Question about my T Top pickup.

[cousingrandpa]

Hey guys, a few years ago one of my friends bought a lot of 10-12 guitars of Craigslist. He gave me an Aria SG. It had a cracked body so I took it apart to repair it & found both pickups were non original. The one in the neck ended up being a transitional Shaw which is really cool, it sounds great in the guitar I put it in. The bridge pickup had no markings so I left it in the guitar & didn't check it out. Now I'm setting the guitar up for slide & put some burst buckers in it & decided to give this pickup a once over. I removed the cover & was pleasantly surprised to find it is a T Top. It is 8.04 k if that helps any. What my question is since the ink stamp or sticker was removed at some point is what timeframe might this pickup be from. I did a little research but found nothing conclusive. thanks for your help guys.

 

[cooljuk]

That's likely an original pickup to the Aria.

There were Japanese pickups manufactured with the same "T" bobbins from Hughes Plastic (the manufacturer of the bobbins Gibson used). Aria did use these.

You can tell that's not a Gibson by the type of cloth coil tape on the coils, the shape and number of the wooden spacers, the different magnet, the additional colors to the jumper leads coming off the coils, and the plastic black hookup lead.

 

[cooljuk]

Here's another example: https://reverb.com/item/31234074-1977-aria-pro-vintage-paf-humbucker-t-top-maxon-mij

 

[cooljuk]

If for any reason you didn't want to keep that, reach out. I know a guy with an Aria V that has high output non-original pickups in it. I bet he'd want that one.