel tuning keys

Factory bridge saddles replaced with GraphTech notched saddles

Factory neck P100 pickup still in it and the bridge P100 pickup was swapped out about 13 years ago for a used DiMarzio DP209 P-90 Super Distortion I bought off eBay

All Gibson 500K Volume & Tone pots put in, still have factory 300K Gibson pots


I'm going to take it somewhere and have all the wiring looked over and maybe have the 50's wiring done as well as I've heard that 50s-style wiring gives optimized tone.

I want the full humbucker sound out of the P90 Super Distortion so that needs to be wired in Series right? On the Dimarzio site it says "4-conductor wiring for split and parallel humbucking modes."

Also, how do you think a P90 Tone Zone would sound in the bridge and moving the P90 Super Distortion to the neck position?

 

[8len8]

50’s wiring isn’t optimized, it’s just different. To me it gives more control over mids than the highs you have control over with modern wiring. Also, many folks don’t like how the volume and tone controls now interact with 50’s wiring.

 

[8len8]

A P90 won’t sound like a humbucker not matter how you wire it.

 

[Giblesoqul2001]

Like 8len8 said P90 is not going to sound like a humbucker. But by your description something surely don’t sound right. I have a LP Special and when I play it out at a gig it don’t sound thin it does cut more and have some more high end. I found myself EQ the amp a little differently.