rockabilly69

Yes! Yes! Although some of the coolest Heritages I've played have been old ones, a good percentage of the worst quality, I've seen were also from the early years, with many guitars having to be sent back to the factory! One of my close friends was a Heritage dealer in the so called good old days, and he relayed to me some stories of such guitars, and some newer dealers I've talked too have repeated these stories, so average at best is a fallacy. Also the factory in my opinion was very run down and in need of some good clean up, but these days it's looking great. And some of the new ones are in my opinion the best Heritages I've ever seen, heard, or played! Hands down, with the new guard, the nuts, frets, and binding on the on the standard models look great, and both of my older H150s needed work in all of those departments. The only thing I don't like with the new guard is the relic-ing, especially on the tuners and around the headstock. Another thing, on the custom cores, I think they should offer unpotted humbuckers, for what they are charging for CCs, I think they should cut a deal with Throbak! They should also use better bridges (Faber or ABM would be nice), and better tuners, like Japanese made Klusons (or upscale Gotohs). But all all in all, I think Heritage has upped their game. Things I love that went by the wayside... Schaller bridges, tailpieces, and pickups!, I never liked any of them.

I use plain Zippo lighter fluid, non-diluted, and it works great! My guitar not only smelled of smoke, but of of dank basement. And now it smells fine (like old nitro)! This is the guitar I'm referring to...

Yes stay away from flames!

I also love low frets!

Wipe the entire guitar down with naptha. I've done this to a few smokey guitars. and it has helped immensely. Naptha is safe for nitro finishes! I'm personally not a fan of the ozone generator or fabreeze. I tried that many times and either didn't work (ozone genrator) or my guitar smelled like Fabreeze, which I find almost as unbearable as smoke! Leaving my case out in the sun did help immensely help. but I had to leave it outside in my backyard every day for almost a month before it took hold. The little fan trick sounds like it would work for hollow body! And I also thought that was the charcoal sounded like a good idea! Good luck!

Sounded great! Good to see you rocking out

Nice looking guitar with some seriously flamey wood!

That natural one had some SERIOUS flame and killer woody tone!

I recorded a guy that played a Garnet that was once owned by Randy Bachman. It sounded really good!

I love that one!

That goes both ways!

How fitting that this is right under Kuz’s pic..

That’s funny because his behavior was more like a pissy school child than any manufacturer I’ve ever seen. Some of the rants and fights he got in with his customers long before his BLM behavior should’ve put him out of business. It wasn’t until his BLM remarks though that a size-able group of people saw his true colors. No mob put him out of business, his mouth did and he quit the business himself. I won’t support that guy again.

It wasn't just the SJW class that thought he was a dick. He treated many of his customers like absolute sh*t. Do a google search and I'm sure find plenty of people that he severely pissed off! There are so many pedals that are better than his why bother.

or frustration LOL

That's what I like most about it, and the first thing that drew my eye to it!

I love it too, as it makes the guitar feel like a living breathing thing. And Dolly hit the nail on the head!

I agree, it's not just the lack of potting, it's also the wind, the materials, and sometimes even the springs that the pickups are mounted with (or without ie P90). And frankly, some pickups have it more than others. My old USA LP Special had it and it followed the pickups (SHED P90s) when I swapped then into an SG! You can hear every time I hit the pickup selector here. And even with the tone knob turned down to 0 during the woman tone sections you can hear it... https://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=8291529

One of my favorites so far! Nice tone!

I've experienced it many times with Throbaks, and in their first few runs I saw more more than one that got too microphonic. I actually have fixed a few microphonic issues with Throbaks. I love microphonic pickups. Old timer Gretsch fans used to call that wood in the sound "knock"!

That's not an issue as long as they find a few good examples of PAF tone that's good enough. Most of them from the good years share enough DNA to make the chase worthwhile. And that's why Throbak offers more than one good variant of that tone. And yes, the original bursts and goldtops do have a considerably different wood tone than the newer ones further confusing things.

The exact science is finding great examples from the past, finding out why they sounded so good, and then consistently being able to wind a pickup that gets that solid tone consistently. I know Throbak pickups are expensive, but frankly, I've never heard a bad one. And yes, maybe a pickup is not too complicated of an item, but sourcing the right materials to assemble pickups takes a bit, and I think Throbak not only sourced the right materials, they put the work in to get the details that make the pickup winding right, and they got the winders. The proof is in their track record. They make a consistently good pickup. And they sell for what people will pay for them! And these Gibson pickups? Most people around here know that I'm a Gibson fan, but I don't think they are that consistent in their pickups. They have hit and misses even in the same pickups. I've heard and installed many good and bad examples of Classic 57's, Burstbuckers, and Custombuckers. If I truly thought they had nailed the original PAF tone, I would buck up the money for these limited editions, but I seriously doubt they did,

who's the guy in Salt Lake City?

What do you mean not for profit? The run of 1000 sold out immediately, I bet that was a pretty profit! That said, for the big money (still less than a $1000) I would rather go with Throbak.

I also like some DiMarzio pickups (biased though as I'm endorsed by them for acoustic pickups). I recently put a set of Twang Kings in one of new Tele builds... and I also put a PAF-59 and a Super Distortion in the bridge of my Telecaster Deluxe. As for Duncans I have a set of custom Shop Peter Green pickups in my Tobacco Burst H150... and a Billy Gibbons BG1400 in another one of my Tele builds...