The Gibson Gold Top.

GreatDane

"up yours, baby."
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from Vintage Guitars Info:

"The 1952 and early 1953 Gibson Les Paul goldtop models are not very playable as a professional instrument because of a shallow neckset, and a badly designed trapeze tailpiece. They do have some collector appeal though, as Gibson's first Les Paul generation. The trapeze tailpiece had two problems: first, the strings wrapped *under* the bar, not allowing the player to "mute" the strings with the palm of the hand. The second problem was if the trapeze was knocked from the side, the whole guitar could go out of tune. This happened because the trapeze tail's string bar was not anchored to the top of the guitar (only string presure and a felt pad kept the bar from moving side-to-side). In addition the neck angle is also very shallow on the trapeze models, so the strings could not be looped over the top of the LP tailpiece (the string action would be too high). Also converting to a 1953 style stop-bar or a tunematic was very very difficult again because of the neck angle. The very earliest Les Paul models also had fretboards with no edge binding and the lead pickup had diagonal mounting screws. Because of the funky Les Paul tailpiece on 1952 and early 1953 models, this version of the Les Paul Standard is generally looked down on by players and collectors.

"Les Paul himself has said he told Gibson about the tailpiece design flaw when he saw the first production models. He explained that the strings were supposed to wrap *over* the bar, not under it, and that the neck angle should be steeper to accomodate this difference in action at the bridge. Apparently it took Gibson a whole year to figure out that maybe Les Paul actually knew what he was talking about! Because of the 1952 tailpiece problems and complaints, by early 1953 the "wrap around stop bar" tailpiece/bridge combo was adopted by Gibson on the Les Paul Goldtop. This rectified the playability problems (the strings wrap over the *top* of the tailpiece, allowing palm mutes). These models are quite nice (though many players still complained because the stop bar can not be intonated perfectly). The early 1953 wrap-around models still had a shallow neck angle, limiting the downward adjustment of the stop bar. But this had the added benefit of keeping the strings close to the pickups, making early 1953 models with wrap tails very loud guitars. But as 1954 approached, the neck angle increased allowing more downward adjustment of the wrap around tailpiece. Regardless the 1953 stop tail Les Paul Goldtops had better playing action, and the tuning was more stable since the stop bar was now anchored to the top of the guitar allowing no movement side-to-side. The previous problem of right-hand palm muting was solved, as was the tuning problems from tailpiece movement. Although this was a big improvement on the 1952 design, it still had its limitations in respect to intonation.

"The conversion from the trapeze to wrap-around tailpiece happened around serial number "3 1300" (with "3 1314" for example having a wrap-around and "3 1359" having a trapeze, so there was some overlap no doubt). Earliest seen wrap-around is serial number "3 0995", so there was definately a mix of wrap-around and trapeze tail Goldtops in the "3 1000" to "3 1400" serial number range). By 1953 a rhythm/treble plastic surround on the pickup selector switch was added. By around serial number "3 22xx", Gibson changed the control cavity route slightly too (no longer routing the ground channel going to the end pin for the original trapeze tailpiece).

"By fall 1955, the tuneamatic bridge and stop tailpiece was adopted on the Les Paul Goldtop (solving the earlier intonation complaints), making the 1955 to 1958 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop a big winner. The combination of P-90 pickups and a tunematic/stop tailpiece is considered by most Les Paul players as a great setup. Hence the late 1955 to early 1957 Les Paul Standard Goldtop is regarded as a very usable and versatile guitar. They played great, sounded great, and looked great. How could it be improved? The tune-a-matic bridge was fitted to a great number of Gibson guitars during 1954-1955 including the Les Paul. It was a great addition to the solidbody line of guitars.

"In early-1957, Gibson changed from P-90 single coil pickups to their new humbucking pickups, making the Les Paul Standard what it is today (one of the most popular electric guitars of all time). The humbucker goldtop is an amazing model and one I would love to find (please email me if you have one for sale!) The new humbucking pickups were not met enthusiastically by players at first. Most Les Paul players still wanted and used the P-90 goldtop models. But this idea eventually changed, making the humbucking pickup Les Paul models very desirable.

