TalismanRich

I haven't pulled out the pedalboard to restructure things yet. I need to redo it all. And it's not like I'm busy since there's still snow everywhere, and more coming tomorrow. I'm just feeling lazy. I put the H-140 in the case, pulled out the ASAT and the 535. No pedals involved. Sometimes not even an amp involved. Just me and my guitars.

Many years ago, custom options were almost the norm. The guys would work with people to build guitars that are much different from the standard line. Pressure has several custom made guitars. He likes spruce, so he has a unique Millennium with a spruce top. Heritage had a system called the VIP (Var-I-Phase) and D-VIP. The switches could implement a coil tap, and phase reversal. The 3 knob, 3 switch is a D-VIP. You have master volume and master tone, and the third knob would vary the blending of the phase of the pickups depending on the switches. I would probably go with the 22, as I like Seth Lovers, unless it was a color I didn't like. My favorite is obviously the red, followed by natural, then sunburst. They now use Heritage branded tuners, with kidney beans. I don't know who is making the tuners, but I'm guessing that Edwin Wilson probably chose a manufacturer and had the branding set up. It's not an unusual thing to do. Just call Gotoh, Grover, Guyker, Wilkinson, etc and tell them you want 1000 sets, and they'll happily give you a price. Many people change the tuners. It's not difficult, as long as you check the dimensions.

I think there is a distinct difference between the headstock on the archtops like my 525 and the Eagles vs the 150/535/137. I remember the black 555 that was given away at PSP in 2016 had a bigger headstock than the standard 535. Sorry for the blurry photo, but it's the only one I have.

Bolero's looks very much like mine, which is a 2005. This has the Sheptone Tribute pickups, otherwise it's stock.

I think "50s" neck is meaningless. It varied at Gibson from 52 to 59. Every one was hand rolled and there were more than one person doing the work. Generally 50s means thicker. 60s SGs had thinner necks than 59 LPs. I certainly haven't played enough old Gibsons to say they are all the same, but the ones I've played varied. As for quality issues, I have 5 Heritage guitars from an 87 to 08. The only thing I have really done as a "repair" was changing the pickups in my H140 (it was used and one of the pickups was really screwed up). I put Sheptones in my 535, but just to try them. They sound different from the stock Schallers. I also changed the pots and caps in my 157 to see if there was any improvement. I can't say it was better. The Vishay Poly caps are good, so I don't think the oil filled caps improved anything. One advantage of the later models is the use of SD59s in place of the Schaller pickups. People used to pull the Schallers and put in new pickups, often SD59s or Seth Lovers. Now they pull the SDs and put in something else. On a Semi, that's a harder task than on a solid body with an access panel for the controls. Some people don't like the Schaller bridge and tailpiece. They change them to ABR or Nashville types, which are usually lighter. My 535 already came that way, so not all have the Schaller hardware. A couple of the Grovers on my 535 were getting tight, so last year, I changed to locking Grovers, and used keystone buttons instead of kidney beans. Strictly a choice. Normal factory is Grovers with kidney beans. They can be replaced in about an hour for under $100 if you want. You can see how they look in this thread.

All earlier 535s don't necessarily have thin necks. First, since they were all hand carved, there was some variation in the necks. They had templates to check as they were working the neck, but they would vary. My 535 neck (2005) is rounder and beefier than my 03 H157 or 87 H-140. There's a slight difference in shape as well. Second, different people did the carving. Marv could be different from Arnie. The guitars from the past few years have tended to be on the thicker side, but you'll still see a bit of variation between individual instruments. If you have the opportunity to play the guitar first, I would highly advise that. Some people are very picky about the feel, others can play varying thicknesses, but shape makes a difference. My Strat has a VERY thick neck, my 140 is relatively thin. Both are comfortable. I've played several PRS guitars and I hated the shape. They hit my thumb in a manner that was actually painful in a short time. I have a dislike of wide/flat necks. Hardware can be changed if you want, but the neck and body are pretty much set in stone.... er... wood.

