NGD (sorta) & Changing 58/15LT out for 58/15MT

Greywolf said:
Congrats , the Special is an awesome axe. As mine is a maple neck its LT's are spot on single when tapped .
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Man I looked high and low for a maple necked SSH because I knew that would make for such a unique, well rounded instrument. But to no avail. Im happy either way but I feel that a nice quarter sawn one piece maple neck with either rosewood or an ebony board would add a high end focus. That's so awesome you've got one, is it private stock?
 
Broseph said:
Are MT’s the same as TMs with more wiring options? Or are the MTs designed to avoid volume loss when tapped?
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Whoops sorry friend Im so focussed on the MT and LT thing I didn't notice you said TM.
 
ViggoP said:
The MEV does the same thing in a different way I guess. It’s more hifi. The pickups are extremely clear sounding, it’s like the guitar pickup equivalent of 4k resolution. The placement of the middle pickup is really nice if you’re a heavy picker (like I am), it doesn’t get in the way. I really like how they sound in full humbucker mode. They are fast, they respond immediately. They’re actually great for high gain tones. I’m not as crazy about the split tones. You can make them sound really good if you set your amp up for them but that comes at the cost of the full humbuckers not sounding as good and vice versa. There’s a noticable drop in volume, which is to be expected when splitting to full single coil. I guess it does the humbucker split thing better than most but not as good as the SSH limited IMO.
Mine is an 2020 Experience edition and it’s by far my most beautiful guitar. The wood selection is amazing. Every piece of wood in it is perfect (to me). It sounds absolutely huge acoustically, it’s the loudest solid body electric I own and the sound is beautiful. It really rings. I made a NGD thread about it if you wanna check it out.
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Your MEV is amazing I've seen that post before when I was doing a bunch of reading on them. The neck too! Probably not easy to find a nice uniform flame like that and being that they cut it out of ONE piece there's no margin for error. When I made the choice I knew I'd be losing out to some degree on the clarity and hifi sound as you described that the MEV brings to the table.
 
I have a Special with the MT's and I think they are fantastic pups. I also have the 58/15 LT's in my 594, 594 HB and HBii as well.

I haven't removed or bothered looking to see how these are wired so I can't help you with any advice on swapping.

Of course a Special is quite different to a 594 - different bridge, different scale length etc as well as fact one is 'semi-hollow' and my 594 is Solid. My 594 HB has a different finish (Nitro over CAB) and the Pups are TCI tuned too so its not a 'fair' comparison to assess the Pups as they ought to be fitted into the same model at the very least, ideally in the 'same' guitar to get a true comparison.

That being said, there are still 'noticeable' differences to my ears. The MT's have a bit more 'output' so hit the amp a bit harder which, if you are setting it up on the 'edge of break-up', will crunch more than the LT's. In terms of 'vibe', I would say the 594 offers a more 'vintage' vibe, more PAF style HB and the MT's are a more 'classic' HB with a bit more bite. The main difference though is their Split coil sounds. The 58/15 LT's offer a 'true' split where as the MT's are offering a 'tapped' HB. I don't know how much of the 2nd coil is kept and/or if the number of winds change on the main coil, but it does obviously affect the tone.

I love my Special and its 58/15 MT's so I wouldn't change it at all. I also love my 594 and the 58/15 LT's that I think suit it very well so I wouldn't change that either. Pups are always a personal choice though but all I can say is that I fell in love with the Special and think its a fantastic instrument, very versatile and lightweight too. I had my 594 first and fell in love with the 58/15 LT's first but I do prefer the 'splits' on the MT's in general.
 
MWebster said:
Your MEV is amazing I've seen that post before when I was doing a bunch of reading on them. The neck too! Probably not easy to find a nice uniform flame like that and being that they cut it out of ONE piece there's no margin for error. When I made the choice I knew I'd be losing out to some degree on the clarity and hifi sound as you described that the MEV brings to the table.
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Yeah, the neck is probably the best part. It's outrageous.
 
So far I’ve had 85/15s, 85/15 MTs, 58/15 MTs and 58/15 LTs. My favorites are easily the 58/15 MTs and least favorites are the LTs. The 58/15 MTs are just the right output for me and the taps sound great. It’s rare that every possible switching option sounds great to me but that’s exactly what my SSH does. The LTs sound great clean but just don’t do it for the type of gain sounds I like. Also can confirm that an SSH with a maple neck and swamp ash body sounds killer.
 
I have a 2020 Special Semi Hollow with the MT’s and I’m actually trying to go the other way and want to swap to the LT’s. The MT’s are too hot for my tastes. But I can’t find information anywhere about how to do the swap given the different wiring of the MT’s vs the LT’s. I reached out to PRS and will post what I hear from them.
 
Goodsal said:
I have a 2020 Special Semi Hollow with the MT’s and I’m actually trying to go the other way and want to swap to the LT’s. The MT’s are too hot for my tastes. But I can’t find information anywhere about how to do the swap given the different wiring of the MT’s vs the LT’s. I reached out to PRS and will post what I hear from them.
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I did the same and will post what they tell me as well. Thanks for doing that though. The LT seems to have a braid, a black and a white? I'm probably wrong but the MT is 4 wire. I'm hoping they can just be transposed into the same wiring scheme and it works haha.
 
Goodsal said:
I have a 2020 Special Semi Hollow with the MT’s and I’m actually trying to go the other way and want to swap to the LT’s. The MT’s are too hot for my tastes. But I can’t find information anywhere about how to do the swap given the different wiring of the MT’s vs the LT’s. I reached out to PRS and will post what I hear from them.
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LT’s are wired like a standard humbucker while MT’s are completely different, but both are compatible with the mini toggles. Only issue you’ll run into is not having resistors to reuse if you like that style of split sound (MT pickups don’t use or need them)
 
It looks to me that MT’s get wired to the mini-toggles with black, red, white and green wires. But the LT’s have only red, white and green in the neck and only black, green and red in the bridge. How do you connect 3 wires where 4 wires previously were?
 
Malloc said:
LT’s are wired like a standard humbucker while MT’s are completely different, but both are compatible with the mini toggles. Only issue you’ll run into is not having resistors to reuse if you like that style of split sound (MT pickups don’t use or need them)
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So when I install the MT's, remove the resistors? Which ones, if you would elaborate on that? Also, do you have a picture of the cavity with the MT wiring?
 
@MWebster Here's a photo of the cavity of my SSH with MTs. Would you mind doing the same with yours with the LTs? I can try to take better pictures if this is helpful.

Bves9QG.jpg
 
Also I'll put up a pic of the LT cavity for sure. It should be here on Thursday or Friday.
 
Goodsal said:
It looks to me that MT’s get wired to the mini-toggles with black, red, white and green wires. But the LT’s have only red, white and green in the neck and only black, green and red in the bridge. How do you connect 3 wires where 4 wires previously were?
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From the photo it looks like the black and green from the MT set go to ground and uses red and white as the hot and neutral wires. While the LT probably just has the green and it's shielding braid going to ground with the red/white in the neck and the black/red in the bridge being used at the terminals the red/whites from the MT set are soldered at. At that point it's just knowing the polarity.
 
SinSir said:
I'd keep the resistors..they help with volume loss on split coils.
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The resistor values used for LT’s are probably not optimal for the MT’s. That is in case the MT’s need/use resistors at all, they could have done a physical tap from the coil. I’m not sure how they designed the MT’s and I haven’t looked inside mine. I don’t see any resistors in the picture supplied by Goodsal.
And by the way, does the LT’s use resistors? Aren’t they supposed to split to ”true single coil”?
 
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