"The humbucking pickups were designed by the engineer Seth Lover, who sought a way of eliminating the 60 cycle hum and other interference that single coil pickups exhibited (single coil pickups include the P-90 pickup). His idea was very simple - make a pickup with two smaller pickup coils instead of one big coil, and wire the two coils in series and out-of-phase. This way the hum from one coil cancels the hum from the other. The resulting pickup was not merely one that had no hum, but also that the sound was different. Humbuckers generally produce a higher output signal and also a mellower tone with greater midrange and less treble frequencies.

"The newly designed humbuckers fitted in the 1957 Les Paul goldtops came to be known as "PAF" pickups. This was due to the "Patent Applied For" decal on the bottom side of the pickups. The patent for these was applied for in 1955 and granted in 1959, but Gibson still continued to label their humbucking pickups as "PAF" for at least another three years (in 1963 the PAF label was replaced with "Patent Number" label). Gibson seemed to be in no hurry to apply the patent number to their pickups even after the patent was granted. This was probably to not help the competition copy their pickup design, by telling them which patent to look up at the US Patent Office.

"The final change to the Gibson Les Paul was in 1958, which was largely a visual change. The finish was changed from a "goldtop" to a sunburst. Also the back of the guitar was changed from a brown to a cherry red color. Mid-1958 to 1960 "sunburst" Les Paul Standards are consider to be one of the most attractive electric guitars ever produced (even though they are identical to the 1957/1958 humbucking goldtop model, except for the finish)."
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1952 Gibson Les Paul gold top guitar model introduction guitar specs:
multiple piece carved maple top (not "center seamed", two or three pieces), single cutaway, mahogany back and neck, single ply cream binding on the neck and top (binding is consistent in width and depth along the body's top, even in the cutaway area), two soapbar P-90 pickups with cream covers. Trapeze tailpiece/bridge combo with the string looping under the bar bridge. The string contact point ("the bar" of the trapeze) is NOT screwed or stud mounted to the top of the guitar. In fact it "floats" on its round feet (adjustable for height), with no holes in the top to keep it in place. This is one of the player problems with this tailpiece, as it can easily be hit from the side, causing the pressure mounted tailpiece bar to slide slightly on the top (putting the guitar out of tune). Not to mention the strings can only be wraped *under* the bar and not over the bar (the one degree neck angle does not allow top-wrapped strings).
Very early models had no neck binding and the two pickup mounting screws were positioned diagonially on the pickup's corners (instead of being mounted in a line with the string pole screws). Single bound top and fingerboard, cream color plastic parts, dark brown back plastic covers, tall 5/8" gold barrel-shaped knobs, trapezoid fingerboard inlays, pearl "Gibson" logo positioned 3/4" from the tip of the peghead. The logo on non-neck binding models (early 1952) often has the "G" touching the dot in the "i" (this is rarely seen on bound neck 1952 models.) "Les Paul Model" silkscreened on peghead in gold, no serial number, "Gibson" logo in pearl is noticably lower in position than 1958 and later Les Pauls, nickel plated parts, Goldtop finish, brown back and neck finish (some with gold back/sides). Single-ring keystone Kluson tuners with no "Kluson" name on the gear cover (very early models with vertical "Kluson" and "pat.pend" on the gear cover and no second post hole). Tuner bushings are round (except on very early non-neck binding models where they are hex). Also 1952 models did not have a "rhythm/treble" toggle switch plate. The standard case for this model was a brown hardshell case with a pink lining. The top of the case was flat and had four latches.

Early 1952 Les Paul models (no neck binding) also have different wood routings. For example, the control cavity is a squarish parallelogram shape, instead of the cloverleaf shape used on 1952 models with neck binding. Also the route under the bridge p-90 has the wire channel passing thru the pickup route in the center. Contrast this to 1952 models with neck binding which have the normal wire channel route through the treble side of the neck pick route.



1953 Gibson Les Paul goldtop model guitar specs:
serial number on back of peghead, stud wrap-around tailpiece/bridge with strings looping over bridge (the trapeze tailpiece/bridge was abandoned). The conversion from trapeze tailpiece to wrap-around on the 1953 Les Paul started at earliest around serial number "3 13xx" (so early 1953 models still use the older trapeze tailpiece). Neck set increased from 1 degree (trapeze tail) to 3 degrees (stop wrap tail) to compensate for the new tailpiece in early 1953, but as 1954 approach the neck set increased again slightly from 3 degrees to 4 degrees. This allowed for greatly downward adjustment of the stopbar bridge (1953 Les Pauls with wrap stop tails often are down all the way to the guitar's top to achieve good string playing action). The gold barrel-shaped knobs on 1953 stopbar Les Pauls are shorter than the knobs used on the 1952 trapeze models (1952 knobs 5/8" tall, 1953 knobs 1/2" tall). A cream plastic ryhthm/treble round plate was added around the toggle switch. In 1953 the case for the Les Paul Standard now had a curved top, echoing the carved maple top of the guitar. The rear control route was change in 1953 around serial number "3 22xx". This trapeze tailpiece ground channel route was discontinued. This route was used for the ground wire running to the claw of the trapeze tailpiece.


