So, I purchased a “fix-it-up” guitar from a local Ebay second chance music store.
It’s a John Lennon model Epiphone EJ-160. As you can see from the link it is a replica of the acoustic-electric that Lennon was seen with on "Hard Days Night.
The reason for it being sold as a fix-up is that its mini acoustic humbucker pickup pretty much broke into pieces and fell apart. Other than that the guitar is pristine.
So here’s my choices -
1 - find a replacement for the humbucker, install it, and pat myself on the back for saving hundreds of dollars off the retail price
2 - try to repair the pickup (I’m good with a soldering gun/iron and actually I r an electrical enguneer*) Only problem is that besides the fact that the guts of the pickup are separated, the plastic front piece is now actually multiple sections of a plastic front piece.
3 - Pull the electronics, take off the electric strings, put on some acoustic strings and forget about playing the guitar electrically. As a full sized jumbo it’s got great acoustic tone with the right strings. Still a bargain at the price I paid.
Right now I’m still working on choice number one but have as yet to find ANYBODY that offers a replacement pickup (with plastic front piece) that will fit this guitar. Maybe I’m looking in the wrong areas so that’s why I through this out here.
I invited the group from this ongoing guitar thread to this thread. I wanted to
put this in it’s own thread so as not to monopolize discussion in that one.
Old, old engineer joke meant to show that engineers are smart in engineering but nothing else
I wouldn’t try to fix the pickup, it’d be more trouble than it’s worth. I’m not an electrical enguneer, but I am the son of one, and I’m pretty familiar with soldering irons myself, and also with what’s inside pickups.
What I’d do is what I did do for my acoustics: I bought a decent soundhole pickup - an LR Baggs M1, which, as magnetic pickups for acoustic guitar go, is remarkably good.
And, really, it depends on what you want to do with the guitar. Do you just want to play it casually or do you want to do gigs with it? If you’re just playing at home, you don’t need a pickup, and if you want to record with it a decent mike will always sound better than any acoustic pickup.
ETA: The Baggs pickup I have is designed to work with acoustic strings, by the way.
Shakester’s option is also legitimate. Basically, there is a solution out there. Actually, probably several solutions. Part of the question here is how you want it to sound afterwards. Full on humbucking howl? P90 like the original? A pizieo bridge?
Well, dang Shakester, you ought to know better than saying something like that to a certified nerd. You probably meant that as a warning but it sounded totally like *challenge *to me.
The jury is still out on whether this one joins my flock or gets resold so I’m still inclined to try to put it back to it’s original condition. I’d much rather get it operational and pass the discount on to the buyer (I’m not really interested in turning a profit on it and E-Sabbeth’s $100 Duncan suggestion would put my total cost into this guitar at right around a decent price as a used working EJ-160
The world is a much safer and better place without my live performances.
I agree, but for now, that’s still plan B.
Also, If you do a little casual searching about this particular guitar you would see that it’s sound is not at all acoustic (pu or miked) but that of an electric guitar with the sustain and envelope characteristics of jumbo acoustic guitar. So, while it might just turn out to be a stand alone dandy acoustic (I haven’t strung acoustic strings on it and the factory electrics that are on it sound flat when acoustic strumming) that’s really not the sound that is desired for this guitar that was built to mimic Lennon’s sound.
That’s good to know. I may look into that for my other acoustic guitars. Thanks for the info.
I’m aiming for the “Lennon” sound that inspired this remake. There seems to be a little bit of chatter about the re-issue pickups being kind of flat as some have suggested in your link so I wouldn’t be apposed to an upgrade.
So P90 like the original is my answer. Original stock P90 is good, upgrade p90 replacement is better. Somebody suggested a stacked P100 instead but I would hesitate to try it as it may not fit.
Before I started this thread I had no idea exactly what style the pickup was so I’m already much better off in my pursuit.
Watching this from a distance while I grab minutes of wi-fi connectivity during the family spring break trip. Nothing to add to the good deduction work so far.
Shakester’s solutions are inexpensive and practical, but given your goal of finding a drop-in, E-Sabs and your own research seem promising.
You’ve checked Gibson and acoustic guitar message boards? Seems like folks would discuss stuff like this there. How did the pickup break? If this happens to that model it would be discussed. If it was a random thing, then less likely.
I have some pics and links to them and will put them in my next post. I’m sending from home so my upload speed is crippled as most of my bandwidth is configured for download.
