Gotoh Pickups

Hi everybody,

I've been following this forum (mostly on the Greco threads) for some time but this is one of my first few posts.
I have done a search on Gotoh Pickups but information seems to be scarce. I know from other threads that the VH-1 is a highly regarded model. What about the others. I have come across many Gotoh pickups but they all look different.
Some have "Gotoh Pickups" stamped on the back.
Some just have the word "Gotoh" on the back.
Some have grey wires, other have orange wires.
I have even seen a few with only 4 small screws at the back.(for holding the bobbins) The pole piece screws do not protrude through the back.

I am starting tis thread as a collective point for all info related to Gotoh Pickups, old and new.

I hope you can contribute.

Thanks.

DV

The old Gotoh's in the early Tokais were called Gotos (no H) Gotoh are basically the Japanese equivalent of Allparts, they make loads of aftermarket guitar bits, including a very wide range of pickups, from cheap and cheerful to very good indeed.

There's a few here:

http://www.music-trade.co.jp/gotohstclassic.html

GOTO pickup have grey and white cables,not braided. Bridge measures about 8,3 K and it?s a very good one.I do like it. You can find them in Reborns and FLGs Burnys late 70?s. I have seen them with gold and silver baseplates ones.

Not trying to hijack this thread, but speaking of the VH-1 pickups, does anyone know anything about Gotoh VH-1G pickups? They have black cables, silver back plates, gold polepieces, large rectangular VH-1G sticker. I recently saw one on ebay, but don't know anything about these. Do they share any of the VH-1 lineage?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...IFaxbFg%3D&viewitem=&sspagename=STRK:MEWNX:IT

How are the verdicts on the early Gotoh pickups as found in the Reborn/Reborn olds? Would it be wise to replace them for 'better' ones?

Yes!

@luis; to my knowledge the early LS50, 60 & 80 had Goto's and they were stamped most of the time. I have seen D, X & S stamps. The S was only found on LS80s. My S stamped Gotos measure 8.8k on the bridge. So probably the X, D & S had different DC resistence.

Thanks for the info Jacco.Yes,I have checked and my pickups says "Patent Applied For made by goto" and a S in black ink stamped on silver plate. They do not have the same plate sturcture as PAFS.
I have seen gold plated ones in FLG-60 series from a friend.

About replacing Goto, yes but...it?s an useful pickup and you can leave it(I was able to achive convinced rock?n?roll sound through a Pro tweed era replica),but you can notice an exchange for open sound.I replaced mine with a pair of Wolfetone?s Dr. V. and it was an improvement no doubt.Worth it!
But bridge was not pushing as much as Goto.

I find the Gotos lacking some character. Though I'm a huge Tokai fan, the pups of the earlier LS series are the weakest link IMO.
I changed mine to Kloppmanns; covered 58 in the neck, uncovered 59 in the bridge:



And here the back of my 1979 S stamp Goto:



PS I just checked my data and it seems the neck measures 8.50, bridge 8.53. So I was wrong about the 8.80 I claimed earlier.

Emiel said:

How are the verdicts on the early Gotoh pickups as found in the Reborn/Reborn olds? Would it be wise to replace them for 'better' ones?

Click to expand...

Go by your ear and your playing style. You'll find loads of different opinions about what is good and what is not, and it seems at times to be more about fashion and trends than music.

For me, I find the old Tokai PAFs to work really well through the vintage Fender amps that I play. The old Greco pickups of different varieties are great too. I can play very expressively through these pickups and I usually don't change them out after trying a lot of them.

I'm sure you'll also find people who swear by Seymour Duncans and Tom Holmes and Bareknuckle or even some guy in Alaska making pickups in his kitchen.

If you can make them sound good, keep them in, and if not...

Cali Girl said:

Emiel said:

How are the verdicts on the early Gotoh pickups as found in the Reborn/Reborn olds? Would it be wise to replace them for 'better' ones?

Click to expand...

Go by your ear and your playing style. You'll find loads of different opinions about what is good and what is not, and it seems at times to be more about fashion and trends than music.

For me, I find the old Tokai PAFs to work really well through the vintage Fender amps that I play. The old Greco pickups of different varieties are great too. I can play very expressively through these pickups and I usually don't change them out after trying a lot of them.

I'm sure you'll also find people who swear by Seymour Duncans and Tom Holmes and Bareknuckle or even some guy in Alaska making pickups in his kitchen.

If you can make them sound good, keep them in, and if not...

Click to expand...

Agreed.

So many things to try on a pickup before upgrading it.
Raise or lower them, use your guitar tone/volume knobs, tweak your amps differently, etc, etc.

If all that fails then contact the dude in Alaska and tell him to hand wind you a set of humbuckers that sound like Jimi's Strat.

The problem is that there have been some Japanese guitars in the distant past that had a sound like someone had wrapped a coat around your speaker and then shoved it up another persons arse. Total mud!

Change the pickups and bingo, a proper frequency balance.

Of course I have no idea what brand or period they were from, but it was what put me off these guitars way back in the late 80s.

I recently heard a guy playing an Ibanez LP from the 70s and it had that same useless muddy sound that I remembered. No idea what model or anything but it may have had a bolt on neck, or maybe his amp was crap or he EQ'd it like that (I don't believe anyone would do that).

However, the Japan built pickups haven't been like this for a long time, and going by the pickups in Bacchus guitars they are very faithful clones of the original types.

What I'm getting at is, this whole pickup thing that keeps coming up may be due to memories of bad pickups from the early 70s before they really got everything copied accurately?

To be honest, a couple of the current crop of Gibson and Fender pickups are ***** as well.

I'm fiddling with the setup of my newly acquired LS-80 in order to get the best playability/sound out of it.

I can definitely imagine why Jacco find the Gotos to be a bit dull and lacking character... I lowered them a bit which helped to open the sound some... more clarity/string definition sure would be nice though.

Still it is a real nice sounding guitar!!

jacco said:

I find the Gotos lacking some character. Though I'm a huge Tokai fan, the pups of the earlier LS series are the weakest link IMO.
I changed mine to Kloppmanns; covered 58 in the neck, uncovered 59 in the bridge:

Click to expand...

Same findings here, the Gotoh while they are not bad lacked a bit in my LS150. I replaced them with Catswhisker pickups (72 Classic & custom wound Classic 2) - it is now more alive and more complex tonally.