Loud G string

[alex1fly]

Ok y’all, help me sort through the nonsense online. What are the common ways of addressing a G string that is louder than every other string. Let’s assume that you can’t change pole piece height or pickup type, and don’t want to go to a wound G. I did a little research and mostly found people arguing with each other, lol

[GuitarStv]

Traditional staggered single coils? You can't really.

They were designed boosted way up high for use with a wound G string, which would have a very small diameter magnetic wire in it. If you're using an unwound G, there's just more string material over the pole piece and it barks out louder than all the rest.

Ways to compensate for it that I've seen people do:
- Always run enough overdrive that it's compressing your signal
- Always run a compressor so that it reigns in the G string
- Back the pickups really, really far off the strings . . . this makes them sound weaker but will reduce (although not eliminate) the G string problem
- Ram the magnet under the G string down further (sometimes breaks the pickups)



Best solution - get pickups without a traditional stagger, or use the string gauges that they pickups were designed for.

[beaubrummels]

Try a different brand/weight/composition string for the G. For example, use steel for all the others and use nickel for the G

[jeremy]

plain strings are all the same, its only the wound strings that are different. what are the pups in question?

[dave74]

Go down a number on the 3rd. It'll be slightly looser and have less volume, by a tiny bit.

Go to a wound 3rd. I know you said no on that, but I think most people have only tried wounds with pre-packaged sets with stupidly large wound 3rds,
My custom set for C# standard is 10.5/14/20w/30/40/52.
For D standard I used to make custom 10/13/18w/28/38/50 sets, but lately for D standard I just use EB ultra slinky and live with the 17p. (10/13/17/28/38/48)


Whenever the brands make sets with wound 3rds they go super big and it just feels stupid, especially if you are a shred-lead player.

For Eb I use the Turbo Slinky sets. 9.5/12/16/26/36/46

[eclecticsynergy]

The Hendrix gauge set was designed to address that problem.
But it has light low strings and isn't for everybody.

re @GuitarsStv's suggestion of ramming the poles down:
If the pickup has plastic bobbins, you can attempt to lower the G string poles by simply tapping them down gently.
You can't do that with traditional fiber bobbin pickups, though, since the windings actually contact the magnets inside.

[alex1fly]

I put a 9.5-44 set on from my usual 10-46 and the volume balance is better.

pickups are EMG revs. Polepieces can’t sink as far as on regular humbuckers since they’re sealed. And I don’t dig the sound of all the other pole pieces raised up. Hopefully the smaller gauge will do it, need to spend more time with it to know.