# Are "Metal" Pickups The Biggest Scam Out There?



## bzhang9 (Mar 1, 2020)

Just being real, lots of stock pickups sound garbage, many expensive pickups sound garbage, many of them sound basically the same with minor eq and output differences easily compensated by the signal chain

there's demos eg lundgrens sounding basically the same as agile stocks, they all probably cost about $20 to make anyways

I've tried BKPS, fishmans, instrumentals, alpha omegas etc etc they don't objectively sound better than dimarzios, often worse

I'd say most boutique pickups are popular because they look good, feel expensive, has the placebo effect, and fancy name

Someone could mass produce comparable decent pickups for 50 bucks, make a killing, and put these companies out of business


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## Promit (Mar 1, 2020)

Yup, you caught them. I'll send over the Guitar Player Magazine reporter tonight.


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## diagrammatiks (Mar 1, 2020)

maybe? I've gotten a lot more whatever about pickups. I've had five used Ibanez's last year that came with all sorts of dimarzios. Their ok. I still prefer bkps.

Plus the difference in price between the sets is only 100 bucks. so whatever.


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## MASS DEFECT (Mar 1, 2020)

Sure, to some extent. But you can't get an Ibz/Dmz stock pickup sound and feel like an EMG 81, which is a quintessential "metal pickup" .


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## Hollowway (Mar 1, 2020)

Agile pickups DO sound a lot like Lundgrens. That's why so many people like them. And obviously people have different tastes, so that's why you like some and don't like others. Then there's the fact that if you price something low, people will assume it's not as good as something priced high. And on top of that, you could substitute "pickup" with any other piece of music equipment in that last sentence, and realize that very few of us want to buy one guitar that is cheap and then be done forever. Or amp, or bass, or OD, etc. 

But the biggest scam out there? No. The biggest scam out there is trickle down economics.


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## bzhang9 (Mar 1, 2020)

No one has a problem paying $300 for bits of metal and plastic that probably costs $20 to make?

A set of pickups costing more than the lastest generation Ipad makes sense?


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## Edika (Mar 1, 2020)

I don't think anyone is arguing the cost of a pickup vs raw material, however you have to take into account RnD, country of production-cost of operation and all kind of other stuff plus the fact that the volume of production will offset the cost. BKP has a smaller operation than Seymour Duncan so they must sell their pickups higher in price to make ends meet.
I have tried several different sets in one guitar. They changed the sound of the instrument quite a bit. Not to the point it masked the sound of the instrument (I tried some sets in a few guitars and they didn't sound identical, it was a combination of pickups plus guitar) however I never managed to EQ the guitar in a way that it sounded like the previous set that was in. Not even managed to get close. The main difference is the recorded sound vs the in room sound. Maybe recording different pickups in the same guitar might not sound that different but the response of the pickups in the room varies quite a bit from set to set.
If you like Dimarzios you like Dimarzios. I've tried a few modern sounding pickups and I'm not a big fan most of the times. And there is variation in clarity between pickup to pickup.


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## budda (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> No one has a problem paying $300 for bits of metal and plastic that probably costs $20 to make?
> 
> A set of pickups costing more than the lastest generation Ipad makes sense?



You know mark-up is on *everything* you buy, right?

Holloway wrapped things up nicely.


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## pastanator (Mar 1, 2020)

not even the biggest scam in music imo

the biggest scam in music is mic cables


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## Hollowway (Mar 1, 2020)

OP, you could make your own pickups, if you wanted. It's one of the easier things to do in the world of guitars (way easier than building a guitar or trying to make hardware, etc.). Lot's of people do that, and it's super inexpensive, in comparison.

And if you think metal pickups are expensive, try looking at the other genres. Those are aimed at older doctors and lawyers playing old Fenders and Gibsons. Those things will make the metal pickups look like a crazy bargain.


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## MaxOfMetal (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> No one has a problem paying $300 for bits of metal and plastic that probably costs $20 to make?
> 
> A set of pickups costing more than the lastest generation Ipad makes sense?



A guitar is maybe $100 in lumber. The electrical system in your house is maybe $300 in wire, conduit, receptacles, and switches. The tires on your car are maybe $80 in rubber. 

What you pay for these things is the proper and consist assembly, not the raw materials. 

It's not like any of this stuff is a secret. StewMac has sold pickup parts and building supplies since at least the mid 80's.


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## Lorcan Ward (Mar 1, 2020)

R & D is a big reason you pay a lot for products like that. With that said so many pickups are just slightly modified existing pickups and they seem to cost more every year.


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## budda (Mar 1, 2020)

Lorcan Ward said:


> R & D is a big reason you pay a lot for products like that. With that said so many pickups are just slightly modified existing pickups and they seem to cost more every year.



Everything costs more every year


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## Demiurge (Mar 1, 2020)

The market itself is not a scam, just the after-school-special grade peer pressure and hype that the consumers inadvertently impose on these products just make it feel like one. $200 pickups are less offensive when you haven't convinced yourself that you need them because someone on the internet has them, too.


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## KnightBrolaire (Mar 1, 2020)

Throbaks are like 500$ a set. Actual vintage PAFs are worth thousands of dollars. sub 300$ for pickups is a steal comparatively. I mean if you want to play with cheaper pickups there's plenty of solid stuff for under 50$ a pickup (bill lawrence, dragonfire/other artec resellers, warman, entwistle). Getting outraged over gear prices is the most first world problem shit ever.
Don't like it, don't buy it, or buy it used.

A/B ing pickups is extremely subjective unless you're doing some kind of scientific evaluation of the frequency response of pickups in the same guitar with the same strings/riffs/amp/a motorized picking hand to control force/speed. TLDR you're not evaluating anything objectively.


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## budda (Mar 1, 2020)

I keep mentioning a small builder who charges like $60usd a pickup but Americans arent interested


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## bzhang9 (Mar 1, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> A guitar is maybe $100 in lumber. The electrical system in your house is maybe $300 in wire, conduit, receptacles, and switches. The tires on your car are maybe $80 in rubber.
> 
> What you pay for these things is the proper and consist assembly, not the raw materials.
> 
> It's not like any of this stuff is a secret. StewMac has sold pickup parts and building supplies since at least the mid 80's.



That's a bit extreme, comparing the work that goes into building a guitar to winding a pickup

The proper and consistent assembly of a pickup using machinery doesn't seem like it should cost that much

If we agree Agile cepheus sounds like lundgrens, why are we ok with lundgrens costing 4x more? Because meshuggah uses them and theres SSO threads hyping them up?



KnightBrolaire said:


> Throbaks are like 500$ a set. Actual vintage PAFs are worth thousands of dollars. sub 300$ for pickups is a steal comparatively. I mean if you want to play with cheaper pickups there's plenty of solid stuff for under 50$ a pickup (bill lawrence, dragonfire/other artec resellers, warman, entwistle). Getting outraged over gear prices is the most first world problem shit ever.
> Don't like it, don't buy it, or buy it used.



Relax bro its a forum don't get all offended. Obviously there's the vintage market with ridiculous prices. This is SSO forum no one cares about those.


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## budda (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> That's a bit extreme, comparing the work that goes into building a guitar to winding a pickup
> 
> The proper and consistent assembly of a pickup using machinery doesn't seem like it should cost that much
> 
> If we agree Agile cepheus sounds like lundgrens, why are we ok with lundgrens costing 4x more? Because meshuggah uses them and theres SSO threads hyping them up?



How was it extreme? He explained it in the second line.

Also yes, you answered your own question.


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## MaxOfMetal (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> That's a bit extreme, comparing the work that goes into building a guitar to winding a pickup
> 
> The proper and consistent assembly of a pickup using machinery doesn't seem like it should cost that much
> 
> If we agree Agile cepheus sounds like lundgrens, why are we ok with lundgrens costing 4x more? Because meshuggah uses them and theres SSO threads hyping them up?



The concept is the same.

With any consumer product materials are usually the smallest cost. What you're paying for is the entire integrated supply chain, as well as operating costs of the enterprise, including new product development, marketing, etc. 

Revenue vs. Profit


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## KnightBrolaire (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> That's a bit extreme, comparing the work that goes into building a guitar to winding a pickup
> 
> The proper and consistent assembly of a pickup using machinery doesn't seem like it should cost that much
> 
> ...


lmao, why would I get offended about what you said. I was merely pointing out that you're salty about something that you don't need to be salty about. There are cheap good pickups out there already and there's no point in bitching about boutique prices because they're not going down anytime soon.


