Asat Classic pick-up and pickguard.

[10drum]

Greetings,

I'm new here.
I hope I've chosen the right forum.
I took a 2003 asat classic in trade for one of my Martins. I'm a Fender guy so I was glad to give it a try.
The neck pick-up had some static issues and after doing some research I think it is a cheap replacement pick-up. I'd like to replace it with this original G&L p/up:

http://www.glguitars.com/shopping/shopexd.asp?id=241

I will also need the pickguard because the one that came with this guitar has 2 adjustment screw holes. Will a standard Tele pickguard be cut right for this guitar & p/up and if not where can I find an original pickguard? I think tortoise shell would look good on this guitar.

Thanks for all replies

[JagInTheBag]

Welcome 10drum! Chandler is the oe vendor for replacement pick guards, http://pickguards.us/

They should be able to take care of you. Congrasts on the ASAT!

~JagInTheBag

[louis cyfer]

the 2 screw holes are so you can adjust the overall pup height without taking the pg off. not a bad thing at all. tortoise shell will not look good on that guitar.

[Craig]

Greetings,

I'm new here.
I hope I've chosen the right forum.
I took a 2003 asat classic in trade for one of my Martins. I'm a Fender guy so I was glad to give it a try.
The neck pick-up had some static issues and after doing some research I think it is a cheap replacement pick-up. I'd like to replace it with this original G&L p/up:

http://www.glguitars.com/shopping/shopexd.asp?id=241

I will also need the pickguard because the one that came with this guitar has 2 adjustment screw holes. Will a standard Tele pickguard be cut right for this guitar & p/up and if not where can I find an original pickguard? I think tortoise shell would look good on this guitar.

Thanks for all replies

This is the correct forum, but see this post: READ THIS FIRST - About The Project Page sub-forum .... You've got to post some pictures!
I'd like to see if the neck pickup was previously replaced.

You will need a G&L ASAT Classic pickguard if you want to replace the existing one. As mentioned by JagInTheBag, the
link he provided is to the vendor who supplies pickguards to G&L.

tortoise shell will not look good on that guitar.

You need to know why louis answered without first seeing your guitar. He dislikes Tortise Shell and Pearloid pickguards
on any guitar. And, of course, you weren't asking for opinions on the pickguard, just where to find an original one.

Hope this helps.

[10drum]

Thanks all,

I know the holes are to adjust the p/up height, I haven't seen any asat classics with the adjustment screw holes. This guitar has a tele style chrome neck p/up. Did G&L make some like that? I may try a seymour duncan '54 in there first, I can pick up one of those for less than $40 from a friend, but I was just trying to keep it original.

I did wonder why he thought tortoise wouldn't look good, oh well, I'll try a different p/up before I buy a pickguard anyway.

Any suggestions as to which is the best photo storage site? I'll post some photos soon.

Thanks again.

[Michael-GnL-Michael]

Thanks all,

I know the holes are to adjust the p/up height, I haven't seen any asat classics with the adjustment screw holes. This guitar has a tele style chrome neck p/up. Did G&L make some like that? I may try a seymour duncan '54 in there first, I can pick up one of those for less than $40 from a friend, but I was just trying to keep it original.

I did wonder why he thought tortoise wouldn't look good, oh well, I'll try a different p/up before I buy a pickguard anyway.

Any suggestions as to which is the best photo storage site? I'll post some photos soon.

Thanks again.

You should first determine whether that pickguard is an original. The ASAT Classic pickguard looks the same but there are actually several different models with slight differences. Chandler, (the pickguard company linked above and also the supplier to G&L) requests a precise tracing when ordering ASAT Classic pickguards. If it is an original from the factory, often there is a model number on the backside. If you remove the pickguard and look on the back you can check. If it matches a model Chandler offers then it is an original G&L/ Chandler guard and not some sort of special order from another company. You also will have the correct number and not have to provide a tracing.

Photobucket has worked well for my needs.

Did you describe the guitar's finish somewhere on the forum?

We will be more than happy to inform you in advance of placing the order whether you are making the wrong choice.

[10drum]

Michael,

There are no numbers on the back side of the pick guard. I did not describe the finish. I think it may ash, bound on the top only, seems to be without any stain, and clear coated. The guitar has a birds eye maple neck. I pulled the neck to check the date and the body is stamped with 2003 and it looks like the neck has a 03 date made with a sharpie with some art work similar to what I see on railroad cars. All in all its a nice guitar. I took some relief out of the neck, strung with 10's, and adjusted the action, it plays great, the bridge p/up has a great tone but the neck is just fair. I will try out the seymour duncan for now but I may go ahead and order a stock G&L p/up and probably get an original guard if I decide to sell it later.

