Dimebucker VS Bill Lawrence USA 500XL - Review

[Sharkfin]

I'm drawing up a wiring diagram for my RR project and am wondering what are the color codes for the L-500XL pickup?

Dan Erlewine's The Guitar Player Guide has a Bill Lawrence with 4 wires listed, but I'm not sure if it's the Bill Lawrence USA or the Bill & Becky L.

It has them as:
White & Green (start & finish for the South poles)
Red & Black (start & finish for the North Poles)

They are rarely sold on ebay that's why you dont see them often, but keep checking and you'll find one.

The Bill Lawrence USA's have the wires in either a RED or a GREY sheath, and have thinner blades. Stay away from those!!

**Here's a tip**
The Bill and Becky ones have 5 wires that aren't in a sheath, they are indivual and all sticking out.
The wires are Red,White,Blue,Green,Black.
The blades are thicker than the USA versions.
There's usually 3 stickers on the bottom of the pickup:
#1. Bill Lwarence's autograph
#2. An American Flag
#3. The model of the pickup

Here's a photo:




Keep an eye out cause they aren't on there often. Only buy this version.
You can buy brand new ones for $54.00 at:
http://wildepickups.com/Wilde_Bill_s_Twin_Blades.html

[Dred]

Apparently this should work:

This place, lists wiring for a lawrence pickup as:
NStart Green, NFinish Black
SStart White, SFinish Red

This sire has gone and duped the exact same table as the one above.

I can see the confusion in this, as for instance, the image I posted has a Bare wire and no Blue (suggesting it's for a Lawrence USA), and the credibility of the other two sites is questionable in my opinion. However, with all this long winded nothingness, I actually am getting somewhere.

This photograph is of an instrucion sheet of a Bill and Becky pup. http://www.servimg.com/image_preview...=89&u=10051644

Happy soldering, mate!

[metalchurch79]

That wiring diagram is for a Bill Lawrence USA pickup.

You need to wire your Bill and Becky Lawrence pickups like this:
White - Hot (lead wire)
Red & Green wire together and tape off
Black & Blue are the ground wires. They can be used together, or you can do like me and ground them to different locations. I run the Black to the bridge ground, and the Blue wire to the back of my volume pot.

Dime turned his pickup around, but it really didn't make a difference because of the nature of the blade design pickups and the pull on the poles. It's hard to explain really.

I get the best results by using a 500k volume pot (no capasitor) and no tone pot.
They're very chunky sounding but clear and bright at the same time.

I havent been on here much lately so I apologize. I have some really cool links that I could pm you if you wanna do some more reading up on Bill & Becky Lawrence, etc...

[MetalMedal II]

How does the "real" Bill and Becky L-500XL sound with cleans? Does it distort on the clean setting like an X2N?

[metalchurch79]

It's not bad actually. Atleast not for my setup, but as with everything it depends on how hot your signal is going into your amp.
I'd say that if you roll you volume back to about 7 or 8 it will clean up really nice.
I think the L500L is a little cleaner (slightly less output) than an L500XL.

[Bigfknbang]

here's a vid of me playing my old warlock with the bill lawrence USA l500xl. alot of reverb i know, lol. i also have this pickup in my DK2m its a good pickup. im thinking about getting a dimebucker for the dk2m though.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tX28_kLhOo

[ken361]

Lot of reviews said the dime was kinda thin sounding and there is a few that dont care for the duncan invader I have one and it rocks pretty well. Does the Bill lawrence sound good for VH type of music? What about GFS ? there pretty cheap compared to duncans.

[Jacksonguy666]

well i have the SD version, and im guesing something came undone, bcuz it makes my 6505 mod on my vypyr sound like the LOW GAIN brit model, in fact i know something is wrong, bcuz its a gain cutting piece of shit right now, i think ill put it in my explorer and see what happens...