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## c7spheres (Mar 1, 2020)

- I don't think it's a scam, but marketing's main goal is to make sales. Only if they misrepresent is it a scam. 
- The placebo effect is a very real thing. I think in some form we've all been under it's spell at some point and maybe still fall into it's trap sometimes. It's why you like something then don't once the honeymoon wears off, or even years later. Sometimes an epiphany stirikes and suddenly you hear things different.
- This is why gear that doesn't change for decades can still be a big seller year after year. It actuall IS good for whatever it does. Like a Strat, a Les Paul, a v30 and sm57 combination, a PAF pickup, EMG's, that .88 green Tortex pick, the girl next door etc.. 
- A Tried-and-True gear thread would be a pretty cool thread. Talking about gear that is actually tried-and-true. Stuff that's been around at least say 15-20 years.


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## budda (Mar 1, 2020)

c7spheres said:


> This is why gear that doesn't change for decades can still be a big seller year after year. It actuall IS good for whatever it does. Like a Strat, a Les Paul, a v30 and sm57 combination, a PAF pickup, EMG's, that .88 green Tortex pick, the girl next door etc..
> - A Tried-and-True gear thread would be a pretty cool thread. Talking about gear that is actually tried-and-true. Stuff that's been around at least say 15-20 years.



But you just covered half of it .


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## Hollowway (Mar 1, 2020)

You guys are going to think I’m crazy, but I don’t swap out pickups. A long time ago I got one of the first Gary Kramer delta wing /turbulence models. I got a JB7 and put it in there, and didn’t feel like it made enough of a difference to warrant the cost and effort. Since then I just keep whatever came with the guitar (and granted I’m buying decent guitars) and I just accept that that is that guitar’s “sound.” So many times I hear people buying an Agile or Kiesel and asking what pickup would be good in it BEFORE the guitar even arrives.


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## MaxOfMetal (Mar 1, 2020)

Hollowway said:


> So many times I hear people buying an Agile or Kiesel and asking what pickup would be good in it BEFORE the guitar even arrives.



Yeah, some people are just fucking morons. 

It's like the folks who order the pickups before they even choose the guitar to buy. 

Cart before the horse and all that jazz. 

It was really bad when BKPZ were first hyped to the moon and back. Dark times for this sub-forum.


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## KnightBrolaire (Mar 1, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> Yeah, some people are just fucking morons.
> 
> It's like the folks who order the pickups before they even choose the guitar to buy.
> 
> ...


I love people that want to swap pickups out immediately, it's super entertaining to watch them do the mental gymnastics to support that idea. Even better is that one dipshit that was on here a while back who was hyping pickups he'd never tried. Still cracks me up when I think about it


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## Demiurge (Mar 1, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> It was really bad when BKPZ were first hyped to the moon and back. Dark times for this sub-forum.



Oh, god, all those threads, "What BKP sounds like _____?" Why does the brand choice precede the sound?


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## Avedas (Mar 1, 2020)

The stock Kiesel strat pickups were pretty bad though. I replaced them after about 2 weeks.


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## Hollowway (Mar 1, 2020)

Avedas said:


> The stock Kiesel strat pickups were pretty bad though. I replaced them after about 2 weeks.


I like their newer ones, but my old DC800 had terrifically bad actives. I’ll agree with you on that!


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## Zoobiedood (Mar 1, 2020)

You might not have a good understanding of how things are priced.


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## Cynicanal (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> Someone could mass produce comparable decent pickups for 50 bucks, make a killing, and put these companies out of business


And yet, that hasn't happened. I wonder why? Maybe because it's not so easy to produce pickups that are at that level, and they're not really a big scam?


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## Emperoff (Mar 1, 2020)

Why is it a scam? If you don't like a brand nor their price you can take your money elsewhere. Princing involves plenty of things besides materials as previously stated.

I'm the first that laughs when I see a thread about people putting a pickup set that's worth more than the guitar they'll go in, or when they order the pickups before even having the guitar (geniuses). If people are stupid enough to act like this just becausse of hype, manufacturers can get away increasing their prices.

A pickup is the first "layer" between your guitar and the amp. It will affect *everything* that goes afterwards feel and tone-wise. How important is finding the right "layer" is very dependant on the player. Also, there are some guitars that are more picky than others. 

Does any of that justify the prices? That's on you.


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## gunch (Mar 1, 2020)

GUITAR ENTREPRENEURS HATE HIM

Old pedal exposes shocking tone secret
Lean this weird $50 trick for stunning results!


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## KnightBrolaire (Mar 1, 2020)

gunch said:


> GUITAR ENTREPRENEURS HATE HIM
> 
> Old pedal exposes shocking tone secret
> Lean this weird $50 trick for stunning results!


*10 band eq has entered the chat* 
WHO DARES CHALLENGE MY REIGN?


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## spudmunkey (Mar 1, 2020)

Demiurge said:


> Oh, god, all those threads, "What BKP sounds like _____?" Why does the brand choice precede the sound?



This. The "Dude, Dimarzos suxk. Get Duncans" comments drives me bonkers. Most companies make many many different pickups.


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## diagrammatiks (Mar 1, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> No one has a problem paying $300 for bits of metal and plastic that probably costs $20 to make?
> 
> A set of pickups costing more than the lastest generation Ipad makes sense?



there's nothing that costs more then 27 dollars worth of materials after factoring out labor, research, and blood ming.



MaxOfMetal said:


> Yeah, some people are just fucking morons.
> 
> It's like the folks who order the pickups before they even choose the guitar to buy.
> 
> ...



HEY. there's no need to get personal.


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## JustinRhoads1980 (Mar 2, 2020)

Its all marketing man. 

Honestly, I have bought into it, but after I got my BCR Shredzilla with the exclusive Hi-Power series Dimarzio disortions that are like the super distortions but with a better lower end it has really opened up my mind.

Reasons being that it was a passive (I was a active/fishman or no go guy) along with a dimarzio and a brand exclusive pickup. I didn't know what to expect but in my guitar thru the kemper the shit sounds fire. Best cleans I have had along with distortion sounds. Neck pickup is always something I will just be meh on. I really don't look for really anything in my neck pickups other than a good clean sound so I am indifferent to them.

When I had my schecter solo-ii custom it had the Schecter USA Made pasadena set in there and I actually really like them looking back on it, but I was so caught up in getting either the willie adler or devin townsend fishman set in it. (got the dt set). After that it was just meh.

Now whether this is a passive or active thing I dunno, but I definitely have tried guitars with pickups that are advertised "mAx bRo0tZ bRuH" and played guitars that have pickups that don't fit that box and sound better. It could also be that Dimarzio may be more my thing I dunno.

All I know is when these companies go on and on saying how there pickup is that and that, I don't give a shit anymore. If I play through it and it sounds like a shit pickup regardless of whether it is a pickup advertised for Metal or blues I won't care what label it is categorized under. And vice versa for if they sound good.


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## lewis (Mar 2, 2020)

On this subject - has anyone took apart a fishman yet and reversed engineered it to see what goes into the PCBs?

People could easily solder their own version right?
Like building pedals. Dont see the difference.


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## lurè (Mar 2, 2020)

KnightBrolaire said:


> *10 band eq has entered the chat*
> WHO DARES CHALLENGE MY REIGN?


*Fortin 33 has left the chat*


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## Sumsar (Mar 2, 2020)

lewis said:


> On this subject - has anyone took apart a fishman yet and reversed engineered it to see what goes into the PCBs?
> 
> People could easily solder their own version right?
> Like building pedals. Dont see the difference.



From what I read people design the pickups on the spot having the pickups in the guitar and just connected to a computer where they can change EQ curves etc. They might be using a special version of the pickup for that and then on the end product the EQ and compression curves are baked in. But if you could hack the circuit and basicly start designing your own sounds that would be awesome. Or maybe like the TC electronic toneprint where you don't download new settings for your pickups with an app?


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## lewis (Mar 2, 2020)

Sumsar said:


> From what I read people design the pickups on the spot having the pickups in the guitar and just connected to a computer where they can change EQ curves etc. They might be using a special version of the pickup for that and then on the end product the EQ and compression curves are baked in. But if you could hack the circuit and basicly start designing your own sounds that would be awesome. *Or maybe like the TC electronic toneprint where you don't download new settings for your pickups with an app*?



Honestly surprised this hasnt happened yet. A Company could sell one physical pickup -then using an app, we could buy any (all) their different Pickup models they offer as software and load them into the pickup (similar to loading profiles into the kemper)

All it would take is a company to eq match all their pickups and create a tone print of them right?


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## Iron1 (Mar 2, 2020)

Politicians that "care about you" are the biggest scam out there. This is minor leagues compared to that crapfest...


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## budda (Mar 2, 2020)

Iron1 said:


> Politicians that "care about you" are the biggest scam out there. This is minor leagues compared to that crapfest...



Well there's been that one dude fighting for the people for 30+ years, but let's leave that for the politics thread .

