Help with Luke 3

[StankyUncleJ]

I recently purchased a Luke 3 HH from Guitar Center. It was an amazing guitar and sounded fantastic; however, I was missing single coils, so I traded it for a Luke 3 SSH. I went and picked up the new guitar today because they had to ship the olive gold color in.

The issue is that the back pickup was really quite, the strings were fretting out, and the middle pickup was lower than the neck pickup. I have also noticed that it keeps going out of tune. I explained to Guitar Center that the back pickup was not very loud and their technician decided to take a look at it. He tried to raise it, then said that there were no springs in it and he would have to add some springs.

I'm pretty devastated because I have shows coming up real soon and I have to drive an hour to and from Guitar Center. Did I get a lemon? Do the pickups normally have springs in them? My Luke 3 HH had none of these issues and I am thinking that I may want that back, but that single coil neck pickup sounds so good!

This is my first time on the forum and I was hoping to bring great news and pictures, but instead I could us a little help.

 

[StankyUncleJ]

Sorry, I don't normally just charge into a forum head first.

Hello, I am new here, but I have been looking through posts prior to purchasing my guitar. Looking forward to a long relationship with my Luke if I can get things worked out.

Thank you for any help provided.

 

[guitarp77]

What I can tell you is that lemons are prettynhard to find (if not "nonexistent") in the MM world.

Contact cust serv, they are the best in the business and willmtake cae of you!

Welcome to the board!

 

[mystixboi1]

Contact CS for sure

Also, I have a liii HH and it has a taper pot that controls the volume of the 2nd and 4th positions. You should see if your Liii has this too

Good luck

 

[beej]

Hi there,

On the fretting out issue- this usually just requires a small tweak of the truss rod, that's something we can easily walk you through.

Yes, the pickup heights are fixed, and for volume there is some adjustment possible from the preamp, inside the cavity. It does sound surprising that the bridge humbucker is quiet. So I'll agree with what everyone else told you- call or email the Customer Service folks (the link is in my signature), and see what they say before you do anything.

Welcome to the forum!

 

[xjbebop]

I've done a lot (too much...??) business with GC, but I would -never- let one of their "techs" touch a guitar of mine...just sayin'

It's also quite possible that someone else bought & returned or just monkeyed around with that guitar before it got shipped to you. Happens a lot in the GC world.
Best thing to do would be ship it to EBMM for a factory freshening as soon as you can.
I recently had a similar experience. Got a great deal on a JP6 that had been at the local GC for a couple of years but it had a couple of issues. I spent a few extra bucks to ship it to the factory and now it's fabulous! Can't say enough about the excellent customer service I received. And the turn around was fast.

...or, you could just return it and try again....

 

[A.J.]

PM sent!

 

[beej]

There ya go AJ is on the case.

 

[StankyUncleJ]

I want to thank everyone that posted and especially to A.J. for the fast and helpful service. After some advice that was given I decided to call GC. They were actually very helpful and allowed me to bring it back in for a trade. I did have to drive a ways, but for what it's worth...um it was worth it. They went ahead and traded it for a blue Luke 3 that has a roasted maple neck. I really liked the rosewood neck, but this feels just as good, though a little different.

Glad I made the decision to get on the forum and ask. Extremely helpful everyone!

 

[TNT]

all's well that ends well!!

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, ..........maybe I'll pop into GC and see if they will give me a "deal" on the first Luke. I'll have that baby up and purrrrrinnnn like a kitten by the time he gets back from his lunch break!!!!!