Thanks for all the help I will check out photobucket.

[Craig]

Please do post a photo of the bridge pickup. If it is the stock MFD, then I can
understand why the neck pickup sounds bad. Leo designed the bridge pickup so that
aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it. That's why there is a modified bridge
pickup in the USA ASAT Classic Blues Boy, so that the neck SD Seth Lover blends well with it.
See the Gallery Album: Instrument Manuals and Wiring Schematics:
Album: ASAT Classic Bluesboy Wiring Diagram and Picture Diagrams.

If the stock bridge pickup is still there, I suggest you get a stock neck MFD pickup and you should
be good to go.

Hope this helps.

[editorjuno]

"Leo designed the bridge pickup so that aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it." While I certainly agree that the ASAT Classic's bridge MFD (essentially a P-90 in the Tele bridge form factor with ceramic magnets instead of Gibson's alnico, not so much a design per se as an adaptation) doesn't play well with traditional-style Tele neck pickups, there's a universe of aftermarket Tele neck pickups that work perfectly fine with it. Of course if you already know that you like how the stock MFD neck pickup performs, it makes perfect sense to get one -- but there are tons of usable alternatives out there if the MFD isn't your cup of tea, and there's also the option of replacing both pickups for assured balance and blend.

I replaced the bridge pickup in my Tribute Classic Semihollow and at first thought the neck MFD was sort of OK, not wonderful but passable as in "I can live with that." Now that I've replaced both pickups, I'd no longer consider an MFD for either position -- but that's just me, I know a lot of players swear by their factory pickups. The bottom line that there is more than one way to arrive at "good to go" -- assuming you have the standard (non-Bluesboy) bridge MFD, installing a neck MFD is just the most straightforward way to get there.

Please do post a photo of the bridge pickup. If it is the stock MFD, then I can
understand why the neck pickup sounds bad. Leo designed the bridge pickup so that
aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it. That's why there is a modified bridge
pickup in the USA ASAT Classic Blues Boy, so that the neck SD Seth Lover blends well with it.
See the Gallery Album: Instrument Manuals and Wiring Schematics:
Album: ASAT Classic Bluesboy Wiring Diagram and Picture Diagrams.

If the stock bridge pickup is still there, I suggest you get a stock neck MFD pickup and you should
be good to go.

Hope this helps.

[louis cyfer]

"Leo designed the bridge pickup so that aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it." While I certainly agree that the ASAT Classic's bridge MFD (essentially a P-90 in the Tele bridge form factor with ceramic magnets instead of Gibson's alnico, not so much a design per se as an adaptation) doesn't play well with traditional-style Tele neck pickups, there's a universe of aftermarket Tele neck pickups that work perfectly fine with it. Of course if you already know that you like how the stock MFD neck pickup performs, it makes perfect sense to get one -- but there are tons of usable alternatives out there if the MFD isn't your cup of tea, and there's also the option of replacing both pickups for assured balance and blend.

I replaced the bridge pickup in my Tribute Classic Semihollow and at first thought the neck MFD was sort of OK, not wonderful but passable as in "I can live with that." Now that I've replaced both pickups, I'd no longer consider an MFD for either position -- but that's just me, I know a lot of players swear by their factory pickups. The bottom line that there is more than one way to arrive at "good to go" -- assuming you have the standard (non-Bluesboy) bridge MFD, installing a neck MFD is just the most straightforward way to get there.

Please do post a photo of the bridge pickup. If it is the stock MFD, then I can
understand why the neck pickup sounds bad. Leo designed the bridge pickup so that
aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it. That's why there is a modified bridge
pickup in the USA ASAT Classic Blues Boy, so that the neck SD Seth Lover blends well with it.
See the Gallery Album: Instrument Manuals and Wiring Schematics:
Album: ASAT Classic Bluesboy Wiring Diagram and Picture Diagrams.

If the stock bridge pickup is still there, I suggest you get a stock neck MFD pickup and you should
be good to go.

Hope this helps.

what pups did you replace them with?