ITT: Pickups are not a scam, marketing works, high profile people hyping shit works, and some people have a need to spend extra cash and mod their brand new guitars.


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## KnightBrolaire (Mar 2, 2020)

Sumsar said:


> From what I read people design the pickups on the spot having the pickups in the guitar and just connected to a computer where they can change EQ curves etc. They might be using a special version of the pickup for that and then on the end product the EQ and compression curves are baked in. But if you could hack the circuit and basicly start designing your own sounds that would be awesome. Or maybe like the TC electronic toneprint where you don't download new settings for your pickups with an app?


modeling pickups exist already, but they're suuuuuuper niche. Look up Cycfi pickups. You can impart any eq curve onto the pickups and even do tonematching. They got a pretty convincing classical guitar sound from them.


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## littlebadboy (Mar 2, 2020)

Sumsar said:


> From what I read people design the pickups on the spot having the pickups in the guitar and just connected to a computer where they can change EQ curves etc. They might be using a special version of the pickup for that and then on the end product the EQ and compression curves are baked in. But if you could hack the circuit and basicly start designing your own sounds that would be awesome. Or maybe like the TC electronic toneprint where you don't download new settings for your pickups with an app?





lewis said:


> Honestly surprised this hasnt happened yet. A Company could sell one physical pickup -then using an app, we could buy any (all) their different Pickup models they offer as software and load them into the pickup (similar to loading profiles into the kemper)
> 
> All it would take is a company to eq match all their pickups and create a tone print of them right?



Something like the Dialtone pickup?







Dialtone Pickups allow players to adjust tone using two finger-friendly knobs built directly into the pickup. Currently offered as a drop-in humbucker replacement, Dialtone's controls adjust the frequency response of the pickup, allowing players to emphasize and color the rich tones already present within the guitar.


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## USMarine75 (Mar 2, 2020)

Hollowway said:


> The biggest scam out there is trickle down economics.



Not true. Time and time again corporations and CEOs prove they can be entrusted to put the wellness of the people before their own good.



bzhang9 said:


> No one has a problem paying $300 for bits of metal and plastic that probably costs $20 to make?
> 
> A set of pickups costing more than the lastest generation Ipad makes sense?



That's not how the economy, trade, or capitalism works.

Why does this topic keep coming up? I keep seeing these Occupy-Wallstreet-anarchist-socialist-anticapitalism-rants about why guitars and equipment cost so much. What world do you people live in? There are plenty of guitars and parts for low cost. Buy a G&L, Epiphone, Schecter, LTD, or whatever for $300-700. Buy $30 MIC pickups if you think they all sound the same and are all made the same.

Or if you don't like it then start a company making pickups for $50. We'll see how long you stay in business. Here's your homework tonight... Show me a business plan that works with your proposed profit margin.

Let's propose 100 humbuckers with hot PAF wind (~8000 turns, 42 AWG). A quick google search for pickup parts:

HB bobbin set: $2.50 x 100 = $250
100 brass base plates: $5 x 100 = $500
1200 rod magnets: $0.82 x 1200 = $984
Wiring: 42 AWG, PE Copper, 8000 turns per coil, 2 coils = 16,000 turns x 100 pickups = 1,600,000 total turns x 5" per turn = 8,000,000" or ~666,000 ft = $720 of wire.
4-wire Hookup wire: $2.75 x 100 = $275
Braid/Shielding: $.50 x 100 = $50
Probably missing a lot of stuff like screws, springs, etc.
Total without labor = $2,800 for 100 HB worth of parts = $28

So, lets round up to $30 per pickup just in parts (As this includes no QC failures. So, let's say 5% don't pass QC, which is another $150 worth of parts needed.)

And this is hand wound = 8,000 turns per coil, so 16,000 turns per pickup labor that you are doing. Not to mention all of the bad pickups you will need to re-wind, as well as all the time it will take you to learn and then correctly apply techniques like scatter winding. And then time to wax pot, test, package, sell, ship, deal with customer emails and orders, deals with customer service and complaints, etc.

I think it's fair to say probably 4 man-hours of labor/time per pickup to do all of this? At $10/hour that's another $40. So you're at $70 cost per pickup before you make any profit. And since no one knows who you are you'll probably only sell a few here and there, so good luck having steady work for your employees. Or if it's just you at first that's a lot of your own time you're working for free or pennies to get the company started, all along having to work an actual job to pay bills.

So $70 for your no name pickup? Or I can buy a Dimarzio Tone Zone for $70 shipped right now. Or for $150 I can buy a "boutique" BKP VH2... or a Godwood WCR... or Gibson 496R.



budda said:


> You know mark-up is on *everything* you buy, right?
> 
> Holloway wrapped things up nicely.



That is not how he wants this world to work.

tl;dr I want my mansion for $25,000 because that's all the parts cost.


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## diagrammatiks (Mar 2, 2020)

USMarine75 said:


> Not true. Time and time again corporations and CEOs prove they can be entrusted to put the wellness of the people before their own good.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Every year there are people taking a marketing class for the first time and realizing. IT'S ALL MADE UP MAN!


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## efiltsohg (Mar 2, 2020)

Hollowway said:


> OP, you could make your own pickups, if you wanted. It's one of the easier things to do in the world of guitars (way easier than building a guitar or trying to make hardware, etc.). Lot's of people do that, and it's super inexpensive, in comparison.
> 
> And if you think metal pickups are expensive, try looking at the other genres. Those are aimed at older doctors and lawyers playing old Fenders and Gibsons. Those things will make the metal pickups look like a crazy bargain.



to be fair, PAFs ARE metal pickups to a lot of people


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## Promit (Mar 2, 2020)

I will say that _some_ of the particularly expensive pickups out there, you're paying for nebulous other things that are important but not necessarily obvious. For example, an original PAF may have used whatever rando magnet was readily available at the time. But 60 years later, recreating that specific sound doesn't mean grabbing whatever random magnet is _currently_ available. So replicating something faithfully in retrospect can be much more expensive than the originals (which are themselves now ludicrously expensive). Some of these companies have custom magnets done - that's not cheap. Some are employing US workforces - that's not cheap.


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## Sumsar (Mar 2, 2020)

lewis said:


> Honestly surprised this hasnt happened yet. A Company could sell one physical pickup -then using an app, we could buy any (all) their different Pickup models they offer as software and load them into the pickup (similar to loading profiles into the kemper)
> 
> All it would take is a company to eq match all their pickups and create a tone print of them right?



I guess it has to be pushed by a larger well known company and have a shit ton of marketing and hype thrown at it, just like the fishman fluence pickups had.

The problem with having pickups that are to a degree 'digital' or 'the last pickup you will ever buy' is that companies will need to find a way so that it is either not the last pickup you buy or that you will start buying the software and generate money that way. If you truly make a product like this that actually works and gets the mass appeal and hype needed, said company could take a biiig lump of the market, but probably also shot themselves in the foot while doing it.

And if it ends up being a digital modeler thing it will end up like VST plugins or axe fxs. Your fantastic shiny new toy is hopelessly outdated next week/year. Passive / analog pickups, pedals, amps and microphones has the appeal that they don't really get outdated even if something new comes along. A 6505 and duncan distortion-7 still sounds amazing to me even if they came out years ago.


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## KailM (Mar 2, 2020)

OP hasn’t tried Black Winters...


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## Emperoff (Mar 2, 2020)

KnightBrolaire said:


> *10 band eq has entered the chat*
> WHO DARES CHALLENGE MY REIGN?



I DO.


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## Bloody_Inferno (Mar 3, 2020)

KnightBrolaire said:


> *10 band eq has entered the chat*
> WHO DARES CHALLENGE MY REIGN?



Here comes a new challenger:


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## USMarine75 (Mar 3, 2020)

budda said:


> Well there's been that one dude fighting for the people for 30+ years, but let's leave that for the politics thread .



Correct, but sadly he didn't make the ballot.






tl;dr pickups.


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## Lindmann (Mar 3, 2020)

lewis said:


> Honestly surprised this hasnt happened yet. A Company could sell one physical pickup -then using an app, we could buy any (all) their different Pickup models they offer as software and load them into the pickup (similar to loading profiles into the kemper)
> 
> All it would take is a company to eq match all their pickups and create a tone print of them right?


You could easily do it yourself. 

Take a couple of your favorite pickups, put them in the exact same guitar and take the EQ curve each time (of course always play the same riff).

When you're done, put one of them in for good and create IRs that represent the difference between the pickup you left in the guitar and one of the other pickups.

Then copy your IRs onto your IR-loader stompbox like the mooer radar and enjoy the various pickup options that are just one footstep away.


