# NGD/NPD Agile Pendulum 82527/Lace Alumitone



## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

Hi everyone, I am ashamed to say that my NGD actually happened last year November! I've just been too lazy to post up here, so now I thought I'd make up for it by adding a little something.

So I live in South Africa and had the opportunity to go to Boston and NYC last November for University. I ordered my Agile from Kurt about 2 weeks before I left and managed to pick it up from a friend whilst in NYC.

I have been so happy with it, it really is an awesome guitar and an awesome company to deal with.

Anyway I have decided that passive pickups are my great love, I have SD JB and Jazz in my Epiphone les paul and I just love them.

So I found the Lace Alumitone Bass Bar for 6 String Bass, which is a direct replacement to the Cepheus Pickup. I looked around locally but couldn't find anything. I then found Guitarcenter.com! Pay attention international customers. They can only supply specific brands due to dealership restrictions, however, they now ship to over 90 countries worldwide at a flat rate of $19.99. So Order a amp head and cab, shipping = $19.99! 

Plus it is DHL express. I ordered on the 9th and my pickup arrived on the 15th!
I had a bit of trouble with DHL here because my house is apparently very difficult to find and there is some kind of industrial strike happening here. 

anyways I get my pickup yesterday. 



The donor and patient...



The helpful nurse cautiously watching



The guts of the Cepheus



Bye bye active...



Hello passive

(I'm having some trouble with the images, apparently I'm a bit of a moron, I uploaded all of pictures to flickr, so:Flickr: JacobsByron's Photostream)

Here are some AB tests I did, unfortunately they are not very representative of he improvements. The Lace is so dynamic and just *feels* right. I've found that to me active pickups feels very much, on or off. at 10 they are great and tight, maybe a little sterile, but in between I find them to be cold. 
The lace is very very nice, warm and expressive.  so I'm very happy. Again, unfortunately the recording don't do the comparison justice, but the more open chords illustrate better the difference, more clarity in the lace. 

SoundClick artist: Invitation To The Dance - Jazz, metal,technical

If there are any questions comments, i'd love to hear them. 

Byron


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## GATA4 (Feb 17, 2011)

Very cool dude 

Thanks for the A/B clip! The Lace is definitely warmer and clearer...the Cephus is pretty harsh.


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## Philligan (Feb 17, 2011)

Sounds awesome, man, great post 

As much as the Lace sounds better, I was surprised; that Cepheus sounds pretty great, too


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## JamesM (Feb 17, 2011)

Sweetness duder.


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

Thanks guys, 
After I checked the AB test I was like, ass! I shouldn't have bothered cause the Cepheus sounds so good. But the more I play on the Lace, the more and more I'm happier with it. I have officially adopted the quote, "Batteries are for flashlights" 

As soon as I have some time I'll throw together some tones both high and low gain, cause the ones I recorded with are just tones I made for other guitars.

Very happy, I'm still curious to know how the emg 45hz will sound, but I dont have the $$$ to test it. 

Also I forgot to metion I recorded everything through podfarm 2.


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## TMM (Feb 17, 2011)

I had no idea the bass Alumitones fit an 8-string format! I'm on it.

Nice guitar / pickup / clips too, btw!


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

Thanks! I really appreciate it.  The Pendulum 82725 actually uses Rondo's 9 string pickup! but it is conveniently the size of a 6 string bass soap bar pickup. so the Emg 45 series fit perfectly too.  I think guitar center is having a sale on the Alumitones now too, so you could pick one up for pretty cheap. 

Thanks again/


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## Red Beard (Feb 17, 2011)

Finally! Its awesome to see one of these pickups in an 8 string. It sounds like an improvement as well, at least to me. Way to post clips too. Any chance of an audio sample of some low clean playing?


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

Yeah, sure. No prblem.  I was going to make up some decent tones. The clips really don't do th pickup justice. I'll try post up another clip over the weekend,. Thanks everyone for the postive words.  any other requests? Low clean? Anything else?


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## GuitaristOfHell (Feb 17, 2011)

That finish is a win.


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## srrdude (Feb 17, 2011)

i'd like to hear how tight you can get that pickup. Something really grindy.


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## Customisbetter (Feb 17, 2011)

That is slick.


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

srrdude said:


> i'd like to hear how tight you can get that pickup. Something really grindy.


Sure sure, can you give me an example? I'm not sure I know what grindy sounds like.  thanks again to everyone, I really appreciate the kind words.  sorry to see the armada that you're selling your guitar. I can definitely vouch for the guitar, it really is awesome.


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## Red Beard (Feb 17, 2011)

Thanks for the upcoming clip! Did you notice any decrease in weight from swapping out the pickup as mentioned on the Lace site?


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## Alwballe (Feb 17, 2011)

oke, a bit of topic here, but this haz been buggin me ever since i joined here:
Feel free to have a laugh but still, What does "NGD" stand for? >.<


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## Dan_Vacant (Feb 17, 2011)

Alwballe said:


> oke, a bit of topic here, but this haz been buggin me ever since i joined here:
> Feel free to have a laugh but still, What does "NGD" stand for? >.<


it means New Guitar Day and i had the same problem on other sites lmao


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## Dan_Vacant (Feb 17, 2011)

and i was wondering about lace pickups for erg and then found this it sounds awesome


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

New Guitar Day.  Don't worry it took me a while aswell. 