1954 Gibson Les Paul goldtop model guitar specs:
Neck set increased from 3 degree to 4 degrees to give additional wrap tail movement adjustment. This allowed for greatly downward adjustment of the stopbar bridge (1953 Les Pauls with wrap stop tails often are down all the way to the guitar's top to achieve good string playing action). Note there were a handful of 1954 Goldtops made with the serial number starting with "7". This is confusing as the "7" would otherwise mean 1957 (and a 1957 Goldtop would have a Tunematic bridge). This was no doubt a mistake by Gibson, and the pot source/code can be checked to verify the correct year. I would estimate less than ten of these 1954 Goldtops with a 1957 serial number exist.

1955 Gibson Les Paul goldtop model guitar specs:
Wrap around tailpiece and accompanying studs changed slightly. The "ears" of the tailpiece changed in thickness from 3/16" to 1/4". The accompanying studs had to change also so the new tailpiece would fit the studs. This increase in ear thickness stopped the ears from cracking at the intonation adjustment screw, which was common on the thinner 3/16" thick ear tailpieces. Pickup spacing chnaged from 3 1/8" to 3"; this moved the bridge pickup towards the neck just a bit, putting more wood in front of the wrap-around bridge studs (because some models had problems with the wood cracking in front of the treble stud). By fall 1955 the Les Paul Standard changed from the wrap-around tailpiece to a ABR-1 tunematic bridge and stop tailpiece. See here for details on this change.
 
Fall 1955 to Early 1957 Gibson Les Paul goldtop model guitar specs:
Tune-o-matic bridge added (with "ABR-1" on the bottom side of the bridge and no wire to hold the saddles in place), stud tailpiece moved back to anchor strings (stop tailpiece). This happened around serial number "510xxx". The "Gibson" peghead logo moved down slightly from the top edge of the peghead (some 1954 models are seen with this lower Gibson logo.) Tuners now had "Kluson Deluxe" stamped in the gear cover in a vertical line. The four knobs change from a barrel shape to a top-hat ("bonnet") shape in 1955. The tone capacitors for (all) Les Paul models changed in late 1955. Prior to this they used a brown waxy looking tubular Sprague capacitor called the Sprague "grey tiger". But by 1956 this changed to Sprague's "bumble bee" tube cap, which was black with colored value stripes (in the 1968 the same capacitor was again used on the single cutaway Les Paul standard reissues, but Sprague has changed the marketing name of the capacitor to "Black Beauty"). The Bumblebee caps were used from 1956 until 1960 for all pre-SG Les Paul models (Juniors, Specials, Standards, Customs).