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## USMarine75 (Mar 3, 2020)

lewis said:


> Honestly surprised this hasnt happened yet. A Company could sell one physical pickup -then using an app, we could buy any (all) their different Pickup models they offer as software and load them into the pickup (similar to loading profiles into the kemper)
> 
> All it would take is a company to eq match all their pickups and create a tone print of them right?



Or something like this...


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## Avedas (Mar 3, 2020)

efiltsohg said:


> to be fair, PAFs ARE metal pickups to a lot of people


Are those the people who think anything with humbuckers "sounds like a Gibson"?


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## Bloody_Inferno (Mar 3, 2020)

Avedas said:


> Are those the people who think anything with humbuckers "sounds like a Gibson"?



Wasn't Eddie Van Halen one of those people?


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## TedEH (Mar 3, 2020)

Lindmann said:


> create IRs that represent the difference between the pickup you left in the guitar and one of the other pickups


Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm no math-a-magician, but I'm not sure this is what an IR is/does. From what I understand, an IR is closer to a reverb than an eq.

I'll definitely jump in the camp of "any pickup is a metal pickup if you use it to play metal" though.


----------



## gunch (Mar 3, 2020)

Don't get me wrong though the different "schools" of pickup design and different technologies people pursue are actually really fascinating


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## AndiKravljaca (Mar 3, 2020)

TedEH said:


> Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm no math-a-magician, but I'm not sure this is what an IR is/does. From what I understand, an IR is closer to a reverb than an eq.
> 
> I'll definitely jump in the camp of "any pickup is a metal pickup if you use it to play metal" though.



Oh, no, this absolutely exists. One of the ways to create an IR is with a sine sweep that gives you a full frequency range at equal volume, and measures the response, meaning it's pretty easy to make IRs which are equalizer curves. I have some of these:

https://www.3sigmaaudio.com/electric-impulses/

And here's me using their Telecaster IR to make my 'metal' pickup sound like a Tele:



I mean, it's not 100% but it's damned good considering what it had to work with!!


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## diagrammatiks (Mar 3, 2020)

AndiKravljaca said:


> Oh, no, this absolutely exists. One of the ways to create an IR is with a sine sweep that gives you a full frequency range at equal volume, and measures the response, meaning it's pretty easy to make IRs which are equalizer curves. I have some of these:
> 
> https://www.3sigmaaudio.com/electric-impulses/
> 
> ...




that's what a tele is supposed to sound like? hmmmm


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## TedEH (Mar 3, 2020)

AndiKravljaca said:


> make IRs which are equalizer curves


Why not just.... use an EQ then?

My understanding of IR isn't great though so, I'm probably just missing something.


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## sleewell (Mar 3, 2020)

no clue on all the rest but i fucking love my BKP war pigs.


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## fps (Mar 3, 2020)

The thread is pretty unclear on what is meant by a "scam" here. I'm certainly unclear what's scammy about it. The promise that the next pickup could be *the one* certainly could be seen as scammy, but it's preying on something that already exists in the customer. 

The sheer variety available now isn't a scam, it's simply variety. I'm lucky I've found sounds I like I suppose, and forums like this one have really helped with that.


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## Winspear (Mar 3, 2020)

TedEH said:


> Why not just.... use an EQ then?
> 
> My understanding of IR isn't great though so, I'm probably just missing something.



An IR is nothing more than an EQ, but it's extremely detailed for an exact match. A 31 band could probably get close for function but still not really comparable


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## spudmunkey (Mar 3, 2020)

a "Metal" tag is no more of a cash-in than "vintage" or "gamer", etc.


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## TedEH (Mar 3, 2020)

Winspear said:


> An IR is nothing more than an EQ, but it's extremely detailed for an exact match.


This doesn't sound right to me. The response is supposed to be over time, isn't it? If it's an EQ, how come you can load them in reverb plugins but not in EQ plugins? Something about this doesn't line up.


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## Emperoff (Mar 3, 2020)

TedEH said:


> This doesn't sound right to me. The response is supposed to be over time, isn't it? If it's an EQ, how come you can load them in reverb plugins but not in EQ plugins? Something about this doesn't line up.



Because IRs also capture room reflections, so they also contain reverb to some degree. So more like a EQ + slight reverb if you wish.


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## Descent (Mar 3, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> Just being real, lots of stock pickups sound garbage, many expensive pickups sound garbage, many of them sound basically the same with minor eq and output differences easily compensated by the signal chain
> 
> there's demos eg lundgrens sounding basically the same as agile stocks, they all probably cost about $20 to make anyways
> 
> ...




Quite a big factor is the cork-sniffing, yes. Honestly I've found some boutique pickups being a game changer, just not in metal. More for other things where I play low output or med. output soapbars and humbuckers, they seem to impart a lot more tone and feel of the wood. Most high gain pickups could easily be interchangeable with a sophisticated enough eq system.


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## TedEH (Mar 3, 2020)

I have a feeling this is a huuuuuuge oversimplification of what IR is/does. Will need to do some googlin' later.


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## c7spheres (Mar 3, 2020)

TedEH said:


> This doesn't sound right to me. The response is supposed to be over time, isn't it? If it's an EQ, how come you can load them in reverb plugins but not in EQ plugins? Something about this doesn't line up.





Emperoff said:


> Because IRs also capture room reflections, so they also contain reverb to some degree. So more like a EQ + slight reverb if you wish.



- From what I understand about IR's, which is limited, it's not techinically an EQ, but essentially has the same percieveable effect. An eq obvioulsy just cuts or boosts frequencies, but an ir is a type of convolution algorithm, which there are 3 types and only 1 or 2 types are ever used in audio. The convolution (like convolution reverb) basically blends the 2 sounds together using a specific formula (algorithm) not so much just mixing them but mathmatically binding them into one object. If you reserch it through Google and Wikipedia more you'll see what I'm talking about, but basically they are differnt means to a similar end result.
- Using an EQ to approximate a devices curve can be done with mics, speakers, and really any piece of audio gear. You pump white (not pink) noise through the device at whatever (prefereably unity) settings and analyze it on an RTA. from this you can read it's offsets in comparison to the white noise and obtain it's "EQ" curve. When you apply this curve to anything else you are basically imposing it's curve characteristics on whatever it is your doing. I did this with my porta studio to emulate different analog reel to reel decks and it works out pretty good. Not perfect but in the ballpark.
- Using an IR is more like a summing and difference model where the simlar objects are more or less discarded (not technically) so the remaining objects (sound) is a more true sum and difference (of both objects) together, or superimposed/ mixed together. Very similar to EQ but still completely different.


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## Winspear (Mar 3, 2020)

TedEH said:


> I have a feeling this is a huuuuuuge oversimplification of what IR is/does. Will need to do some googlin' later.


It's an EQ over time, so it captures the decay and EQ curve of a sound compared to a measuring tone (you capture them with a white noise burst or sweep, and they will apply the same cut/boost and decay to each frequency (decay being irrelevant when used simply as a cab/pickup/any EQ simulation))


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## tedtan (Mar 4, 2020)

Yeah, basically you start with a known source (white noise, sine sweep, starter pistol, etc.) and then run it through a device (e.g., a power amp and mic'd up speaker cab) or through a PA into a room (for reverb) and capture the result, then subtract the initial source from the captured result, leaving the difference. That difference is static, so it can't capture nonlinear differences, like distortion or modulation effects, but it can capture static differences like EQ, delay repeats, reverbs, etc. well.


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## Jamiecrain (Mar 5, 2020)

The OP is correct. Pickups of at least average quality sound very similar which an EQ can often round out. 

Remember the golden rule:
80% of tone is in your hands. 
10% is in the hardware (wood, pups etc.)
And the last 10% is in your head. If it feels good, you think you sound good!

so yes, forking out hundreds on fancy pups is IMO a waste of money.


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## Fretless (Mar 5, 2020)

Haven't read everything in here yet, but do some digging on the production of a large portion of the "custom" pickups on the market, and you'll see that they're using the exact same parts as each other. The only thing that varies in a lot of cases is wind count.


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## starion (Mar 5, 2020)

Back in the day, aftermarket pickups were definitely a must cause most stock pickups were wooly messes which sort of set in my mind that all stock pickups were trash. But then I got lazy with a couple of ibanez’s and that broke me out of that habit. The Infinity and Duncan designed Duncan Ibanez pickups sound pretty good to my ear.

The thing I think about is the Periphery guys all have their own signature pickups, all to different brands but I really doubt if you had someone test them back to back you’d tell the difference, so at that point we're just making pickups just be able to sell them.


----------



## devastone (Mar 5, 2020)

USMarine75 said:


> Not true. Time and time again corporations and CEOs prove they can be entrusted to put the wellness of the people before their own good.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



To tack on to this, that is just raw materials, you will also probably need equipment to wind the pickups with (hand wound pickups still aren't technically "by hand", they have to at least be spun while the wire is put on), work benches, test equipment, soldering supplies, and you might want a building to do this in, but I guess you could start in your garage, if you have one. Oh yeah, there is also a think called NRE (non-recurring engineering) and R&D, you do have to figure out how to make them and what to make. 