@Red Beard: The pickup itself is substantially lighter, its like "I don't think this is going to work" thin. But in a solid mahogany guitar it doesn't make a noticeable difference. Perhaps in a 2 pickup guitar, but again I don't see it reducing the weight of a Les Paul to such an extent. Basically, if you want a lighter guitar, swapping out the pickups ain't gonna help.  So in a really round about way, I'm saying nope, I didn't notice a difference in the guitar, but the pickup definitely. 

Also, I'd really like to emphasize how impressed I was with Guitar center. International shipping to my door in 7 days for $20.00, unbeatable here in SA.


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

Dan_Vacant said:


> and i was wondering about lace pickups for erg and then found this it sounds awesome



Thanks! I'm glad I could help.  I'm very happy with it.

I suspect there may be a way to "split" the coils if there are coils, so it might give another sound for cleans.  the reason I say this is because there are 3 wires coming from the pickup, 

http://www.lacemusic.com/wiring/pdf/12.pdf

just curious. But I'll get my hands on a push pull pot and check it out.
Also the wiring recommends a 250k but I used a 500k pot, because it's what I had. Apparently higher pot values give a slightly brighter sound. So it might be worth playing with values.


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## darren (Feb 17, 2011)

The Alumitones come in the same sizes as EMG and other active soapbar pickups... 1.5" x 3.5", 4.0" or 4.5".


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## SYLrules88 (Feb 17, 2011)

i had not bought alumnitones for my 8 because while the dimensions of the 5 string bass pup i think would fit in a passive route, i read online about the magnetic field and it didnt sound like it would cover the entire area.

TS i havent listened to your sound clip yet but does the pup pick up all of the strings?


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## srrdude (Feb 17, 2011)

5mjacbyr said:


> Sure sure, can you give me an example? I'm not sure I know what grindy sounds like.  thanks again to everyone, I really appreciate the kind words.  sorry to see the armada that you're selling your guitar. I can definitely vouch for the guitar, it really is awesome.



You sir are a champion and a scholar. I'm thinkin like...nile tightness. I always describe their sound as kind of a grinding noise. Very tight with focused upper mids. Its almost as if someone took a disc grinder to a metal flag pole. 

Lol but maybe thats just me!

*i should mention, im interested in hearing how tight its palm muting is, i would love to hear a riff with a palm muted pedal to hear the difference. 

I've been talking to harry haussel about getting some 8-string slanted pickups made and i recently submitted a final design to him, but with how cheap these are and how impressed i am so far by their clarity, I may have to get a set of both and see how they stack up to a $XXX (a lot) dollar set of customs.


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 17, 2011)

srrdude said:


> You sir are a champion and a scholar. I'm thinkin like...nile tightness. I always describe their sound as kind of a grinding noise. Very tight with focused upper mids. Its almost as if someone took a disc grinder to a metal flag pole.
> 
> Lol but maybe thats just me!



haha! That sounds cool, i'll do my best  Any pickup that can sound like a "disc grinder to a metal flag pole" wins in my book. 

@SYLrules88: The nice thing about the pendulum is that its actually routed for a 9 string so the magnetic field is actually much wider than it needs to be because of the angle. But yeah, the response is pleasantly even over the strings. I'll put that in a recording for you. As for a nonfanned 8 I really couldn't say, obviously you'd have to use the 5 string bass bar, which means maybe it won't pickup the strings, or you'd need to route wide enough for the 6 string bass bar.

For anyone looking at using these pups, when you actually mount it in your guitar the top part of the pup mushrooms out a bit, so according to this: http://www.lacemusic.com/wiring/pdf/BB_specs.pdf
you only need to route enough space for the C measurement, not the A. (if I remember correctly, but I'm pretty sure.)


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## Red Beard (Feb 18, 2011)

SYLrules88 said:


> i had not bought alumnitones for my 8 because while the dimensions of the 5 string bass pup i think would fit in a passive route, i read online about the magnetic field and it didnt sound like it would cover the entire area.
> 
> TS i havent listened to your sound clip yet but does the pup pick up all of the strings?



I would not be worried about the 4" version sensing the strings on a single scale eight string guitar. When I talked to Lace recently they confirmed my suspicion that the Tone Bar and Bass Bar pickups have the same specs, but the magnetic field is wider on the Tone Bar as they are used for steel guitars. The 4" Tone Bar pickups 10 string on a steel, so if you are worried I would go that route.


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 18, 2011)

GuitaristOfHell said:


> That finish is a win.



 Thank you.  Are you talking about the guitar finish or the end of the clip?
If you're talking about the clip, check out my tube screamer replica clip, same riff just a bit tighter.


