Metropoulos Forum

i have bought several pairs of late 60's T-tops and installed some in some les paul 59 ri, SG61' ri and have some in a 69 SG standard, so i know how they sound but i'd be curious to know teh difference with a typical good PAF with readings about 7,5 or 8 k ?

do the PAF have more mids and thickness or is it very very similar to the late 60's T-Tops (airy with not that much mids and kind of a soft attack ) ?

from what i heard in the 59 les paul recording , the late 60's gibson pu's don't seem to sound that far from the PAF's but , that's just through a clip !

Well.....early, late 60's and the later ttop's had 60.3mm magnets...A bit shorter than the 50's Pafs' with 63.5mm magnets- Also the ttops utilized Poly wire- Polyurethan Coated where-as the 50's early early 60's were still wound with Plain Enamel wire with the chemical Benzene in the coating.....

yes, i know more or less that there are some differences in teh way they are built but i'd lke to know what's the consequence in tone and the differences.
i would tend to think PAf were maybe a bit louder in general and might have had a bit more mids and maybe slightly less high end than the mid/ late 60's pu's.
also, maybe the response was a bit different as well .
but all that is supposition and i'd be curious to know if someone compared them in the same guitar or in two similar guitars or so.

the only info i found from someone thaty should know about it, was a comment by Fralin that was saying ususaly PAF have a bit warmer mids and less top end than T-Tops .
he also seems to say T-tops are very close to teh 61' and on ones .
knowing PAF are very inconsistent, i suppose it must not be true for all PAF pu's (i suppose it's a bit of a russian roulette with them until you try them)

t-tops are 7k5, matched coils, degaussed a5
pafs are 7k-10k, matched and unmatched coils, a2-5

yes, i have read several topics about teh differences and i'm still finding sopme interesting infos .
but it's easier to find technical/ specs differences than tone differences between them , maybe because there are many different PAF tones (before 61' ) due to different windings, type of magnets ... for only one consistent T-top tone .

it seems there was all type of alnico magnets in PAF's , not only A2 & A5 .

yes, that's why I wrote A2-5. the pafs tend to sound smoother, more middy and softer than the t tops. angus has good t top sound

yes, when i think T-tops i think angus but robbie kriegger as well on some songs , jimmy page from 71-72 to 75 it seems had one in teh bridge and so many others that played post 65' Gibson's.