I love when people think you should be able to buy things for the cost of the raw materials.


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## Riffage (Mar 6, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> Just being real, lots of stock pickups sound garbage, many expensive pickups sound garbage, many of them sound basically the same with minor eq and output differences easily compensated by the signal chain
> 
> there's demos eg lundgrens sounding basically the same as agile stocks, they all probably cost about $20 to make anyways
> 
> ...



My take is this... Pickups are the widest opinion variant youll find. 
So lets just pretend youve got your perfect rig. Each part shapes the sound, and the pickups are the first electronics to pull in your tone & push your amp a certain way. So it REALLY depends on your style & the rest of your chain as to WHICH PU is gonna work. 

THAT SAID, I do mainly rock/metal, and I now use a Dimarzio Tone Zone in one guitar, and a Duncan Omega in another. I havent tried everything, but Ive tried a fair amount. 
Im not really hot on high output nececarilly, but it can matter, as its driving your front end, so I guess it depends on whats up there.

So... try a lot of shit & see what works!


----------



## Backsnack (Mar 6, 2020)

This came up in my YouTube feed recently. Seems relevant.


----------



## Manurack (Mar 6, 2020)

I don't think so. Like @c7spheres said, the placebo effect is real. Dave Mustaine played a Seymour Duncan JB, so did Will Adler and countless others. 

I bought a Seymour Duncan JB for the bridge in my Goldtop in 2011 and it's never left since. I love that humbucker! It's always been advertising through tried and true companies, just look at how an unknown pickup company has been kicking ass on the guitar pickup world with their Fishman Fluence line of pickups that offer both active and passive tones and the flick of a switch.

Now everyone including your grandma uses Fishman Fluence pickups because of that feature. Gotta go with the tone you chase, man.


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## c7spheres (Mar 6, 2020)

Manurack said:


> I don't think so. Like @c7spheres said, the placebo effect is real. Dave Mustaine played a Seymour Duncan JB, so did Will Adler and countless others.
> 
> I bought a Seymour Duncan JB for the bridge in my Goldtop in 2011 and it's never left since. I love that humbucker! It's always been advertising through tried and true companies, just look at how an unknown pickup company has been kicking ass on the guitar pickup world with their Fishman Fluence line of pickups that offer both active and passive tones and the flick of a switch.
> 
> Now everyone including your grandma uses Fishman Fluence pickups because of that feature. Gotta go with the tone you chase, man.


 I really think feel to amp response is most important with pickups besides huimbucker vs single coil pole vs bar etc., then ceramic, alnico, steel, cause you can tell the magnet type in the tone a lot of times. The rest can seemingly be adjusted for. Then again, I'm no pickup expert or anything, after all, I'm still using EMG's. pff! : )


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## Merrekof (Mar 6, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> Yeah, some people are just fucking morons.
> 
> It's like the folks who order the pickups before they even choose the guitar to buy.
> 
> ...



I'm one of those folks. 
Personally I find aesthetics of pickups appealing. So when I planned on buying my Ibanez JBM27, I planned to buy a set of BKP aftermaths, battleworn, black poles,... like I said, for aesthetics. When I got the guitar, I found the stock Titans to be awesome so the BKP plan was scrapped. 

Also, I think BKP raised their prices because of the hype. I can't imagine a pickup going from 100 to 170€ in idk, 5 years, is a normal increase. But then again, if people are willing to buy, I'd raise prices too. That's just the way it works.


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## Manurack (Mar 6, 2020)

Merrekof said:


> I'm one of those folks.
> Personally I find aesthetics of pickups appealing. So when I planned on buying my Ibanez JBM27, I planned to buy a set of BKP aftermaths, battleworn, black poles,... like I said, for aesthetics. When I got the guitar, I found the stock Titans to be awesome so the BKP plan was scrapped.
> 
> Also, I think BKP raised their prices because of the hype. I can't imagine a pickup going from 100 to 170€ in idk, 5 years, is a normal increase. But then again, if people are willing to buy, I'd raise prices too. That's just the way it works.



I hear ya on the whole aesthetics aspect! When I first got my Goldtop, it came with stock Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pros in black open coil.

I've always loved the classic Les Paul look with all metal hardware, so I went with gold pickup covers and never looked back.


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## Adieu (Mar 6, 2020)

TedEH said:


> Why not just.... use an EQ then?
> 
> My understanding of IR isn't great though so, I'm probably just missing something.



Using an IR is that automated EQ adjustment that people wanted earlier in this thread


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## USMarine75 (Mar 6, 2020)

Manurack said:


> I hear ya on the whole aesthetics aspect! When I first got my Goldtop, it came with stock Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pros in black open coil.
> 
> I've always loved the classic Les Paul look with all metal hardware, so I went with gold pickup covers and never looked back.



You know how many people I’ve told that my LP and V have BKP or Godwood pickups (depending on their genre preferences) and they’re like omg these are amazing... and then I tell them they’re just the stock 496/500 pickups lol. They may be Gibson but they’re their least tone-snob version. I bought a set for $120 recently and put them in my LP Custom Shop Custom (dumb name lol) replacing the Probucker 2 and 3.

I also have an LP with stock Gibson P90 and I’ve had a lot of people tell me I should change them, yet their my fav pickup of all time for anything less than modern high gain. 

Tone is in the ear of the beholder.


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## TedEH (Mar 6, 2020)

Adieu said:


> Using an IR is that automated EQ adjustment that people wanted earlier in this thread


I think you misunderstood my misunderstanding.


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## ElysianGuitars (Mar 6, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> No one has a problem paying $300 for bits of metal and plastic that probably costs $20 to make?
> 
> A set of pickups costing more than the lastest generation Ipad makes sense?


Pickups manufactured by boutiques are generally done on small scale, BKP still winds everything by hand even, companies like mine (and Guitarmory by extension) have just a handful of people working on the pickups. The sum of the parts is only a tiny part of the price of making a pickup, the businesses building them have overhead, employees to pay, and need to make some kind of profit. Companies also have to network, do things like the NAMM show, find suppliers, and any number of other challenges to making the pickups.

An iPad made in a Chinese factory by people making pennies per hour is not even remotely comparable. If anything, the iPad benefiting off of near slave labor is a bigger concern.

I love the example of someone releasing a $50 pickup that sells like gangbusters though. As someone who tried that at the $75 level, let me tell you it is not that easy. Forums talk about guitar pickups a lot, but aftermarket guitar pickups are not as big of a business as you think they are. The real money is in OEM.


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## ElysianGuitars (Mar 6, 2020)

Fretless said:


> Haven't read everything in here yet, but do some digging on the production of a large portion of the "custom" pickups on the market, and you'll see that they're using the exact same parts as each other. The only thing that varies in a lot of cases is wind count.



There's quite a lot more to winding than just the count  Yes, everyone uses the same parts, but the wind is the important part, and there's a ton of variables there.


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## Manurack (Mar 6, 2020)

USMarine75 said:


> You know how many people I’ve told that my LP and V have BKP or Godwood pickups (depending on their genre preferences) and they’re like omg these are amazing... and then I tell them they’re just the stock 496/500 pickups lol. They may be Gibson but they’re their least tone-snob version. I bought a set for $120 recently and put them in my LP Custom Shop Custom (dumb name lol) replacing the Probucker 2 and 3.
> 
> I also have an LP with stock Gibson P90 and I’ve had a lot of people tell me I should change them, yet their my fav pickup of all time for anything less than modern high gain.
> 
> Tone is in the ear of the beholder.



Nice! When I first got my Ibanez RG 3EX1, it was used and had a Dimebucker in it. I fucking hate that pickup with a passion! All hyped up to be amazing. I put a Gibson 500t in the bridge and added a gold pickup covers as well to match the rest of the gold hardware. The 500t is such a great pickup! 
And FYI, the RG had all grey hardware which looked like shit with the amazing top on it, so I replaced all the hardware to gold and it really compliments that fine koa top!


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## Emperoff (Mar 6, 2020)

Backsnack said:


> This came up in my YouTube feed recently. Seems relevant.




Maybe if it weren't by Fluff 



Merrekof said:


> I'm one of those folks.
> Personally I find aesthetics of pickups appealing. So when I planned on buying my Ibanez JBM27, I planned to buy a set of BKP aftermaths, battleworn, black poles,... like I said, for aesthetics. When I got the guitar, I found the stock Titans to be awesome so the BKP plan was scrapped.
> 
> Also, I think BKP raised their prices because of the hype. I can't imagine a pickup going from 100 to 170€ in idk, 5 years, is a normal increase. But then again, if people are willing to buy, I'd raise prices too. That's just the way it works.



