Replacement for EMG's on '85 Nightbird

SBrem

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Hello all, I'm taking suggestions for pickup replacements for the EMG's on my Gruhn era 85 Nightbird. Gruhn's shop suggested I would reduce the guitar's value by doing that, but I'm not all that fond of the sound compared to say, my 2000 Bluesbird. The Nightbird is probably my favorite electric guitar to play as far as handling goes, but not for it's sound. So, I guess I'm looking for something that would perhaps drop into the existing routs, so I could put the EMG's back in to sell it someday, but I don't see that happening yet. Now, the Bluesbird is solid, and the Nightbird chambered, so maybe I'm looking for more of the semi-hollow sound of my 335. I know the very basics of pickups, but I'm not a pickup geek at all, and I know there are many here who have far more practical experience with them, so fire away. Thanks in advance...

Steve
 

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Seth Lovers on my GSR Starfire 6, hard to go wrong with them and they drop right in! Leave the EMGs in the neck pocket..
 

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Your Bluesburd is not solid if it’s a 2000.

The only pickups I’d put in a Nightbird are NOS HB1s but they’re crazy expensive if you want to keep the coil tap.
 

SBrem

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Your Bluesburd is not solid if it’s a 2000.

The only pickups I’d put in a Nightbird are NOS HB1s but they’re crazy expensive if you want to keep the coil tap.

I guess I was assuming the 2000 was solid; I had an early 70's M-75C which I loved back then, but it was stolen in 74. I will look around on the HB-1's. Is that Guild purist thing, or a sonic preference? I know I loved my old M-75 through my Marshall 100w plexi stack. Of course, that was 45 years ago or so, and I have no need for that type power anymore, but I would like something different than the EMG's. I never use the coil tap or phase switch, so whether they are working or not isn't critical. The guitar just plays so beautifully...


Steve
 

walrus

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Right, your 2000 BB is chambered, much like the Nightbird is.

Love to see some pics of both guitars!

walrus
 

DThomasC

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Be aware that the volume and tone controls are probably low resistance, something like 10k or 15k ohm; I don't remember what mine were. If you install ordinary (passive) humbuckers then you'll want to replace both pots with 500k. Then there's the knobs. The factory knobs would not fit on the CTS pots that I almost always use, so I had to find something else. I ended up using some black, knurled dome knobs that were intended as replacements for a tele. They look OK, but they're not as classy as the factory Nightbird knobs.

The other issue is the ground wire. There isn't one. At least there wasn't one on my Nightbird. I ended up pulling one of the inserts for the tailpiece and drilling a hole between the control cavity and the opening for the tailpiece insert. I ran a wire through the drilled hole and pressed the insert back in with the wire jammed between it and the wood for the top. This is actually how most ground wires are installed on guitars like this and probably exactly how the ground wire for your Bluesbird is installed. It's not as difficult as it sounds and any good luthier should be able to do it if you don't feel comfortable doing it yourself.

The other thing is the pickup mounting rings. If you want to use the ones that are on the guitar (guaranteed to fit the guitar!) then a little tab needs to be fabricated that allows the two-screw pickups to work with the three-screw mounting ring. It's been discussed here before and I think there might be photos of them on GAD's blog about HB-1's (?)

Bottom line, there are no passive pickups that are drop in replacements. HB-1's already have three adjustment screws, so you avoid the tab mentioned in the previous paragraph. As far as the pots go, it's not that big a deal to replace them. Some might say that it's good to remove the entire wiring harness along with the EMG's and pack them away safely in case you ever want to put them back.

The wire to ground the strings is a pain and is required. Did you ever take your hands off the strings and hear a loud hum/buzz until you touched the strings again? That's why you need a ground wire.
 

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HB1s are a Guild purist thing BECAUSE of the sonic preference! The look and sound amazing.

The pots will likely both be 25K from EMG. The cap will be .01uF. All need to be replaced if you use passive pickups.

Please don't drill into the pickup rings. I see so many rings destroyed when people swap pickups. Here's a pickup with the tab DThomasC is describing:

Guild-HB1-Cover-JB-Back.jpg
 

SBrem

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Sorry to not answer the last few days, just busy. Now I've taken some pics, and uploaded to Photobucket, but, apparently they've change the way they work. The Bluesbird's Serial # is CM 000669, The Nightbird's is BL100304. I have pix, don't know how to share. I never "share" photos through a site, even though I'm in the graphics business, so I'm not sure what to do with them.
 

SBrem

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OK, time to revive this, only 2-1/2 years later. I took out the Nightbird a few weeks ago, and it needed some care, it was playing rough. So, I carefully tweaked the truss rod somewhere between a 1/4 and 3/8 of a turn over 3 days, lowered the bridge a hair, and it's settled down nicely, reminding me of how I fell for it back when I bought it new around '87 or so. I still want to change out the pickups, and I'm kind of convinced on Seth Lovers as the replacements, unless I pick up a pair of vintage HB-1's if I can find them. I'm not looking to use either the phase switch, or a coil split. I know I'll need 500K(?) pots, and new knobs as the shafts aren't the same as the originals. Does anyone (GAD? Hans?) know if vintage HB-1's would drop into the pickup rings holding the EMG's that were stock? And, I just discovered that the bridge pickup ring is broken; fix or replace? I want to pull out all of the electronics so that I can someday re-install them to make it original again, or just include them in the sale, and I'll need a replacement dummy switch for the phase switch that looks as nice.
 