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## proto (Feb 18, 2011)

which alumitone will fit my an 828? 
i'm looking at replacing my cepheus with either alumitones or waiting for the 8 string dimarzio deactivators to come out. -- going for some warm jazz/clean tones


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 18, 2011)

Just measure your pickup cavity and compare to these dimensions:
http://www.lacemusic.com/wiring/pdf/BB_specs.pdf

As far as I know the Bass Bar is the only lace pickup that will fit the 828. But be careful because apparently the 5 string model might not cover all the string properly, and so you might need to route wider for the 6 string version of the bass bar. (Those are 5 string bass and 6 string bass pickups)

but measure first and take it from there.


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## capone1 (Feb 25, 2011)

Talk about a complete epic win, he orders bass pups internationally and ends up with awesome. 

Badass clips man. 

I'm so interested to hear more. Any alternatives to the pups we access to now is HUGE.


I salute you sir.


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 26, 2011)

Thanks so much Capone1! very kind words.  Yeah I am super happy with the pickup!
I've been so busy lately with lame stuff that I haven't had the chance
to record or post anything, so my apologies to those I promised clips to.

But I may have some free time soon.  I was interested in the 6 string bass q tuner
So I would really like to check that out, or alternatively the emg 45hz may be quite cool!

Thanks again for the awesome words. And I will do my absolute best to post a few more 
clips within the next few days. 

but yeah, anyone out there willing to try the q tuner earns some mega awesome points from me.


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## 80H (Feb 27, 2011)

awesome difference between the two pickups, so much more life to the lace. thanks a ton for sharing - will definitely affect my next guitar choice


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## mgcasella (Feb 27, 2011)

Rep added - THANK YOU! 

What value pots did you use for the Lace? 

I believe the site says to use 250K ones but I've wondered if experimenting with pot values changes the tone (for better or worse) as I always use 1 meg pots with my pups.

So... tell us about what you decided to do inside the guitar - thanks!


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 27, 2011)

OK! so finally I had some free time. Here ya go!
SoundClick artist: Invitation To The Dance - Jazz, metal,technical

I apologise for any sloppyness in my playing. Half way through the grind section I changed tone to try and illustrate the 'grindyness' for srrdude.  

There is some low clean playing at the end for Red Beard and there is also a little ditty right at the end to illustrate the response across all string for SYLrules88.

There is no post processing on any of the channels, all the tones are dual tones through Pod Farm 2.

@mgcasella: I originally planned to put in a 250k pot as suggested, because I was expecting the pickup to be brighter than it is. Unfortunately I realised too late I don't actually have a 250k pot, so I settled on a 500k pot. I have a 1meg which i'm keen to try, but I'm happy with the "brightness" as it is now. so I will probably stick with 500k. I also want to get a push/pull pot to try get some coil splitting action, but I'm not sure if the pup can be split? it has 3 wires, so I'm not sure, but some fiddling will answer my questions. Finally because my pendulum is only routed for one knob I will probably stick to just a volume knob, otherwise mabye a pull for tone knob, or a trim pot in the body for tone and shifting the vol knob to 1M. That way I could use the trim pot to dial back any excessive highs. There is a claim on the Lace website that if run through a full response system one can actually achieve near acoustic/piezo tones. so if I can get that with a push/pull knob or something, it would be sweet! But again, fiddling with these things will answer all nagging thoughts. 


Everything I mentioned above is here: 
Guitar Wiring FAQs
"The rule is: Using higher value pots (500K) will give the guitar a brighter sound and lower value pots (250K) will give the guitar a slightly warmer sound."

Thanks so much for all the enthusiasm, kind words and questions. Please feel free to ask me anything and/or request clips or what have you. 

Thanks again everyone.


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## capone1 (Feb 28, 2011)

The new clips sound really good(don't be so hard on yourself red light syndrome hits all of us) 

How about something in the higher registor to show off the lead sound. maybe clean chords and a ripping solo? just to hear the difference.



NO PRESSURE BY THE WAY;-)


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## srrdude (Feb 28, 2011)

My response to this thread:


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 28, 2011)

Thanks guys!  srrdude I cant see your pic  but I'm registering at imageshack now so I'll hopefully be able to see it soon. 

@capone1: I'll put together a recording for you.  No problem. I'm not a very good lead player but I'll do my best  

Thanks again for the enthusiasm guys. Totally loving this guitar and pickup, I just miss a neck pup  and I'm too scared to route the guitar, or even have the guitar routed. I love it too much. 

What do you guys think of having a straight neck pup rather than an angled one?
I'm too curious about q tuners, they're apparently too harsh for bridge position. And the piggy bank is telling me no! double  

Thank you all again! any other requests?


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## 5mjacbyr (Feb 28, 2011)

@srrdude: Just saw the pictures 
very nice!


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## srrdude (Feb 28, 2011)

Chyea bro. 212 is much easier to swallow than the 700 i was gonna shell out for customs, so well try em out. Ill keep you posted on the build as it progresses.


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## alex103188 (Mar 26, 2011)

So I have this exact guitar but with dual humbuckers.. I read on the website that the lace alumitones are designed for passive installation but work with "pre existing preamp technology". Does that mean to imply that they can be direct replacements for the cepheus active 9's and basically work like active pickups? I do love me some passives, but the idea of the alumitones just enhancing what was already there sounds amazing!


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