I believe is quite the opposite. Duncan and Dimarzio raised their prices significantly since people were paying what BKP was asking. BKP has barely changed prices in the last 10 years.

People seem to forget that BKP is UK based. Same case as Lundgren. For us europeans the difference is not that much. In fact, a set of BKP Juggernauts with custom "active" covers costed me 300€, which is roughly what a set of equivalent Duncans or Lundgrens cost. With the bonus that you can have any aesthetics you want on them.


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## Backsnack (Mar 6, 2020)

Emperoff said:


> Maybe if it weren't by Fluff
> 
> 
> 
> ...



So what is Fluff saying that’s wrong?


----------



## Merrekof (Mar 7, 2020)

Emperoff said:


> Maybe if it weren't by Fluff
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Well I haven't bought Duncans or DiMarzios in years. The classic Duncan like a JB doesn't seem to be priced that high, the newer Black Winter though..?
Now that I think of it, it's been 4 years already since I last bought BKP's! I remember the first BKP's I bought were a lot cheaper. Like 2/3s or something like that.That was probably 10 years ago, maybe more 

Edit: I remember paying 250€ for a set of covered warpigs. That's more like 340 these days..


----------



## Emperoff (Mar 7, 2020)

Backsnack said:


> So what is Fluff saying that’s wrong?



Just remember the video when watching next Fluff pickup demo


----------



## Edika (Mar 7, 2020)

Emperoff said:


> Maybe if it weren't by Fluff
> 
> 
> 
> ...



A BPK set in the UK now without any covers is about £260-270. The most expensive production Duncans I know are the Black Winters and are at £200 new. A 30-35% in price is not that low. But I regularly see the Seymour Duncan Hot Rod set (JB/59) at £120-130. And most Dimarzios you can find at £70-80 each and sets around £140-160. 5o me double price for BKP vs more sets from SD and Dimarzio is not even close.

EDIT: The Gibson 500T/496R combo kicks all kinds of ass. I'm really curious about their Dirty Fingers set and the more classic 498T/490R.


----------



## Iron1 (Mar 7, 2020)

ElysianGuitars said:


> Pickups manufactured by boutiques are generally done on small scale, BKP still winds everything by hand even, companies like mine (and Guitarmory by extension) have just a handful of people working on the pickups. The sum of the parts is only a tiny part of the price of making a pickup, the businesses building them have overhead, employees to pay, and need to make some kind of profit. Companies also have to network, do things like the NAMM show, find suppliers, and any number of other challenges to making the pickups.



All the things most people don't consider. Really with any business. Getting people to pay attention long enough to get them interested in the product is a bigger struggle than actually coming up with an attention grabbing product.


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## Emperoff (Mar 7, 2020)

Edika said:


> A BPK set in the UK now without any covers is about £260-270. The most expensive production Duncans I know are the Black Winters and are at £200 new. A 30-35% in price is not that low. But I regularly see the Seymour Duncan Hot Rod set (JB/59) at £120-130. And most Dimarzios you can find at £70-80 each and sets around £140-160. 5o me double price for BKP vs more sets from SD and Dimarzio is not even close.
> 
> EDIT: The Gibson 500T/496R combo kicks all kinds of ass. I'm really curious about their Dirty Fingers set and the more classic 498T/490R.



Now check the prices of the "soapbar/active" covered pickups, which were the ones I mentioned


----------



## Edika (Mar 7, 2020)

Emperoff said:


> Now check the prices of the "soapbar/active" covered pickups, which were the ones I mentioned



I didn't see the active cover part and since the only option from the big companies is SD then you're absolutely right, prices are quite close. Sorry about that, lack of sleep didn't help with my reading comprehension. SD overcharged significantly for the active soapbar covered passive. 
Lundregns are at the same boat for me as BKP's without the wide customisation options, meaning I consider them more of a boutique builder.


----------



## couverdure (Mar 7, 2020)

Emperoff said:


> Just remember the video when watching next Fluff pickup demo


He did acknowledge that kind of sentiment in this video (0:55). His point was that there's so much options that are readily available that finding a costly specific need isn't very necessary, and this video is him putting a JB in a LP copy. Yeah I know he uses Fishman Fluences on his other guitars, but he's got an endorsement deal with them so whatever pickups they have must've satisfied him well.


----------



## Lord Voldemort (Mar 7, 2020)

Oh, I don't know. People are being a little hard on poor OP, he's not wrong really.

Like anything else, there's definitely a popular consensus that more money equals a better product in the world of guitar pickups, and I do think that it's far less accurate with guitar related things in general than perhaps anything else, but it's especially inaccurate with guitar pickups. OP is genuinely correct that a guitar pickup is just some wires and magnets and plastic, and the components are indeed cheap.

Obviously labor costs are a big causation of price differences, "hand wound" in a first world country is bound to cost more than machine wound in a third world country, but that aside the sound of a $25 pickup compared to a $300 pickup can absolutely be incredibly similar, but most guitarists profoundly disagree with that sentiment and I think that's all OP is getting at.

The scam isn't necessarily within the price-points, it's within the false illusion of Sonic Superiority.


----------



## diagrammatiks (Mar 7, 2020)

Please lord don't get this thread locked.


----------



## Hollowway (Mar 8, 2020)

USMarine75 said:


> Or something like this...



Holy hell, how did I not know this exists? I'm wanting one just for the JCM800 in a box and the jazz archtop sounds. It's $699, which is more than an impulse buy, but that is one of the coolest pedals I've ever seen.


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## Backsnack (Mar 8, 2020)

Emperoff said:


> Just remember the video when watching next Fluff pickup demo


He's only reviewed a set of Fluences since he posted that video. Dunno if you watched it, but he mentions that they're one of the few pickups that actually contain distinctly different technology than standard pickups. And he's endorsed by them, so .... yeah paychecks.

I'd argue that Laces are also unique in terms of redesigning a pickup completely.


----------



## Lord Voldemort (Mar 8, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> Please lord don't get this thread locked.



This could be read in two ways. One, you addressing me and asking me not to get the thread locked as I tend to post controversial opinions in a pretentious way and argue them tooth and nail for as long as I'm able because I'm a giant cunt. Or two, you addressing the Lord praying that this thread doesn't get locked.

I dunno why I get so many threads locked, man, doesn't happen on any other forum I go to.


----------



## torchlord (Mar 8, 2020)

lewis said:


> Honestly surprised this hasnt happened yet. A Company could sell one physical pickup -then using an app, we could buy any (all) their different Pickup models they offer as software and load them into the pickup (similar to loading profiles into the kemper)
> 
> All it would take is a company to eq match all their pickups and create a tone print of them right?


 
It should be possible Slate Digital Does it with microphones, but they may have a rackmount processor (possibly) in order to do the mic profiles.


----------



## Merrekof (Mar 8, 2020)

torchlord said:


> It should be possible Slate Digital Does it with microphones, but they may have a rackmount processor (possibly) in order to do the mic profiles.


And why do we need a pickup with electronics for that? It could very well be a neutral pickup, going into a processor like the Variax or Roland GK. 

By going further on this, maybe one of the next gen AxeFx, L6 Helix's,.. can have the "pickup swap" function. 

I recall messing around with Amplitube once, I'm not sure but didn't it even have a section where you could emulate higher tube plate voltage and stuff like that? The technology is there, I wouldn't be surprised if a pickup builder like Seymour Duncan was already working with a software producer to create pickup voices to be used with next gen DSP's..


----------



## lewis (Mar 8, 2020)

Merrekof said:


> And why do we need a pickup with electronics for that? It could very well be a neutral pickup, going into a processor like the Variax or Roland GK.
> 
> By going further on this, maybe one of the next gen AxeFx, L6 Helix's,.. can have the "pickup swap" function.
> 
> I recall messing around with Amplitube once, I'm not sure but didn't it even have a section where you could emulate higher tube plate voltage and stuff like that? The technology is there, I wouldn't be surprised if a pickup builder like Seymour Duncan was already working with a software producer to create pickup voices to be used with next gen DSP's..



It would be like tube amps too where there will also be the guys who wont ever want to change from the tried and true hand wound and soldered pickups.
So its not like a pickup company adding a digital version that loads all their pickup sounds in, would ruin business. Would just be a new product line rather than a replacement for anything.

With how great other products are with free apps that support them, being able to connect to your pickups using an ipad or mobile, and wirelessly audition their pickup sounds using an app, would be unreal.

