Question about STL-3T - tapped Tele Quarter Pound Bridge

[Mincer]

Yeah, the higher output single coils are always a compromise to me. One sound gets better then it tanks the other sound. You just have to decide what is more important. High output pickups (singles or humbuckers) aren't versatile, but they do one thing really well.

[ToneFiddler]

Slight change of plans: Went with the regular STL-3 (No Tab), because it's more readily available.
Installed it today and so far i really like it
It's got that growl i was hoping for. had a stock fender, STL-1 Vintage '54 and ST-52 fiveTwo in there before.
they all get that nasty upper mid heavy sound if i turn up the gain which really bothers me while playing. keeps me fighting the guitar. They're all good 'til low gain crunch levels. I don't think it's the brightness that bothers me with them. It's just a high mid heavy sound with a lot of brightness and no balls? turning on the Tone knob doesn't do it for me either.
Now the quarter pound (i guess) really shifts a lot of those mids downwards which i seem to like. The added low end also helps to make it sound bigger.
Still there is some tele in there. if you lower the bridge some more you get more of it.

i think i am always afraid of these higher output PUs because my experience with Humbuckers i don'T tend to like those hotter thicker/fatter Pickups, and of course the misbalance between tele neck and bridge just got worse, but that's another story.

So far i really like it. time will tell...

[ToneFiddler]

Ok thanks, i will try my luck

[jeremy]

the qp has a big bottom end and some growl to it for sure, its a really good rock pup. not what i look for in trying to get a clean sound but its still not bad clean

[ToneFiddler]

Thanks,
yes from the duncan soundclips lil59 and QP are quite different. it's sound brighter than the lil59 from those clips and not stuffed or congested which i like.
it's quite different than a hot for tele also which is good, because i don't like those hot pickups which get that fat, middy and smooth.
the QP distortion clips sound very fizzy and harsh though, maybe a touch too much. but then all the pickups dirty clips sound kind of bad. so this pickup sound quite horrible in those clips but it might be just what fits my setup.

i don't want a traditional sound with this guitar.
i want more lowend and not really more mids but beefier mids and some grunt and growl.
the '54 and five two and fender stock tele bridges get really high high mid heavy under gain. not the sound i have in my head at all

[jeremy]

the qp isnt as middy as the lil59 and the voicing is fairly different. it isnt a bright pup but most high output pups arent

[ToneFiddler]

yeah the Broadcaster SSL-1 /SSL-2 example demonstrates this 20% difference.
but the QP is not a vintage pickup as is the hot for strat/tele. since the hot for strat is about the same resistance as the tele version i GUESS SD uses a thinner wire on the lil59 and QP for tele than on the strat versions.
but i don't know.
just afraid the tele QP T is too compressed for my liking. 17k sound very high. didn't like the lil59 T too much (too middy, round and compressed).

[ItsaBass]

define normal:
the QP strat version DCR is 78,8% of the tele version.
lil59 strat DCR is 66,1% of the tele version.
The Hot for strat DCR is 97,5% of the tele version.
A2P DC is 94,3% ...
ssl2 DCR vs broadcaster DCR is 81,3%





well if i end up only using one of the taps fine by me. but i fear one is too bright and one too fat. I want to add a spin a split.

“Normal” was meant to mean your run of the mill, classic, standard issue Tele and Strat pickups, without an overwound/balanced Strat bridge pickup. The Strat pickup has traditionally been up to about 20 percent lower in DCR than the Tele bridge pickup. Yes, there’s variance all over the map, but the point is that the difference between QP Strat and Tele is not at all strange. Tele bridge pickups are traditionally hotter and darker than Strat “any-position” pickups.

[ToneFiddler]

thanks, but i am not a fan of out of phase sounds: i dislike everything with some honk or quack

[ArtieToo]

One of the cool things about a tapped pup, is you can do OOP with only one half of a push-pull, or DPDT switch. Which means, you can also do full output in one position, and half-OOP in the other, with one PP.

[ToneFiddler]

Here's some info on this from 2008. It be useful. Conclusion, use a switch for the tap.

https://forum.seymourduncan.com/foru...ed-single-coil

thanks,
i got the idea from here:

https://forum.seymourduncan.com/forum/the-pickup-lounge/175-dial-a-tap?318-Dial-a-tap=

trial and error i guess

[ErikH]

Here's some info on this from 2008. It be useful. Conclusion, use a switch for the tap.

https://forum.seymourduncan.com/forum/the-pickup-lounge/131424-ssl-5t-dialling-in-a-tapped-single-coil

[Lewguitar]

well if i end up only using one of the taps fine by me. but i fear one is too bright and one too fat. I want to add a spin a split.

But this isn't a humbucker with two coils. It only has one. I've never done the spinasplit mod but I thought it only worked with humbuckers, which have two coils.

[ToneFiddler]

The Strat one is about 14K, the Tele about 17K. That is pretty normal percentage difference between Strat and Tele pickups.

define normal:
the QP strat version DCR is 78,8% of the tele version.
lil59 strat DCR is 66,1% of the tele version.
The Hot for strat DCR is 97,5% of the tele version.
A2P DC is 94,3% ...
ssl2 DCR vs broadcaster DCR is 81,3%

I would assume the taps are at the halfway point, but I don't know for sure. I believe that the taps are in a good spot IMO, having used them. Tapped sounds like a classic Tele or Strat pickup. I set my guitars up to be normal like that, and treated the switch as a boost. I used the boost (i.e. the full coil) so infrequently that I ended up selling the pickups.

I have a Custom Shop Hot For Tele Tapped. It sounds so good full strength that I literally NEVER use the tapped output.

well if i end up only using one of the taps fine by me. but i fear one is too bright and one too fat. I want to add a spin a split.

[ItsaBass]

The Strat one is about 14K, the Tele about 17K. That is pretty normal percentage difference between Strat and Tele pickups.

I would assume the taps are at the halfway point, but I don't know for sure. I believe that the taps are in a good spot IMO, having used them. Tapped sounds like a classic Tele or Strat pickup. I set my guitars up to be normal like that, and treated the switch as a boost. I used the boost (i.e. the full coil) so infrequently that I ended up selling the pickups.