€150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

For guitars of the straight waisted variety (or reverse offset).
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Pacafeliz
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€150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Pacafeliz » Sat Mar 06, 2021 12:33 am

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Well I've always been curious about these, owned a bunch of copies before but they were real bad.
Now I saw this come up in the "local ads" in Berlin for €20, no shipping. At first I thought it's another cheap and butchered copy but the truss rod cover made me reconsider. So I told the girl I'd give her 150 if she ships it and we had a deal... :w00t:

It has been modified and really butchered more than it appears: the neck/body junction has been sanded down to a smooth Ibanez style. The fretboard has been replaced (!!!) weirdly and is now a rather high U shape. The back of the neck I suppose was sanded to reduce thickness and they went so far that the actual truss rod is showing/cracking through... :fp:

Well yes and it was repainted, the pickguard :wtf: well look at it. But it works and sounds good.

Gave it a setup (after the above pic), replaced the tuners with standard old Schallers (since one of those locking thingies broke off during shipping and I couldn't quite figure them out...), oiled the fretboard (which, i believe is dead flat, as in, no radius at all!), cleaned the electronics, etc.
Dunno how much/long life it has got still, but it surly was/is worth the 150 bucks 8)

Will give it a test drive at the rehearsal today!
i love delay SO much ...that i procrastinate all the time.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Pacafeliz » Sat Mar 06, 2021 12:39 am

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You can still see half the original dots :fp:

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:wtf:

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i love delay SO much ...that i procrastinate all the time.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Tumtrah » Sat Mar 06, 2021 3:09 am

Nice find! Are the pickups original?
Last edited by Tumtrah on Sat Mar 06, 2021 5:54 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Pacafeliz » Sat Mar 06, 2021 4:09 am

Tumtrah wrote:
Sat Mar 06, 2021 3:09 am
Nice find! Are the Pickups original?
Yessir!😁
i love delay SO much ...that i procrastinate all the time.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Larry Mal » Sat Mar 06, 2021 6:59 am

Original pickups alone make this a great deal. Congratulations!

Hey, when do we get to hear about the Marauder? I have one and would love to see yours.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by jvin248 » Sat Mar 06, 2021 7:52 am

.

Show off the original wiring too ;)

.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Pacafeliz » Sat Mar 06, 2021 8:46 am

jvin248 wrote:
Sat Mar 06, 2021 7:52 am
.

Show off the original wiring too ;)

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Image
...well the 6-way switch still has 6 different sounds, but it's different from what I've read. One changed pot, but I can't find dates on the others.
Somebody really made this guitar HIS :derp:
i love delay SO much ...that i procrastinate all the time.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Pacafeliz » Sat Mar 06, 2021 8:47 am

Larry Mal wrote:
Sat Mar 06, 2021 6:59 am
Original pickups alone make this a great deal. Congratulations!

Hey, when do we get to hear about the Marauder? I have one and would love to see yours.
Yep will do tomorrow!
i love delay SO much ...that i procrastinate all the time.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Larry Mal » Sat Mar 06, 2021 8:54 am

Pacafeliz wrote:
Sat Mar 06, 2021 8:47 am
Larry Mal wrote:
Sat Mar 06, 2021 6:59 am
Original pickups alone make this a great deal. Congratulations!

Hey, when do we get to hear about the Marauder? I have one and would love to see yours.
Yep will do tomorrow!
You're all Norlin Gibson just like me around here!
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by MrFingers » Sun Mar 07, 2021 3:14 am

Yeah, It appears the choke-coil is missing from the wiring.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by CorporateDisguise » Sun Mar 07, 2021 5:57 am

So they over sanded the back of the neck and then added a thicker rosewood fretboard to compensate? It looks like they anded down the OG fretboard too and just glued the new one on top leaving part of the binding. Freaking hilarious.

The color and pickguard are rad though. Hope its as fun to play as it looks.

If it all goes to shit, you can probably make the money back by selling the pickups and electronics, so a net zero loss.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by jvin248 » Sun Mar 07, 2021 7:31 am

.

Yeah, they did some rewiring in there!

Here's what is supposed to be there.

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Bill Lawrence on the L6-S design:

"When I began working for Gibson... there was a certain hostility towards Fender... the general opinion at Gibson was that a Fender guitar was nothing but a board with a screwed-on neck, but Gibsons were "real" guitars. ...when it came to solid-bodies, they had nothing to compete with a Tele, a Strat, a P-Bass, or a Jazz Bass ... As a designer, I know how complicated it is to combine a functional design with an aesthetic appearance. I don't know if Leo or a team effort was responsible for the final design of Fender's unprecedented masterpieces, but I do know that whoever designed these instruments had extensive knowledge and experience in fundamental design."