I think thats where we need to be heading. Kempers didnt ruin the sales of people wanting real amps. At least in the short term. Anything changing long term is then put down to natural progression. The technology is there and i think companies utilizing it in this way, is win/win for everyone


----------



## USMarine75 (Mar 8, 2020)




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## Iron1 (Mar 8, 2020)

What we need is a Helix pickup - one that's essentially the tech in the Helix Stomp, but only the pickup aspect - so you could "tune" it with your App to go from Single Coil to PAF to Distortion to Overwound/Ultra Hot to Blues etc. etc.


----------



## lurè (Mar 8, 2020)

Or just an EQ pedal to put in front of your amp.


----------



## torchlord (Mar 8, 2020)

Backsnack said:


> He's only reviewed a set of Fluences since he posted that video. Dunno if you watched it, but he mentions that they're one of the few pickups that actually contain distinctly different technology than standard pickups. And he's endorsed by them, so .... yeah paychecks.
> 
> I'd argue that Laces are also unique in terms of redesigning a pickup completely.



I agree with you that Lace pickups, well at least the Alumitone X bar, and Death Bar type versions are a totally different technology than regular, active and humbucker variants. I have not used a ton different pickups, aside from Dimarzio Blaze, D Activator, Active 
Duncan Designed JB variant that came stock in one of my guitars, Seymour Duncan Blackouts, and the Lace X Bar, and Death Bar pickups. The latter pickup's clarity is on another level compared to the rest.


----------



## torchlord (Mar 8, 2020)

Merrekof said:


> And why do we need a pickup with electronics for that? It could very well be a neutral pickup, going into a processor like the Variax or Roland GK.
> 
> By going further on this, maybe one of the next gen AxeFx, L6 Helix's,.. can have the "pickup swap" function.
> 
> I recall messing around with Amplitube once, I'm not sure but didn't it even have a section where you could emulate higher tube plate voltage and stuff like that? The technology is there, I wouldn't be surprised if a pickup builder like Seymour Duncan was already working with a software producer to create pickup voices to be used with next gen DSP's..



If you want to go the route of messing around with circuits, tube types, and what not check out Audio Media Research's Revalver Formerly owned by Peavey. I think it is highly likely you could change plate voltages too, but it has been a while since I opened up my version and played around with it.


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## Marv Attaxx (Mar 8, 2020)

Iron1 said:


> What we need is a Helix pickup - one that's essentially the tech in the Helix Stomp, but only the pickup aspect - so you could "tune" it with your App to go from Single Coil to PAF to Distortion to Overwound/Ultra Hot to Blues etc. etc.


I think you can do something in that direction with cycfi pickups but never heard that in action.


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## Merrekof (Mar 8, 2020)

torchlord said:


> If you want to go the route of messing around with circuits, tube types, and what not check out Audio Media Research's Revalver Formerly owned by Peavey. I think it is highly likely you could change plate voltages too, but it has been a while since I opened up my version and played around with it.


I don't! Really, messing around with that is too much for me. I just remembered seeing software that did that back in the day.


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## budda (Mar 8, 2020)

Lord Voldemort said:


> Oh, I don't know. People are being a little hard on poor OP, he's not wrong really.
> 
> The scam isn't necessarily within the price-points, it's within the false illusion of Sonic Superiority.



I think we outlined in detail why he's wrong . But do go on.


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## MaxOfMetal (Mar 8, 2020)

You want a real scam? Top woods. Shit grows in fucking trees.


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## prlgmnr (Mar 8, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> You want a real scam? Top woods. Shit grows in fucking trees.


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## budda (Mar 8, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> You want a real scam? Top woods. Shit grows in fucking trees.



My man.


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## Lord Voldemort (Mar 8, 2020)

budda said:


> I think we outlined in detail why he's wrong . But do go on.



Most of the arguments against OP were missing the point entirely, at least on pages 1-2. Most disagreeing people addressed finances and why things cost what they cost, but didn't really have an answer for the fact that cheap pickups sound the exact same as expensive ones, yet people generally think the most expensive ones are objectively sonically superior, which as far as I can tell is where the 'scam' lives.

Same thing generally happens with amp clones, pedal clones, whatever. It's the literal exact same thing, but people exhaustively argue tooth and nail that the original/more expensive product is better when that's literally impossible; it's the exact same thing. The high price creates the false illusion of superiority and people fall for it hook, line and sinker.

But you guys do you, it's all good. I could have just missed that being addressed, but it generally wasn't the focus of counterarguments.


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## zenonshandro (May 15, 2020)

A fine line between dissecting pickups and human nature.


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## Cynicanal (May 15, 2020)

Lord Voldemort said:


> but didn't really have an answer for the fact that cheap pickups sound the exact same as expensive ones


[citation needed]


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## bzhang9 (May 15, 2020)

Cynicanal said:


> [citation needed]





you can find many more comparisons like this if you put in any effort

voldemort is right, the point I made originally is why can stock pickups on a $300 guitar sound the same as a $350 set of pickups? Someone tell me why those pickups are not a scam.

Why do pickups cost $350? because people believe the hype and will pay that much, if no one bought lundgrens or BKPs at $350 a set they would not cost $350.


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## Cynicanal (May 15, 2020)

If you didn't hear the difference between those two, you're deaf. #1 has a MUCH darker midrange with less top-end hair. We also know nothing about this guy's rig, if he's using some shitty amp sim that makes everything sound the same, etc.


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## bzhang9 (May 15, 2020)

Cynicanal said:


> If you didn't hear the difference between those two, you're deaf. #1 has a MUCH darker midrange with less top-end hair. We also know nothing about this guy's rig, if he's using some shitty amp sim that makes everything sound the same, etc.



that's not the point, they are extremely similar and despite the slight difference you cannot objectively say one is better than the other. In fact more comments preferred the cepheus.

If you want to pay >5x the price for that difference in tone, you are either extremely rich, a pro musician, or else I feel bad for you


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## Cynicanal (May 15, 2020)

They're really not similar at all, aside from not having much bottom end. One has a very dark midrange and an attenuated top end; the other has a very bright midrange with loads of top end.

"Objectively better/worse" doesn't enter into the equation here (that's a matter of preference), you said cheap pickups sound exactly the same. Then you linked a video demonstrating two pickups that don't sound the same.


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## MaxOfMetal (May 15, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> you can find many more comparisons like this if you put in any effort
> 
> voldemort is right, the point I made originally is why can stock pickups on a $300 guitar sound the same as a $350 set of pickups? Someone tell me why those pickups are not a scam.
> 
> Why do pickups cost $350? because people believe the hype and will pay that much, if no one bought lundgrens or BKPs at $350 a set they would not cost $350.




The Cepheus are want-to-be copies of the Lundgren M series made in a huge OEM factory in South Korea (possibly China now that Artec has moved some of their operations) in huge batches. 

Not only did they not have to pay for R&D, but they didn't have to spend decades building a manufacturing facility or brand. Not to mention the economies of scale that a large OEM has. 

Lundgren is still a fairly small operation out of Sweden. They don't have the same economy of scale, and manufacturing itself is more costly vs. much of Asia. 

Recently, Lundgren has licensed out some designs for stuff like the M8P found on the Indo Ibanez sigs. Wholesale those are probably as much as the Cepheus. 

I don't get what the problem is. Buy the pickups you want. If you find cheaper pickups you dig, that's a good thing. Leave the fancy shamancy stuff to others.


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## Lord Voldemort (May 16, 2020)

Cynicanal said:


> If you didn't hear the difference between those two, you're deaf. #1 has a MUCH darker midrange with less top-end hair. We also know nothing about this guy's rig, if he's using some shitty amp sim that makes everything sound the same, etc.



The argument generally isn’t that $30 pickup A sounds exactly the same as $130 pickup B (although there are wire for wire clones for certain pickups that use the same materials and there is no conceivable option but for them to sound the exact same), rather whether or not one sounds ‘better’ than the other.

The fact that the argument exists and proceeds with stark polarity in opinions is objective proof of concept for this threads synapses. You can do some extremely cursory research on YouTube and find 1,000 A/B tests of cheap vs expensive pickups, some of which have blind tests, and the results always seem to show that they both sound wonderful.

If something that costs $30 produces a sound that general consensus dictates is as good as something that costs $130, it’s fair if a little dramatic to say that expensive pickups are a scam based on the law of diminishing returns.


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## Cynicanal (May 16, 2020)

Lord Voldemort said:


> (although there are wire for wire clones for certain pickups that use the same materials and there is no conceivable option but for them to sound the exact same)


Nope, build quality matters. Compare the Ibanez PowerSound pickups that they put in the GIOs in around 2005 to a DiMarzio SuperD -- basically identical specs on paper (within manufacturing tolerances), but I've played multiple examples of both, and there's no contest between the two -- the PowerSounds are consistently both muddy and shrill at the same time somehow, while the SuperD is one of my favorite pickups ever. Wire that's high quality and largely free of impurities and voids matters, winding pattern matters some (although less than is sometimes claimed), and you're not going to get any kind of decent attention in those areas on a cheap Chinese pickup.


