Maestro Boomering guys...Boomer distorts with humbuckers where Cry Baby doesn't.

[Nocaster Cat]

Hey guys...I've always used my Maestro Boomer with single coils pickups with no issues. I recently started using a Les Paul Custom with a Burstbucker II in the bridge (so not a high output pickup issue) and I'm getting some clipping. I took the Boomer out of the chain and replaced it with a vintage Italian Cry Baby and while it clips just a little, it's considerably less that the Boomer. I've looked at the schematics and parts comparison chart that are floating around out there and the mods and/or noted parts differences seem to be geared towards sweep, vocalness, etc. I know Paul Marrosy and Joe Gagan are huge Boomerang guys so I'm hoping they/someone can enlighten me if there's a mod I can do to reduce the clipping so I don't have to tear apart my vintage one doing trial and error. Thanks!

[joegagan]

the boomer has some distinct differences from the myriad vox, Cbs and their clones.

no mix resistor between Q1 and Q2.

no 100k r to Gd off inductor.

1.0 uf caps ( in place of the .2s in CB vox) feeding the pot .

larger input cap/ smaller  input R .

all of the above contributes to the low end / low-mid punch that the boomer has. this crosses over into distortion pretty easy, esp when hotter pickups are present.  the bad news is that if you lower the gain you lose some of the character - in fact some of the low end goes away when you dial it back.

but you can do some things to make it at least tune-able. the combo of Q1 E to gd 500 ohm trimmer along with a series input trim of 100k in place of the input R  lets you balance back and forth til you find the sweet spot. if you find that the distortion is gone but you also notice the low end is lacking, add around .002u to the .01 sweep cap ( parallel) to bring back the deep a little.

these things are old, there have been cases of resistor drift making bias go wacky, and the electros are usually causing noise and other issues. check em  ( just replace the electros while you are in there)

that should help. let me know what you find.

[Gus]

What might help is a "pickup soak". 
I built something like the following for a friend
keeps a guitar amp input resistance for the guitar or bass
allows you use a volume control at the buffer to reduce the level without losing the guitar, cable cap, input resistance interaction
You could build an opamp buffer with say 1meg input resistance and add a volume control after it for use with the higher output guitar

This has the added fun of the bottom bump

[joegagan]

gus, i love it. you have a .001uf input cap and still manage a bump at 100hz.