I was hoping it wasn't a self portrait!

Since Wilson was so deeply involved with the Gibson Custom Shop, and then setting up the Custom Core line, you would expect them to be quite similar. The man apparently was VERY good at what he did. I"m hoping that Kuz doesn't run into any of the issues with the nitro peeling that some folks with Murphy Lab guitars have experienced. I know he takes extraordinary care of his guitars, so it there's a problem, it won't be from his lack of care.

It's time to change things up for the new year and the pedal board is the target. For years I've been using a OneSpot to power the pedals, but it means I need to run an extension cord. At last years PSP, Bill Durkin had a supply that ran off of battery, so I was looking around and found this for $40 on sale. 4400mAh and enough spots to cover all of my pedals. Charge it up and fire up the pedal board without that extra wiring. I'm curious as to how much time I'll get from a charge. In a pinch I can always plug it in and keep going. I have never had a compressor on my board, and thought it was time I try one. When I'm jamming with my buddies, I sometime have a problem with keeping levels right since we're going direct in and I'm using the Iridium. Maybe this will even things out. I liked JHS's Notaklon, so I'm hoping this will work out.

I would hate to load the wiring harness into that thing. A plain jane 535 is hard enough.

MM, I didn't know you had the Tulk's PSP white whale. Maybe you could answer a question. Looking at the guitar in the pic, do I see a pair of mini switches, ala VIP switching? The original pics in the gallery are gone from that PSP, and all I have is from the video. Being that there were 14 years between Iron Mike's '96 and the 2010 PSP, I'm guessing they were not made at the same time.

I'm with you Daniel. I think the Gibson guard looks clunky. I don't understand changing it as an "upgrade", or putting on the poker chip for that matter. It might have made sense in 1952, but after 70+ years, you would think players would know what the switch does.

It was discussed here. It hasn't been officially announced. At this point it's just a teaser.

The PSP guitar was a 555, just custom ordered with chrome hardware, which apparently is a common request and block inlays. I happen to like gold hardware, which I have on my H157 and 2000 Millennium. I seem to remember the guys talking about how white guitars were very hard to spray correctly. Any imperfection was easily seen. There aren't a lot of white ones out there.

My bad.... I know... I know. Block inlays, headstock inlay, although it has chrome hardware. I posted the darn pic. Maybe I should have looked at it!!! 🤪

Our friend Tulk won the white 535 in 2010. No Bigsby was seen.

That's one of the complaints all the haters have on that other forum.

You're a good Grandpa, MG. Passing along a love of music and fine instruments to make it is a fine legacy.

I did a bit of gamma correction to give a better view of the headstock itself. Now, is this going to be a commercial product, or is someone just making a personal guitar, or something to show at an upcoming NAMM show? Heritage has always done a bit of customizing for the shows to show their abilities. I wonder if NoSnowBlower has any insight. He seemed to have an inside track on things.

In the picture posted on Facebook, you can see that the headstock does say Heritage. Interestingly, the headstock appears to have an outward flare.

That's the big brother of my H-140. The more I see them, the more I like a classic cherry burst finish! I don't know why they get so much hate.

Hey, some of just buy some guitars and then.... KEEP THEM! I've been looking at several guitars, and then I decide instead to just go pick up one of the guitars I already have, and the need to buy something fades away. Buy some new strings and make it sound fresh and new! I have seen a few on Reverb, and actually saw one on the local Craigslist. They're out there.

The cure for that is to pick up a guitar every day. It's a "use it or lose it" thing. Now you just need to let your hair grow out about a foot so that fan can blow it back... rock star style!

It looks like you're having a good time!

I have one from every PSP starting with #2. I don't know if there was one for the 1st PSP. One year wasn't a tee shirt, it was blue with buttons, if I recall. I would need to go up and root through the closet to see. A few years we even had hats.