[editorjuno]

"Leo designed the bridge pickup so that aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it." While I certainly agree that the ASAT Classic's bridge MFD (essentially a P-90 in the Tele bridge form factor with ceramic magnets instead of Gibson's alnico, not so much a design per se as an adaptation) doesn't play well with traditional-style Tele neck pickups, there's a universe of aftermarket Tele neck pickups that work perfectly fine with it. Of course if you already know that you like how the stock MFD neck pickup performs, it makes perfect sense to get one -- but there are tons of usable alternatives out there if the MFD isn't your cup of tea, and there's also the option of replacing both pickups for assured balance and blend.

I replaced the bridge pickup in my Tribute Classic Semihollow and at first thought the neck MFD was sort of OK, not wonderful but passable as in "I can live with that." Now that I've replaced both pickups, I'd no longer consider an MFD for either position -- but that's just me, I know a lot of players swear by their factory pickups. The bottom line that there is more than one way to arrive at "good to go" -- assuming you have the standard (non-Bluesboy) bridge MFD, installing a neck MFD is just the most straightforward way to get there.

Please do post a photo of the bridge pickup. If it is the stock MFD, then I can
understand why the neck pickup sounds bad. Leo designed the bridge pickup so that
aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it. That's why there is a modified bridge
pickup in the USA ASAT Classic Blues Boy, so that the neck SD Seth Lover blends well with it.
See the Gallery Album: Instrument Manuals and Wiring Schematics:
Album: ASAT Classic Bluesboy Wiring Diagram and Picture Diagrams.

If the stock bridge pickup is still there, I suggest you get a stock neck MFD pickup and you should
be good to go.

Hope this helps.

what pups did you replace them with?

These (toward the bottom of the page), and they're never coming out. The website may be a bit quaint and amateurish, but the pickups are simply astonishing:

http://wildepickups.com/Home_Page.html

The cool thing is that a Tele set costs less than what many "boutique" Fender clone makers get for one pickup! Like the MFDs (and P-90s), MicroCoils have mild steel adjustable pole pieces, but that's where the resemblance ends. I could write a lot more, but I suspect I'd come off too much a like a shill for Bill's work, especially since we've known each other for 40+ years.

[louis cyfer]

"Leo designed the bridge pickup so that aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it." While I certainly agree that the ASAT Classic's bridge MFD (essentially a P-90 in the Tele bridge form factor with ceramic magnets instead of Gibson's alnico, not so much a design per se as an adaptation) doesn't play well with traditional-style Tele neck pickups, there's a universe of aftermarket Tele neck pickups that work perfectly fine with it. Of course if you already know that you like how the stock MFD neck pickup performs, it makes perfect sense to get one -- but there are tons of usable alternatives out there if the MFD isn't your cup of tea, and there's also the option of replacing both pickups for assured balance and blend.

I replaced the bridge pickup in my Tribute Classic Semihollow and at first thought the neck MFD was sort of OK, not wonderful but passable as in "I can live with that." Now that I've replaced both pickups, I'd no longer consider an MFD for either position -- but that's just me, I know a lot of players swear by their factory pickups. The bottom line that there is more than one way to arrive at "good to go" -- assuming you have the standard (non-Bluesboy) bridge MFD, installing a neck MFD is just the most straightforward way to get there.

Please do post a photo of the bridge pickup. If it is the stock MFD, then I can
understand why the neck pickup sounds bad. Leo designed the bridge pickup so that
aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it. That's why there is a modified bridge
pickup in the USA ASAT Classic Blues Boy, so that the neck SD Seth Lover blends well with it.
See the Gallery Album: Instrument Manuals and Wiring Schematics:
Album: ASAT Classic Bluesboy Wiring Diagram and Picture Diagrams.

If the stock bridge pickup is still there, I suggest you get a stock neck MFD pickup and you should
be good to go.

Hope this helps.

what pups did you replace them with?

These (toward the bottom of the page), and they're never coming out. The website may be a bit quaint and amateurish, but the pickups are simply astonishing:

http://wildepickups.com/Home_Page.html

The cool thing is that a Tele set costs less than what many "boutique" Fender clone makers get for one pickup! Like the MFDs (and P-90s), MicroCoils have mild steel adjustable pole pieces, but that's where the resemblance ends. I could write a lot more, but I suspect I'd come off too much a like a shill for Bill's work, especially since we've known each other for 40+ years.

i am quite familiar with bill's work so no need to talk them up, they are great pups indeed, and his prices exceedingly reasonable. i have not tried those microcoils, but would love to, and to have a little more understanding about them. i have used bill's pups form the days when he still owned bill lawrence, i have a few old ones around. i also like the l280's and the keystones.
i read ron's summary of the conversations he had with bill about the microcoils on tdpri, and i have a lot of respect for rons's opinions, but after reading all that i am still not clear about the technology that is going in these pups.

