Some thoughts on my recently-acquired Tokai LS92

guyfeld

I am an ageing pro guitarist/singer and have owned a number of big-name guitars in my youth but over the past decade I have found myself using mostly guitars from the East. (financial sensibilities and constraints mostly)

Lately I've been lusting after a Les Paul style axe and someone kindly gave me the opportunity to buy his 2011 as- new unplayed Tokai LS92(Japanese) at a price I could afford.
Some thoughts:
I was pleasantly surprised how chunky the 50’s style neck was..suits my big hands perfectly. Finish and build seems great, and she looks like a million bucks!

The guitar doesn’t sound as “big”, thick or mid-rangey as other LP’s I’ve had…more delicate and airy. I was hoping for thick singing trebles but they are thinner and sweeter than I expected…Jury’s still out on that one..but I’m going to live with it for a while before I start looking at any changes to pickups..

The skinny E isn’t ringing clear and I’m probably going to have to get a new nut.
I was with a friend who is a guitar tech and we tried adjusting bridge height and neck relief but it just seems like the nut is too low..(Hello Foster!)

I use 9 gauge on my strat and thought I’d try some 9’s on the Tokai but it sounded way thinner than I wanted, so probably going to go back to 10’s.

Don't get me wrong - by all accounts, seems like it could be a great guitar, maybe even a "keeper" and I'm grateful for the opportunity to own one, but so far for me , this hasn't been one of those guitars that was "right" straight off the bat..

singemonkey

Interesting. Odd about the nut. Some of the first LS92s in SA didn't come with Tokai MkII pickups. EZ had to change his - they were way inferior to the MKIIs in my LS150, and totally different pickups. But maybe it's the setup.

My LS150 also sounds less mid-rangey than most Gibson Les Pauls - including my own. It sounds much more like vintage '50s LPs and historic reissues, generally, with that more open, acousticy kind of sound. We heard that this trend continues, where a 2015 LP Standard we played the other day had that mid-rangey sound, while the 1957 reissue we played immediately after had that 'airy' sound you refer to. The Standard sounded more like my '83 Gibson.

guyfeld

singemonkey wrote: Interesting. Odd about the nut. Some of the first LS92s in SA didn't come with Tokai MkII pickups. EZ had to change his - they were way inferior to the MKIIs in my LS150, and totally different pickups. But maybe it's the setup.

My LS150 also sounds less mid-rangey than most Gibson Les Pauls - including my own. It sounds much more like vintage '50s LPs and historic reissues, generally, with that more open, acousticy kind of sound. We heard that this trend continues, where a 2015 LP Standard we played the other day had that mid-rangey sound, while the 1957 reissue we played immediately after had that 'airy' sound you refer to. The Standard sounded more like my '83 Gibson.

Thanks for the feedback, Singe..I'll get the nut attended to first, put some 10's on and take it from there. Will also check the pickups out..

ezietsman

What they said. Some LPs are quite warm sounding but the very best ones has a bouncyness to them and together with lower output PAF style pickups sound like hotrodded telecasters in a way. I have an LS92 which, as Singemonkey points out, had the MkIII pickups which weren't all that, lacking treble and were quite muddy-sounding. I replaced them with to-spec PAF copies and now the guitar is great, mine is still a warm-sounding LP, as they go.

Here's mine with my 18 watt Marshall clone https://app.box.com/s/de6d9d3ce10425a8435c

and here's one with that bouncy sound (Singemonkey's LS150 sounds like this one)

Yours may well be one of the very first LS92s that landed here, that still came with the MKIII pickups instead of the MKIIs like they all have now.

guyfeld

Thanks for the response, guys..I'm learning stuff here..
Do the pickups say "mk111 or mk11"on the back?

ezietsman

I forgot how one tells the difference, I think the Mk IIs have braided wire for one and the Mk IIIs don't. Also I think Mk IIs are made by two different companies. I don't recall precisely so don't take my word for it.

guyfeld

I've been looking though the forums and the answers are there somewhere..I'll check the pickups when the nut's sorted..

guyfeld

New nut and 10 gauge strings on ..definitely sounding better. Thanks Phillip at Bothners N1 for doing the nut and my buddy Joe Scheckle for polishing up the frets and conditioning the Fingerboard..

I find the sounds emerging from the neck pickup very like semi-acoustic(335-type), especially in cleanish twin reverb mode..reminds me of Pat Simmons 335 sounds(vintage Doobie bros)and strangely enough, Eric Gale(es-175) and Larry Carlton and John Tropea(also 335's) who all played on Michael Franks' stuff in the 70's.

Forgotten how heavy these things are !Well, let's see how things go...

singemonkey

Have you had a look at the pickups?

guyfeld

Havent looked at the pickups yet..i asked them to check them out for me when the nut was done but the tech was a bit leery of doing so ..

guyfeld

Aha..! I decided to check out the pickups myself and I discovered one of the neck pickups screw heads is stripped! So someone must've dicked with it...
Could explain why the tech at Bothners N1 was not keen to look at them...I'll have to give him the benefit of the doubt ..possibly he discovered it was stripped and left it at that, not wanting be held responsible...I did wonder though why he replaced the nut for free!(because , as he said "you're such a good customer!") :?

I managed to look at the bridge pickup though..still can't verify if it's mk2 or 3..just says Tokai B..with braided cable
. ?
For whatever reason, I can't seem to insert an image here..I know that my Silverlight is out of date on my computer..maybe that's it? Or am I missing something?

Singe, I'm going to try pm you and send that pic..

singemonkey

Image is there. Pretty sure that's a Tokai MkII. Braided wire being the obvious thing. Very decent pickups on a par with many independent offerings. I've still got them in my Tokai until I can get hold of the perfect PAF clones.