Wordman I bought the guitar this way. It was a new guitar that was sold through a salvage retailer (Soundscheap - on EBay). They buy pallets of seconds, busts, demos and also new equipment, evaluate it, and then price it on Ebay.
So, while a brand new EJ-160 never seems to to fall below $499, I was able to pick this one up for around $280. At that price point I figured worst case scenario was - strip the electronics and I have a decent acoustic guitar.
But I wouldn’t mind restoring it to new or better and I’ve given myself a goal of "keep the final product below $399 so I got $119 in the pocket to spend and then pat myself on the back for saving at least $100 off retail.
Here is a link to various photos of the guitar and parts. LINK I posted comments on most pics.
I may have assembled the pickup correctly but honestly, it’s probably missing some important parts.
I know its missing whatever it takes to attach it to the guitar.
E-Sabbath - That Pickup looks sweet but take a close look at the location of the PU hole on the guitar. Not a lot of real estate in that area. The neck stops about 1/4 inch above that hole which I guess that’s why the PU seems to have it’s upper coil at that hole with the lower coil hidden under the wood.
Wordman I’ve Googled and searched a bunch of different ways and uncovered very few discussions about these guitars that included info on replacing these pickups. It doesn’t help that Epiphone only refers to these things as “mini-humbucking-acoustic-pickups”. It wasn’t until E-Sabbath’s reply that I saw that they were a P90’s P100’s style pickup.
Most comments say that these things have crappy pickups and then the opinions vary on improvement, inferiority compared to the Gibson model, or “yes, they are nostalgically crappy on purpose”
FYI, I havent seen the pics of the pickup but if can find the P-90 variant, they are generally considered to sound better vs. the P-100 which is considered a blend of humbucker and P-90 but the lesser parts of both…
Two coils = not a P-90. A P-90 is a single coil pickup with a bar magnet and screw-type pole-pieces.
That pickup is a humbucker, and by the look of it a particular type of humbucker that’s probably unique to the J-180. Yes, it looks like the pole-piece screws are supposed to stick up that far; in that design they need to stick out a lot to get close enough to the strings.
The good news is that it seems like only the mounting plate is broken, from what you wrote I thought you meant that the coil bobbins had crumbled. You can carve a new mounting plate yourself out of pickguard material. Time consuming, but easy enough to do.
If he wants to try and salvage the pickup, would it make sense to assemble and connect it, maybe with a crude mounting plate made out of cardboard or something, just to see if it still works?
Well, the Pickup cover is broken. Any kind of a mounting plate is missing.
I’m somewhat perplexed as to how the pickup stayed in place unless there was once some kind of bracket that the faceplate mounting screws tapped into to hold the pickup in place. But those screws are wood screws. Doesn’t make much sense as a mounting method.
I may have to search a few guitar centers and peek inside a new model to see what’s holding the pickup inside.
Yes, it’s a humbucker. I thought it was a P-90 from E-Sabbath’s link above to another discussion forum. But def of P-90 is single coil. I’m learning fast.
I took the factory strings off and got a better look at the innards. Then I threw a set of acoustic strings on it and tried it out. Had a nice feel to it but soundwise it comes in last compared to my other pawn shop rescued acoustics.
When I finally get the pickup mounted back inside I’ll put an electric set on it and plug it in. If it don’t sing well enough it may be headed back to Ebay or used as a trade in.
Holy cow I just figured it out! Why didn’t I look closer before?
Yes, What I thought was just part of the broken cover plate is actually the mounting bracket.
Each of the 6 pole screws fits through a large individual hole in the plate but then there are two screws which go through smaller holes to cinch the pickup into place.
In this pic you can see on the left one remaining unbroken hole for the pole screws.
Inthis pic you can see the two tension screws with springs on them.
Now that I know how it works I can get off my lazy butt and cut out a replacement part.
Yep, that’s how it goes. The problem with replacing it with a normal P90 or a normal humbucker would be that the mounting plate for this specific guitar is on the top coil, and not between the two. I’m not sure a normal P90 would fit without shifting down. But you could put a strat pickup there pretty easily.
I can’t tell from the photos, but I think something like this (yes, you can also get it in black) could squeeze into that spot if the original pickup turns out to be unworthy or unfixable. I don’t know how you’d mount it in there, but I’m sure there’s ways. And you’d still have a humbucker like before.
