Mini-humbucker

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The mini-humbucker is a smaller variation of the full size PAF humbucker pickup (used in electric guitars) created by the Gibson Guitar Corporation. It has a thinner, less powerful sound than the full-size version and is frequently used in jazz guitars, mounted under the fingerboard or on the pickguard. The mini-humbucker equipped Gibson Firebird, for example, produces clearer, brighter tones that are quite unlike typical Gibson sounds, and fit well between single coils and full-sized humbuckers in the tonal spectrum.

Mini-humbuckers were originally featured on Epiphone electric guitars (now manufactured under license for Gibson) and several of Gibson's archtop jazz guitars. Mini-humbuckers were also used on Gibson Firebird guitars, thus giving them a very distinctive tone. By the 1970s, mini-humbuckers had replaced Gibson's original P-90 single-coil pickups on several of Gibson's budget guitar models, such as the Les Paul Deluxe. Only select re-issue Gibson models are still made with Mini-Humbuckers, as they are less popular than standard humbuckers. Variations of this design are used in Rickenbacker 650 guitars and 4004 basses.