"Gibson needed a mainstream guitar that could compete with Fender. In 1972, I was asked to design a multi-sound system for the SG Standard. This didn't make any sense to me, and after several meetings with marketing, I convinced them to introduce a completely new solid-body that offered a wide variety of different sounds. I was given a free hand as long as I observed a set production cost limit. In order to stay within that limit, I had to make use of their existing hardware, including pickup covers, and the champfered body contours I wanted were not in the budget either. Given a mere $25 more to work with, I could have made the guitar to my specs. ... we ended up with a six-position rotary switch, pickups with large humbucker covers, a stock Schaller bridge with a "stop" tailpiece, and a clumsy-looking body. My original prototype had a beautiful, elegantly-shaped pickguard, but somebody changed that too. Even with these changes, the early production L6-S was still an excellent performer. ..."

I frequently enjoy Bill's word choices sprinkled throughout that interview.

These L6-S models can sound quite a bit like a Strat or a Tele.
Of course ... there are several popular songs that were recorded with Teles and then performed live with Gibson Les Paul models and the Internet argues about it.

I've had a little more than passing interest in this guitar because of Bill Lawrence's design involvement and the unique circuit design. I had come across a poorly repaired broken headstock L6-S with the original circuit, for a bit more than I should have paid (but now it's getting more valuable so I may be ok in time) to specifically get the control circuit and pickups to analyze.. other things in the way and I haven't really messed with it much yet but it's there waiting.

.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by Larry Mal » Sun Mar 07, 2021 7:44 am

jvin248 wrote:
Sun Mar 07, 2021 7:31 am
.


Bill Lawrence on the L6-S design:

"Gibson needed a mainstream guitar that could compete with Fender. In 1972, I was asked to design a multi-sound system for the SG Standard. This didn't make any sense to me, and after several meetings with marketing, I convinced them to introduce a completely new solid-body that offered a wide variety of different sounds. I was given a free hand as long as I observed a set production cost limit. In order to stay within that limit, I had to make use of their existing hardware, including pickup covers, and the champfered body contours I wanted were not in the budget either. Given a mere $25 more to work with, I could have made the guitar to my specs. ... we ended up with a six-position rotary switch, pickups with large humbucker covers, a stock Schaller bridge with a "stop" tailpiece, and a clumsy-looking body. My original prototype had a beautiful, elegantly-shaped pickguard, but somebody changed that too. Even with these changes, the early production L6-S was still an excellent performer. ..."

"When I began working for Gibson... there was a certain hostility towards Fender... the general opinion at Gibson was that a Fender guitar was nothing but a board with a screwed-on neck, but Gibsons were "real" guitars. ...when it came to solid-bodies, they had nothing to compete with a Tele, a Strat, a P-Bass, or a Jazz Bass ... As a designer, I know how complicated it is to combine a functional design with an aesthetic appearance. I don't know if Leo or a team effort was responsible for the final design of Fender's unprecedented masterpieces, but I do know that whoever designed these instruments had extensive knowledge and experience in fundamental design."

I like a few of Bill's word choices sprinkled in there.

These L6-S models can sound quite a bit like a Strat or a Tele.
Of course ... there are several popular songs that were recorded with Teles and then performed live with Gibson Les Paul models and the Internet argues about it.

.

Yeah, that is interesting. Norlin Gibson was very concerned with the popularity of Fender guitars and basically spent those years coming up with various guitars designed to outcompete Fender on Fender's chosen ground. Pat and I both have Marauders for instance, which also have Bill Lawrence designed pickups, and that and the similar S-1 were Gibson basically trying to be better Fenders than what Fender could make.

When those failed Norlin Gibson created the Victory series with the same exact goal. There are other attempts sprinkled around.

The interesting thing to me is that this was also the era when the Fender sound was becoming a little less popular anyway, and the Gibson Les Paul's thick sound was ruling a lot of rock music at that time. Which is why you see Fender trying to shoehorn the Telecaster into doing what the Les Paul could do and so on.

Neither of them seemed to have been able to understand that the real competition was from overseas guitar makers turning out excellent products at great prices and both Gibson and Fender responded to that in the worst possible way, by trying to reduce the manufacturing cost of the instruments since they couldn't quickly address the labor cost (at that particular time, anyway).

Bill Lawrence is dead now so we'll never get to know what he really would have designed the L6-S to be, and frankly it's a very homely guitar to be charitable. I don't doubt that it plays and sounds great, but you do have to lament that the extra $25 wasn't spent on the instrument to have something that really might have shook the world, but again Norlin Gibson was trying to compete by keep the manufacturing cost down and that was a bad decision.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: €150 vintage Gibson NGD (L6-S)

Post by mgeek » Sun Mar 07, 2021 2:47 pm

Blimey! I can't imagine these necks were particularly fat to begin with? Guess they realised they'd gone too far once they hit the rod and tried to add more stability with a nice fat fretboard. Nutters!

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