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## Lord Voldemort (May 16, 2020)

Cynicanal said:


> Nope, build quality matters. Compare the Ibanez PowerSound pickups that they put in the GIOs in around 2005 to a DiMarzio SuperD -- basically identical specs on paper (within manufacturing tolerances), but I've played multiple examples of both, and there's no contest between the two -- the PowerSounds are consistently both muddy and shrill at the same time somehow, while the SuperD is one of my favorite pickups ever. Wire that's high quality and largely free of impurities and voids matters, winding pattern matters some (although less than is sometimes claimed), and you're not going to get any kind of decent attention in those areas on a cheap Chinese pickup.



Not every cheap pickup is manufactured in China, and not everything manufactured in China is done so with inferior materials and built poorly. You’re using narrow anecdotal experience from an instrument designed to be inferior to incentivize upgrading to a better model, which will also have worse pickups than the next model, and so forth, and using that as well as vast assumptions about build quality to construct your point. This is not proof, this is being stubborn.

If the cheaper pickup sounds as good, and the exclusive objective of the pickup is to produce sound, it’s as good. You’re entitled to your opinion, but general consensus pertaining to these comparisons does not align with your opinion, and you’re failing to conclusively provide wide sweeping evidence to solidify your opinion either.

I’ll bet you’re a great guy though, and we can still be friends.


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## bzhang9 (May 16, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> The Cepheus are want-to-be copies of the Lundgren M series made in a huge OEM factory in South Korea (possibly China now that Artec has moved some of their operations) in huge batches.
> 
> Not only did they not have to pay for R&D, but they didn't have to spend decades building a manufacturing facility or brand. Not to mention the economies of scale that a large OEM has.
> 
> ...



Do you have a source agile does not pay for R+D and makes way bigger batches than lundgrens? They look different, probably uses different materials, do you know that they copied exactly and did none of the design themselves? Is there such a big difference in manufacturing to justify 5x the price?

Ain't no problem, just pointing out people are so often hyping the most expensive pickups which are not necessarily better than cheap pickups. You'll often get people asking for metal pickup recs when they are fairly new to this and don't really know what they want, then comes all the BKP is best lundgren is best etc etc when a duncan/dimarzio could be just as good for half the price.



Cynicanal said:


> Nope, build quality matters. Compare the Ibanez PowerSound pickups that they put in the GIOs in around 2005 to a DiMarzio SuperD -- basically identical specs on paper (within manufacturing tolerances), but I've played multiple examples of both, and there's no contest between the two -- the PowerSounds are consistently both muddy and shrill at the same time somehow, while the SuperD is one of my favorite pickups ever. Wire that's high quality and largely free of impurities and voids matters, winding pattern matters some (although less than is sometimes claimed), and you're not going to get any kind of decent attention in those areas on a cheap Chinese pickup.



are we really using GIO pickups to compare now? and talking about how wire impurity affects tone? bro science to the max...

Also you just proved the point, superd is a relatively cheap pickup, if you care about build quality so much why isnt some hand wound bkps your favorite?


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## Merrekof (May 16, 2020)

It is also worth noting that BKP is a mainly custom shop. They can't be cheap if they have a bunch of customers wanting "their own design" made in the UK.

They did increase the price over the years, but why wouldn't they? If people are willing to pay...

Don't forget that marketing, that costs money too. I've never seen ads for cheap China made pickups.


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## diagrammatiks (May 16, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> Do you have a source agile does not pay for R+D and makes way bigger batches than lundgrens? They look different, probably uses different materials, do you know that they copied exactly and did none of the design themselves? Is there such a big difference in manufacturing to justify 5x the price?
> 
> Ain't no problem, just pointing out people are so often hyping the most expensive pickups which are not necessarily better than cheap pickups. You'll often get people asking for metal pickup recs when they are fairly new to this and don't really know what they want, then comes all the BKP is best lundgren is best etc etc when a duncan/dimarzio could be just as good for half the price.
> 
> ...



all pickups are cheap.


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## Cynicanal (May 16, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> Also you just proved the point, superd is a relatively cheap pickup, if you care about build quality so much why isnt some hand wound bkps your favorite?


Because DiMarzio (and Seymour Duncan) pickups are really well built? That, and I'm not a fan of the "no compression, everything is underwound" BKP tone. 

DiMarzio and Seymour Duncan are not at all what I think of when I think "cheap pickup" (this may be because I'm old and when I was getting into guitar, they were the only widely available aftermarket options, but the point stands). They're certainly not $30, or even $50, like the author of this thread was advocating for. When I think "metal" pickup, the first thing that comes to mind is the high-output offerings from those brands -- I could be perfectly happy if any of the SuperD, Evo, Illuminator, Duncan Distortion, Pegasus, Invader, or Black Winter became the only bridge pickup to exist in the entire world. And, the nice thing is, they're all _known quantities_. Anyone can go into any Guitar Center and find examples of most of those in some guitar on the wall (they might have to look on the "used" wall for Invaders or Illuminators, but they're still easy to try) and figure out if they like them or not. Can you say the same about "weird random cheap Asian pickup X?"


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## USMarine75 (May 16, 2020)

Relevant exchange on TGP between a typical TGPidiot and Josh from JHS...



Idiot said:


> Makes video praising $25 Behringer Super Fuzz.
> Makes $180 version.





jhspedals said:


> well... It's actually $155 and made in Kansas City. My employees get a living wage and I'm excited that I got the prices this low! But, buy the Behringer if you can't afford this, it really is great sounding.


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## MaxOfMetal (May 16, 2020)

bzhang9 said:


> Do you have a source agile does not pay for R+D and makes way bigger batches than lundgrens? They look different, probably uses different materials, do you know that they copied exactly and did none of the design themselves? Is there such a big difference in manufacturing to justify 5x the price?



It's all in the giant Agile Intrepid thread. I was there when Darren and Kurt were figuring things out and the original "Intrepid 8" humbuckers, which became the Cepheus they've been using for over a decade now (I've handled a recent one, and compared it to my first run Intrepid Standard) was meant specifically to be a Lundgren M8 copy.

Batch wise, the original buy-in for the Intrepid was 30 units. So they'd make 30 every quarter about for the first year, eventually they'd just have floor stock, which would sell equally as fast. Back then you'd have to wait a few weeks for a Lundgren, if ordering a single pickup. When Ibanez reached out to Lundgren about supplying pickups for the M80M they said they wouldn't be able to keep up production, so they licensed the design. 

Some of the links and pictures of emails have disappeared over time. You're welcome to go read the thread for yourself.

Agile doesn't really design anything. They tell thier OEM what they want and they build it. Sometimes there's some trial and error, but it's not like Agile is a traditional guitar company like ESP or Ibanez or Schecter who have a shop for R&D/Custom Work/AR/etc. It's a small music store that does online orders, who has a house brand. They don't even open the boxes prior to shipping sometimes, and prior to 2006 was pretty much exclusively Gibson and Fender copies.


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## Avedas (May 16, 2020)

Cynicanal said:


> If you didn't hear the difference between those two, you're deaf. #1 has a MUCH darker midrange with less top-end hair. We also know nothing about this guy's rig, if he's using some shitty amp sim that makes everything sound the same, etc.


I must be deaf, because those two sounded almost identical to me. I always find pickup comparisons work much better when the tracks aren't submerged in gain.


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## Emperoff (May 16, 2020)

Can't people understand that aftermarket pickup business started back when stock pickups SUCKED? Now stock pickups have come a long way, but that doesn't mean pickup makers want to go bankrupt, don't they?

So yeah, they raise prices as everyone else to keep up with inflation and other things. You have pickups included with your guitar purchase. NO ONE forces you to buy aftermarket pickups. So leave them for people that want to try different things.

This thread is stupid.


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## USMarine75 (May 16, 2020)

Supposedly when Peavey was designing the Wolfgang pickup he went through like 20 rounds of test pickups. Towards the end they gave him the same exact pickups they gave him in the beginning because they were frustrated and ran out of ideas. He ended up picking a set they’d already given him at least once and he said THESE are the ones lol. Who cares. As long as it makes you happy. (And you can afford it!)


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## Lord Voldemort (May 16, 2020)

Honestly, this thread’s existence is useful if only to illuminate how little the average guitarist understands guitar pickups.


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## diagrammatiks (May 16, 2020)

Lord Voldemort said:


> Honestly, this thread’s existence is useful if only to illuminate how little the average guitarist understands guitar pickups.



lord Voldemort sighted. thread shutdown imminent.


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