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GAD

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My guess is that those are Kent Armstrong pickups, but I've been wrong before. My guess is that the rings will work but Hans would know best.

I've had a tough time finding similar flat-blade mini-toggles that look like that. If anyone has a source please share.
 

SFIV1967

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My guess is that those are Kent Armstrong pickups, but I've been wrong before.
The Kent Armstrong pickups have the height adjustment screws closer together, here on Steve's guitar they are pretty wide apart. So I don't think those are Kent Armstrongs. Steve talked in the very first post about EMGs already.

Hi Steve, when you open the electronics chamber please take pictures of what is inside, there is so few info about those parts that were originally inside and how they were wired.
Regarding the toggle switch. My one has a MIYAMA MS-500F-B DPDT (6P, On-On) toggle switch with the thin round toggle shown to the far right below. This switch is available from various electronic houses with various toggle shapes and as SPST, SPDT and DPDT. The 4 in the picture are just the SPST (On-Off).

1586910188395.png


The green plastic DPDT version is a MS-550F, but I don't believe those were used by Guild originally.

1586911418116.png


However Guild used the green SMK USA made DPDT (On-On) part number J-U4210 switches:

1612690915539.png



And Guild used C&K (USA) 7203 switches as well:


1586912397046.png


And I also believe I saw Japanese NKK M-2020 switches, they are On-On-On:

1586912758366.png



Ralf
 
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SBrem

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The EMG logo is on both pickup covers, but very faded, I’ll get a better shot in the morning, and shots of the controls and backs of the pickups.

Steve
 
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SBrem

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OK, here's a better close up of the pickups, and shots of the control cavity. I've not plugged it into an amp for a long time, and apparently it wouldn't work what with that one black wire going nowhere. I'll get some better shots a little later, I have some chores for the missus to take care of. That C&K 7203 looks the most like the phase switch, except mine is gold.
 

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kent

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i agree steve the emg basically have no tone.their really good for playing out of a rack system but for a more guitar to tube amp not so good [very sterile sounding] i guess this is why i changed mine out 20 years ago. i play mine all the time iam not a collector. i played it so much i had to have it refretted years ago i also play with 11s much more tone. although it puts a lot of wear on frets. over the years ive had classic 57s in it, seymore duncan customs, dimarzios , currently jason lollars . they all sound way better than emg 85s. if your into jazz or blues passives are the way to go. wiring in my limited experience would be like a vintage tele one tone one volume .02 cap vintage style 500k pots .i posted a picture of mine three controls going back to two cleaner signal path. plug that baby into a good tube amp [ i play out with a 65 fender super reverb any kind of boost pedal] and your good to go. as far as playability everyone i ever let play mine loved it most of them were lp players ///////////////ken
 

SBrem

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Thanks Ken, I appreciate the response. I was shown this guitar when I brought a Bluesbird (my second, black/chrome, DiMarzios) for re-fretting. $890.00 and it was mine. I switched to a Strat ('86 - '62 reissue) in the early nineties, but I've come to use both my 2000 Bluesbird and Strat when I gig. I also have a 2011 335 with '59's in it, which also sound great. As for amps, I have '62 Ampeg Rocket 2 (no reverb) an actual '64 Deluxe Reverb, and 2 Bedrocks, a 50w 2-12, and it's little brother 25w 1-12. My original Bluesbird in the early 70's was pushed through a Marshall 100w original Plexi, with both cabs plugged in. How I didn't wreck my ears I don't know, but what a sound. Nowadays, I have Quilter Micro-Pro 200 with an 8" Celestion, and it really is something else, I never would have thought a solid state amp would sound so good, and at 19 pounds, my shoulders are very happy. I guess I'll go for the Seth Lovers in Gold to match the hardware better, put the EMG's and electronics away.
Last note, in the photos of the cavity, there is one thin black wire coming off the phase switch, and it's not attached to anything, any care to hazard a guess where it goes? Thanks again everybody.

Steve
 

kent

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its a ground wire to vol pot.look at my earlier post their are photos of correct wiring of phase sw [all parts are out of guitar. my phase sw has a small circuit on it.my post # 12. monday may 29.my post #15 i drew a schematic of the pp pot. although your pictures are very helpful i would like to know where numbers 5, 9,7, 10 actually go according to sf1v1967 drawing on post #16. specifically 7and 10? iam trying to go back to correct wiring of emgs so i can make a good drawing and post as i lost my original drawing.
 

SBrem

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Yes, Ralf, I'm just discovering that, I'm not an electronics guy (well, a tiny bit) but after pouring over a lot of the info I need, I've started to understand it better, and everyone's input here has helped me a lot. I have my part list put together, and my last thing is the pickup rings. I wrote to Hans Moust and he informed me that I could simply drop the Seth Lovers into the existing rings, as the little adapter plate for the 2 screws is already in there. Still, I'm thinking of getting a set of rings for the SL's, I'm wondering if newer rings would have the outer 4 mounting screws in the same place as what I have now, as I don't want to drill new holes...
 

GAD

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Those rings are part of what makes a Guild a Guild. I would not replace them.
 
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