Regular spacing & F spacing?

[GuitarJoe]

DiMarzio DP100 Super Distortion Pickup | Musician's Friend

Looking at the DiMarzio Super Distortion page and came across something I've never noticed before and I thought the experts could help me out It states "Regular spacing (1.90" 1st-to-6th) is for vintage Gibson guitars. F-spacing (2.01" 1-st-to-6th) is for most Fender guitars, modern Gibson, and guitars with Floyd Rose bridges." So my question is what do they consider vintage? I'm looking to swap a pick up on my '99 Standard so I assume this is modern. Any ideas? Thanks.

 

[captcoolaid]

You want standard spacing. My 2004 LP Standard is 49.2 wich is standard spacing F or Trem spaced is used for Strats and some of the newer LPs, not all of them though.

 

[Bobby Mahogany]

Hey Joe! (pun intended...)
Actually, many modern Gibson have regular spacing at the neck and F-spacing at the
bridge. When you install your pickup, the polepiece adjusting screws are supposed to be lined up with the strings (under them, of course). With modern bridges being a little wider, an F-spacing is often a perfect match at the bridge. Measure the distance between the two e's (top and bottom strings) over the neck pickup screws and over the bridge pickup crews. If the same, vintage spacing, if wider at the bridge, F-spacing for the bridge pickup.
I hope this comes out well enough to be understood...sorry if it ain't so...

By the way, I own a '92 Std and I have a regular spacing SD '59 pup at the bridge. The screws don't exactly line up under the strings. I should probably have an F-spacing under there. Well, the tone is just...AWESOME! So go figure...

 

[GuitarJoe]

Thanks guys, appreciate the quick reply.

 

[Shawn Lutz]

yep, F- Space the strings will go directly over the pole pieces. I even have an F-Spaced in the neck position, both DiMarzio's in my lp
<-----

 

[captcoolaid]

The spacing has no affect n the tone of the pup. But yeah measure to be sure. Gibson unfortunately does not alway use the same spacing. I have also noticed by looks only that depending on the angle of the bridge the string spread may be smaller as well.

 

[csplayer089]

Why are there two different spacings?

A long time ago (in the 20th century, actually) the electric guitar world was divided between Gibson and Fender designs. One of the differences between the two was string spacing. In general, Gibson chose a narrower string spacing at the bridge than Fender, and therefore the polepieces on Gibson humbuckers were closer together than the magnets on Fender pickups. When guitar shops started installing humbuckers in the bridge position of Strats, it was obvious that the strings didn&#8217;t line up with the polepieces, and if the E strings were too far outside, the sound could suffer. Our first humbuckers followed the original Gibson spacing, and we call them standard-spaced. When we released our first humbuckers with wider spacing, Floyd Rose bridges were very popular. Floyd string-spacing is the same as Fender spacing, so we naturally called the new pickups F-spaced.

All of our full-size humbuckers except the X2N® and D Activator-X&#8482; are available in two polepiece spacings. F-spacing refers to the wider of the two spacings. For proper string alignment and balanced output, F-spaced humbuckers should be used in the bridge position on all guitars with string spacing at the bridge of 2.1" (53 mm) or greater. On these guitars, if the nut width is 1-11/16&#8221; (43 mm) or greater, F-spaced pickups can be used in the neck position as well.

 

[SKATTERBRANE]

VIntage PAF spacing is 1-15/16" and Gibson's modern bridge spacing is 2-1/16"

PAF style pickups, including Burstbuckers, and 57 Classics, and older pickups like T-Tops and Shaws are 1-15/16" spacing for bridge and neck.

The Gibson pickups that have the 2-1/16" spacing are 490T 498T and 500T.

If you have a Gibson, even if your OEM bridge pickup is 2-1/16", a 1-15/16" pickup will work just fine in the bridge, as original Les Pauls and up through the 70s and 80s used that spacing, as do all years of Historic RIs.

 

[GuitarJoe]

By chance do any of you know what a '99 Standard would be? Or should I get out the ruler? Thanks again....

 

[SKATTERBRANE]

By chance do any of you know what a '99 Standard would be? Or should I get out the ruler? Thanks again....

A 99 Standard would have a vintage or PAF spaced pickup in the neck 1-15/16" or 49.2mm and a modern spaced pickup in the bridge 2-1/16" or 52.4mm.

As I say, you can put two PAF or 49.2mm pickups in ANY Les Paul. They were made for it.

Most PAF style pickup winders do not even offer any other spacing than 49.2mm.

 

[captcoolaid]

I would agree Rod but i have a 2004 Standard that F spaced was to wide for. The 49.2 is perfect.

 

[acstorfer]

I put an F-spaced Lollar in my bridge. The only reason I went with the F-spacing though was to accommodate my Kahler (tremolo) bridge. In the end, I don't think it would have mattered which spacing I went with.

 

[MrKensei]

The jury's out on whether or not the spacing makes much difference. Just like adjusting the height of pole pieces.
My 03 epi standard came with f spaced bridge and standard spaces neck. I just put 2f spaced rockfield Mafias I to it and I notice no loss of tone.
When I was discussing my needs with Dimarzio UK for my bc rich pickups the rep said that it really doesn't matter much except for appearance and the actual difference isn't perceivable by the vast majority of users.

 

[captcoolaid]

I run standard in everything. Never had a problem with tone loss. The mag field covers a lot of area.

 

[brandon555]

I run standard in everything. Never had a problem with tone loss. The mag field covers a lot of area.

I'm the exact opposite. I get F spaced/Trembucker for everything.... maybe because I'm ocd about the strings and pole pieces last lining up