[editorjuno]

"Leo designed the bridge pickup so that aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it." While I certainly agree that the ASAT Classic's bridge MFD (essentially a P-90 in the Tele bridge form factor with ceramic magnets instead of Gibson's alnico, not so much a design per se as an adaptation) doesn't play well with traditional-style Tele neck pickups, there's a universe of aftermarket Tele neck pickups that work perfectly fine with it. Of course if you already know that you like how the stock MFD neck pickup performs, it makes perfect sense to get one -- but there are tons of usable alternatives out there if the MFD isn't your cup of tea, and there's also the option of replacing both pickups for assured balance and blend.

I replaced the bridge pickup in my Tribute Classic Semihollow and at first thought the neck MFD was sort of OK, not wonderful but passable as in "I can live with that." Now that I've replaced both pickups, I'd no longer consider an MFD for either position -- but that's just me, I know a lot of players swear by their factory pickups. The bottom line that there is more than one way to arrive at "good to go" -- assuming you have the standard (non-Bluesboy) bridge MFD, installing a neck MFD is just the most straightforward way to get there.

Please do post a photo of the bridge pickup. If it is the stock MFD, then I can
understand why the neck pickup sounds bad. Leo designed the bridge pickup so that
aftermarket neck pickups will not work well with it. That's why there is a modified bridge
pickup in the USA ASAT Classic Blues Boy, so that the neck SD Seth Lover blends well with it.
See the Gallery Album: Instrument Manuals and Wiring Schematics:
Album: ASAT Classic Bluesboy Wiring Diagram and Picture Diagrams.

If the stock bridge pickup is still there, I suggest you get a stock neck MFD pickup and you should
be good to go.

Hope this helps.

what pups did you replace them with?

These (toward the bottom of the page), and they're never coming out. The website may be a bit quaint and amateurish, but the pickups are simply astonishing:

http://wildepickups.com/Home_Page.html

The cool thing is that a Tele set costs less than what many "boutique" Fender clone makers get for one pickup! Like the MFDs (and P-90s), MicroCoils have mild steel adjustable pole pieces, but that's where the resemblance ends. I could write a lot more, but I suspect I'd come off too much a like a shill for Bill's work, especially since we've known each other for 40+ years.

i am quite familiar with bill's work so no need to talk them up, they are great pups indeed, and his prices exceedingly reasonable. i have not tried those microcoils, but would love to, and to have a little more understanding about them. i have used bill's pups form the days when he still owned bill lawrence, i have a few old ones around. i also like the l280's and the keystones.
i read ron's summary of the conversations he had with bill about the microcoils on tdpri, and i have a lot of respect for rons's opinions, but after reading all that i am still not clear about the technology that is going in these pups.

Perhaps this unfinished write-up will clarify that issue. If you find that it does, feel free to share it wherever you feel it can be useful to others:
_____

(Note: Below I will try to convey some of my limited understanding of the MicroCoils -- I am neither a pickup designer nor a physicist, so all the useful and accurate information comes from Bill while any errors in my explanation are strictly my own.)

Like many revolutionary products, the MicroCoils are deceptively simple in principle -- they are single-coil guitar pickups, superficially similar to such venerable designs as Gibson's famous P-90. They feature screw-adjustable, unhardened steel pole pieces charged by a bar magnet, just like an old P-90. Now I like a good P-90 as much as the next guy and they're featured in many famous recordings, but their flaws are also very well known. For example, they pick up an enormous amount of AC hum (a trait that turned Gibson toward humbucking pickups in the 1950s), they tend to be one-trick ponies tonally (especially in solid-body guitars), and as they age they become notoriously vulnerable to frustrating microphonic squealing at rock and roll stage volumes.

So, you may well ask, if MicroCoils are like P-90s, what makes them revolutionary? As a player and listener I can boil that down to one word -- performance -- but that doesn't explain Bill's achievement. Part of what separates the MicroCoils from all previous single-coil designs is materials -- neodymium bar magnets were not available circa 1950, and neither was a coil winding technology capable of handling the extremely fine magnet wire necessary to build a MicroCoil. Being able to wind with such fine wire at high speed on oblong coil forms without introducing tone-sucking flaws is another major part of what makes the MicroCoils possible, because using fine wire allows more turns of wire for any given winding space.