1957 Gibson Les Paul goldtop model guitar specs:
Some 1957 and 1958 Les Paul goldtops are seen with dark brown backs (also some 1956 models). These "dark backs" are easy to identify by the serial number, which is ink stamped with yellow ink (instead of black ink, as used on the light color backed goldtops). Also darkback Les Pauls will have black control cavity plates (as used on the Les Paul Custom) instead of brown plates. Rare, but sometimes seen, are 1957 gold tops with a mahogany top (a single one piece body with no maple cap - the mahogany can easily be seen from inside the control cavity route). Humbucking PAF pickups replace P-90 pickups around serial number "7 2000" to "7 3800" range (latest 1957 goldtop documented with P-90s is serial number "7 38xx", and the earliest is a leftie PAF goldtop "7 13xx"). During this period there was definately overlaps of Goldtops with either P90 or PAF pickups. First few months of humbucker pickup production used brushed stainless steel pickup covers (instead of nickel plated covers) with no PAF stickers. Resistance of the new pickups ranged from 7.0k ohms to 8.9k ohms.
The first month of humbucker Les Paul goldtop production used black plastic parts (pickguard, pickup rings, switch surround), with black parts being in the serial number range "7 13xx" to "7 32xx". All black plastic 1957 Les Paul Goldtops should have a dark back (if it doesn't, chances are someone stole the cream parts and replaced them with black parts). The black pickguard is basically a 5 layer b/w/b/w/b Les Paul Custom pickguard (but cut for two humbucking pickups). Within a month or two, PAF goldtops changed to cream plastic parts (cream part PAF goldtops not seen before serial number "7 3000"). Generally speaking black plastic part 1957 Les Paul goldtops are worth less than cream part 1957 goldtops though. The black and cream plastic humbucker pickup mounting rings had "M-69" as part of the molding, on the bottom side between the height adjustment screw and mounting screw. Also the plastic humbucker rings had four "screw tunnels" for each mounting screw (but not for the two pickup height adjustment screws). Though the M-69 pickup surrounds were used until about 1970 (in black, when they were replaced by the M-8 pickup rings with no screw tunnels), Gibson did not use cream colored M-69 pickup rings any later than 1960. That's why there's such a big deal about original cream-colored 1950s Les Paul pickup rings, because original M-69s in cream were unavailable after 1960. Though these seems like minor details, original plastic parts are important to these guitars. The mounting screws for white pickup rings are nickel plated, for black pickup rings the mounting screws are black. In 1957 the Rhytm/Treble ring plastic got slightly thicker changing from .20" thick to about .25" thick. The R/T ring stayed like this until early-1959 when the font on the R/T ring changed getting thinner. Also the "Gibson" peghead pearly logo moved closer to the top edge of the peghead (as positioned on all other Gibson models) in late 1957 (1957 PAF Goldtops can have either the low or higher position "Gibson" peghead logo). The logo changed from 3/4" from the top of the "b" to the tip of the peghead to about 3/8".

Mid-1958 Gibson Les Paul Standard guitar specs:
Model name changed from "Les Paul Model" to "Les Paul Standard". Sunburst finish replaces Goldtop finish in the fall of 1958, around serial numbers in the "8 5300" range (though the first known Sunburst Les Paul has serial number "8 3322"). The maple top on a 1958 to 1960 Sunburst Les Paul is always two pieces and "center seamed" (there is NO exception to this rule, except for one of the first 1958 sunburst Les Pauls with serial number "8 3322"; if a Sunburst Les Paul does not have a two piece center seamed maple top, it is a refinished Goldtop!)
 
I've held a 52. Didn't get to play it, though.

Tried to spray a gold top once. That didn't work out so well, either.
 
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I love this stuff. Totally geek out on it. The changes, the variation over time. My pinnacle guitar would be a 50s Gold top. I'd choose that over a '59.

I'd love a '53 or '54 goldtop with P90's like Sean Costello's. I could never do his justice, though.

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i HAD a 1958 Les Paul sunburst with some flame on the top. it was very nice, but i wasn't getting along completely with the neck. but it was a great playing and sounding guitar. (this was back in 1976, when owning one only required an investment of $1000 to $1200).

i traded it for a late '58 Explorer. :facepalm:
 
i HAD a 1958 Les Paul sunburst with some flame on the top. it was very nice, but i wasn't getting along completely with the neck. but it was a great playing and sounding guitar. (this was back in 1976, when owning one only required an investment of $1000 to $1200).

i traded it for a late '58 Explorer. :facepalm:

you had a 1959 Les Paul, and then an original issue Explorer? that's glorious.
 
you had a 1959 Les Paul, and then an original issue Explorer? that's glorious.

no....i had a '58 Les Paul and then a '58 Explorer......yea, it was pretty cool, but you have to put it into perspective.....in 1976 those (and the rest of the vintage instruments) were semi-desirable USED equipment.....NOT the crown jewels, like now.
 
i HAD a 1958 Les Paul sunburst with some flame on the top. it was very nice, but i wasn't getting along completely with the neck. but it was a great playing and sounding guitar. (this was back in 1976, when owning one only required an investment of $1000 to $1200).

i traded it for a late '58 Explorer. :facepalm:
you had a 1959 Les Paul, and then an original issue Explorer? that's glorious.
no....i had a '58 Les Paul and then a '58 Explorer......yea, it was pretty cool, but you have to put it into perspective.....in 1976 those (and the rest of the vintage instruments) were semi-desirable USED equipment.....NOT the crown jewels, like now.
God, I would kill for one of those Explorers...
 
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