Is a Les Paul Studio Push/pull a Humbucker/P90?

[joseph1597]

I have just bought a Gibson Les Paul Studio and the coil-tap engage doesn't exactly sound like a single coil. Does the circuit board function to change the sound character of the single coil tap so that it doesn't sound exactly like a single coil? Does the the circuit board cause the single coil mode to have as much volume as  the humbucker mode? It seems like the single coil mode sounds louder than the single coil  of other guitars that have this feature.

[sparquelito]

There's not an easy answer to those questions. 

A humbucker is a humbucker, but coil splitting or coil tapping rarely give the performer a classic 'single coil' sound. 

Seymour Duncan elaborates on the difference between coil splitting and coil tapping:

Coil splitting is the practice of shutting off (or otherwise fading out) one coil of a humbucker, leaving behind a single coil for a brighter tone. Coil splitting is often confused with a single coil option known as coil tapping, in much the same way that the terms ‘vibrato bar’ and ‘tremolo bar’ are considered interchangeable even though only one is technically correct. So what is coil tapping, and how is it different to coil splitting?
Coil tapping is when a wire runs off of the pickup windings at a certain point, somewhere short of the full amount. This means you can install a switch to select between a single coil pickup’s full output or a lower output, giving you two distinct levels of power from one pickup.

The tapped output level will give you a more vintage-like sound, while a hotter, more modern voice is available from the full-powered setting. This can give you more precise heat-of-the-moment control over the output compared to simply using the guitar’s volume knob to reduce the output level.

Further, this Gibson link will most likely offer elucidation on what is in your Studio:

http://aws2.gibson.com/News-Lifestyle/Gear-Tech/en-us/Tuned-Coil-Tap-vs-Tap-vs-Split.aspx

😐

[merciful-evans]

Cant better Sparky's advice. Good job!

I was hoping for a single coil sound on my 1st guitar with coil split. I have several now. None of them sound much like a single coil.

[jdgm]

2 hours ago, merciful-evans said:

Cant better Sparky's advice. Good job!

I was hoping for a single coil sound on my 1st guitar with coil split. I have several now. None of them sound much like a single coil.

 

Yes exactly.  Could not agree more.  

Edited June 20, 2020 by jdgm

[sparquelito]

I had a really great Fender Telecaster, a Chinese-made Modern Player Telecaster Plus. 

I played it for years, gigged with it, and ultimately sold it to a good friend who coveted it.
At a point when I needed to thin the herd. 

The neck and middle single-coil pickups were top-notch, and the Humbucker in the bridge was killer-great. 
A fabulous pickup, and it rocked. 

The one down-side to this guitar was the tiny-coil-tap switch and associated function. 

You could be rocking in the humbucking mode, and switch that pickup to a 'single-coil' mode, and it all fell flat. 
That bridge pickup immediately sounded thin, trebly, and useless. 

I wanted to get rid of the switch and feature altogether. 
But, in the end, a good guy bought the guitar, and he loves it. 

🙂