The "Micro" in MicroCoil refers to the very narrow winding space Bill specified. Limiting the available winding space has a couple of key advantages. First of all, it limits hum to a level that's so low that many at first don't believe they're listening to a true single-coil pickup. More importantly, at least as I see it, the narrower the winding space the more phase coherent the signal coming from the pickup. Most electric guitarists are at least somewhat familiar with phasing issues -- the famous "quack" tone of a Fender Stratocaster comes from the partial phase cancellation that occurs when the outputs of two nearly adjacent pickups are combined, as they are in switch positions 2 and 4 of a Strat.

What's not so well known is that more subtle -- but definitely audible -- partial phase cancellations also occur within a pickup's coil because part of the signal is coming from turns close to the string and part of it comes from turns considerably further away. For true phase coherence, every turn of the pickup's coil would have to be equidistant from the string, a practical impossibility. What Bill did was to minimize phase cancellation to the extent that's practical by specifying that very narrow MicroCoil winding space. This is what allows the MicroCoils' exquisite tonal purity, which I'm sure Bill could explain in proper technical terms but to my ear comes across as a sense of intimacy with the string that I've never heard from any other guitar pickup -- it's like a MicroCoil is a freshly washed pane of clear glass, while traditional single-coil designs are more like a piece of waxed paper or even cheesecloth, with the pickup's coil dimensions impacting clarity in a way that cannot be readily corrected elsewhere in the signal chain. In contrast, the more phase coherent, transparent clarity of a MicroCoil can be readily altered to achieve all manner of "waxed paper" or "cheesecloth" effects -- but the player is never stuck with a sound he may only want once in a while. One of Bill's design watchwords has always been "versatility," and their transparency helps make MicroCoils amazingly versatile.

Efficiency

Another advantage of the MicroCoils' narrow winding space is that more turns closer to the strings make for improved efficiency -- more signal for any given inductance. An additional factor in the MicroCoils' impressive efficiency is the meticulous design of the magnetic circuit. Total magnetism -- which experts call the "energy product" -- has two components. Just as electricity has voltage and current (amperes), magnetism has magnetic attraction (gauss) and demagnetization force (oersted). While magnetic attraction is what causes string-strangling problems like "Stratitis" and loss of sustain, it turns out it's the demagnetization force that's more relevant to how much signal is generated. One type of magnet that favors the desirable demagnetization force over the often-troublesome magnetic attraction is the modern neodymium variety. Unfortunately, such magnets are far too strong -- they have a very large total energy product -- to charge pole pieces directly. Bill's MicroCoil magnetic circuit includes a steel moderator bar between the neodymium bar magnet and the pole pieces -- this maintains a favorable ratio of demagnetization force to magnetic attraction while reducing the latter to a level that avoids loss of sustain or "Stratitis."

Wonderful "side effects"

Bill's design goal of versatility implies that the instrument's controls be highly effective in altering the sound -- for high inductance designs like the Bill's famous L-500XL humbucker, the best way to meet that goal is to employ an inductor (passive coil) in a tone control circuit that optionally also includes a resistor along with the usual capacitor in a circuit Bill calls a "Q-Filter." Without getting into the actual math, the very fine wire used in the MicroCoils increases the electrical resistance (Er) and thus alters the LCR (inductance/capacitance/resistance) interaction that determines (among other things) how the tone control operates. This in turn allows a conventional tone circuit (comprising a potentiometer wired as a variable resistor in series with a capacitor) to operate much more effectively than it does with conventional single-coils and eliminates the need for an inductor as in the "Q-Filter." This means that the MicroCoils can be perfect, "drop-in" replacement pickups -- at most, you might find you like a different capacitor value, but the tone circuit can remain just like it came from the factory. I found the typical 22 nanofarad (.022 mFd) "chicklet" capacitor in my guitar to be pretty much perfect.

Another wonderful "side effect" of installing MicroCoils is that the same altered LCR interaction that permits a conventional tone circuit also minimizes the effect of cable capacitance. Excessive cable capacitance has a major impact on the performance of guitars with high inductance pickups and even many lower inductance models wound with a typically thicker magnet wire -- to avoid severe losses in the cable, low capacitance cable (20 picofarad/foot or lower) is a must and even then cable length needs to considered. With the MicroCoils, this issue becomes pretty much a non-problem -- you can use virtually any cable for a short (ten feet or less) run, or choose a low-capacitance cable (I use Bill's cable and solderless plugs) that's considerably longer with no ill effects -- I just measured the cable I've been using regularly and it's nearly 15 feet long!
_____

Like I said, it's unfinished -- I just hope you find it helpful!