G&L Tribute S500 Electric Guitar - Blue Burst
G&L Guitars are the guitars Leo Fender considered to be the ulimate in the evolution of his designs and he worked in the G&L factory until the day of his death. All G&L guitars feature pickups made in the G&L factory on Fender Drive, Fullerton., California.
The S500 has what is considered to be a far better tremolo that fitted to guitars of this type as is it a 2-point rather than 6 screw mounting. It has chunkier frets and a flatter fingerboard.
The G&L Dual Fulcrum Vibrato
The G&L Dual-Fulcrum® vibrato uses two pivoting points rather than the six wood screws attaching the a vintage type tremolo. Leo Fender created this design to yield a much smoother, "silky" feel and allows the player to bend notes up as well as down. Unlike similar looking copies, the DF vibrato uses a hardened steel bridge plate, pivoting on knife-edge bolts set into massive brass inserts anchored into the body. The bolts themselves are machined from billets of cold rolled steel, then heat treated for hardness and finally plated. The handling of the vibrato is improved with the addition of a machined aluminum machined tremolo arm that uses a single locking Allen screw, pressing a nylon insert to allow quick installation and removal, smooth feel, and also allow the player adjust the amount of resistance on the arm. Further, Leo designed the string saddles to improve intonation and reduce string breakage.
The G&L Non-Compression Truss Rod
G&Ls contemporary, non-compression design incorporates a secondary, flat-sided rod which bows away from the primary rod. Unlike a vintage truss rod, this design does not compress the neck longitudinally in order to function; compression is undesirable because it tends to distort the curvature of the fingerboard. Operation is both fluid and accurate with the articulation of the neck, the "relief", being very consistent across the length of the neck
G&L Magnetic Field Design Pickups
The Magnetic Field Design pickups use a ceramic bar magnet installed underneath each coil, with soft iron adjustable pole pieces to transfer the magnetic field to the surface of the pickup. By contrast, traditional Alnico type pickups, such as used in the Legacy and George Fullerton models, use nonadjustable Alnico pole pieces leaving the only adjustment being pickup height. The Magnetic Field Design has this adjustment, but further offers individual adjustment of each pole piece, letting the player effectively adjust the output of each string on each pickup. Magnetic Field Design yield about twice the output per wind, making the pickup quieter while allowing a greater overall output. The sound of Magnetic Field pickups is slightly warmer with a broader frequency response. One major Nashville session guitarist remarked that the G&L S-500 with Magnetic Field single coil pickups sounded as balanced and "sweet" as his favourite old vintage Alnico equipped axe. The difference is that the S-500 sounds that good right into his amp without all the EQ tweaking of his mixing console that made his other guitar sound so good. When he ran his S-500 though his studio rig, he was truly amazed at the rich and warm, yet clear and sparkly sound. |
