[scott from _actual time_]

(i spun this off into a new thread because it was mutating into discussion about pickups. the original thread is here.)

Originally Posted by noodles

IIRC, the Custom is at least a 1/2" away from the strings. The fat mids are exactly what you should be experiencing. Looking at the the Duncan tone chart led me to believe that there would be less mids with the magnet switch, but in actuality it relocated the mids lower down the frequency spectrum.

wow--1/2" is a lot, if you're remembering that right (as a carpenter, i suspect like most folks you might be over-estimating the number ). my Custom is ~5/32" from the strings (no notes fretted), and my Jazz is ~3/16".

i finally hooked up the Jazz and the middle Rio Grande Tallboy single the other day, and i was a bit surprised. i'm still getting the great chewey mids from the Custom, which sounds awesome. the Tallboy alone sounds very good, moderate-output texas single-coil sound, although it gets a little fuzzy with hard attack, perhaps because it's almost too close to the strings, ~5/32", but it's so tall i can't get it any lower.

the Jazz sounds exactly like the name--round and smooth, woody, but almost too round--there's no slight edge for cutting through, like an Air Norton has. the Jazz neck coil + the Tallboy is also very round and almost bland; it has a bit of quack if i pick hard. the Custom inner coil + the Tallboy has nice quack and that slightly phased/notched "Pull Me Under" clean sound. they sound good with high gain, and even better with medium gain. but clean they all sound rather bland--no sparkle.

so i'm wondering if the great dirty tones but bland cleans is the curse of a thick slab of mahogany. my RG is mahogany with a maple cap and DiMarzios, and the maple and/or the DiMarzios (ceramic magents; soon to be Alnico) give it nice quack and sparkle. this homemade S7 is a slab of (African) mahogany with a heavy maple neck and ebony fretboard; it has thicker high-gain mids but no sparkle. all very interesting.

i need to do a direct A/B shootout with my RG, track them both, and listen while i'm not playing.

[noodles]

I used to build custom cabinetry, so I know just how much a half an inch is.



The bridge pickup is now down as far as it will go (flat with the top), and even then, the poles are pretty much buried. The Custom is an extremely hot pickup. I just kept cranking it down, hit bottom, drilled seven holes to clear the pole pieces, and cranked it down some more.

So, yeah, the bridge pickup really is almost a 1/2" below the strings.

[scott from _actual time_]

Originally Posted by noodles

I used to build custom cabinetry, so I know just how much a half an inch is.

heh!

Originally Posted by noodles

The bridge pickup is now down as far as it will go (flat with the top), and even then, the poles are pretty much buried.

wow--that's way lower than i've ever run a pickup. interesting, and cool, that we seem to be getting a similar type of sound. i may crank mine down some just to see, and to lower the volume a bit.

how's the tone of your Jazz--all round, or is there an edge to it? your guitar is a lot more maple than mine, so i wouldn't be surprised if yours has some edge to it.

[D-EJ915]

That's pretty crazy that you run the pickup that low noodles, my X2N is like 3/16" away on my flying V and that's much hotter than the Custom but then my G2 isn't like the fuck-all of gain like your mesa is.

[noodles]

Originally Posted by scott from _actual time_

wow--that's way lower than i've ever run a pickup. interesting, and cool, that we seem to be getting a similar type of sound. i may crank mine down some just to see, and to lower the volume a bit.

What other pickups have you used before? The Custom is hotter than anything that doesn't have a battery or rails on it. The trick is do the height tweaking on the highest frets. I could get some amazing tones in the middle of the neck with it higher, but then the notes get squashed on the upper frets. A lot of our harmony work has me above fifteen, so I absolutely require notes to ring true all the way up to the 24th fret.

how's the tone of your Jazz--all round, or is there an edge to it? your guitar is a lot more maple than mine, so i wouldn't be surprised if yours has some edge to it.

It has bite, but without edge, if that makes any sense. The Jazz is such a fat pickup in the neck position that it never gets edgy, even though it maintains tons of clarity. It's almost keyboard-like in a way, with the same sort of precise, yet rounded, attack. It's amazing for legato runs. It is my absolute favorite pickup in the entire universe.

[noodles]

Originally Posted by D-EJ915

That's pretty crazy that you run the pickup that low noodles, my X2N is like 3/16" away on my flying V and that's much hotter than the Custom but then my G2 isn't like the fuck-all of gain like your mesa is.

The KxK Sii-7 prototype had an X2N in it that I also had to crank way down. Most people don't realize that their pickups are too close because they don't do a lot of playing in the upper registers. I've got solos where I bend the high E at the 24th fret. Too close, and that note just dies. You need to back the magnets away from it if you want it to scream.

[Zepp88]

Hmm...I must test this.

[scott from _actual time_]

Originally Posted by noodles

I could get some amazing tones in the middle of the neck with it higher, but then the notes get squashed on the upper frets. A lot of our harmony work has me above fifteen, so I absolutely require notes to ring true all the way up to the 24th fret.

i bet it's the upper fret thing. i've run lots of really hot pickups--Custom, the newer JBs, XL500s, the 18k custom DiMarzio in my LACS--but i rarely play up there, and fretting those notes dramatically lowers the string height. so the pickup would need to be really low to still be ~3/16" from the strings when fretted at the 24th fret.

It has bite, but without edge, if that makes any sense. The Jazz is such a fat pickup in the neck position that it never gets edgy, even though it maintains tons of clarity. It's almost keyboard-like in a way, with the same sort of precise, yet rounded, attack. It's amazing for legato runs.

interesting--seems like you're getting way more bite from it than i am. it's prolly some combination of the extra maple, or your hard-tail, or my rather dark amp settings.

[eaeolian]

Originally Posted by scott from _actual time_

interesting--seems like you're getting way more bite from it than i am. it's prolly some combination of the extra maple, or your hard-tail, or my rather dark amp settings.

Sounds like I'm getting more than you are, too, even in my maple/maple/mahogany Sonic 7. (I would expect my maple/ebony/alder Soloist to have more...)

FWIW, I run my pickups that far off the strings in their stock config. When I was working with Wolfe on my JB rewind, he put the meter on the JB7 and discovered it was like 19.6K - when he rewound it, he put it in the 14.6K range, like a6 string JB, and the clarity jumped tremendously - AND I could run it closer to the strings without it turning to mush.

[scott from _actual time_]

Originally Posted by eaeolian

Sounds like I'm getting more than you are, too, even in my maple/maple/mahogany Sonic 7.

i nudged the presence on my power amp up a tad, and i'm getting more bite from the Jazz. it still sounds quite nice, but the AN7 may be a hair better for me. eventually i'll do a shootout between the Jazz and an Alnico V AN7.

FWIW, I run my pickups that far off the strings in their stock config.

i think i'll experiment some with this too, although i have single-coils that can't go any lower and so can't get any quieter, and i don't want to lower the humbuckers so low that they're way quieter than the singles. but i'm curious to see how lowering might affect the tone on the first octave of the neck, where almost all my playing is.