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Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

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  • Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

    I dusted off an old Schecter earlier (a 006, I forget which specific model; it's been in the attic for a decade) and gave it a quick bash, decided I quite like it and will clean it up, give it another chance to rock. It's an HS config and the neck single coil sounds pretty good, some kind of Duncan Designed. The bridge pickup isn't quite right, though. It sounds a lot like a JB (I'm guessing it's the DD HB-102?) but the bass is a tiny bit lacking and the high-end is a little more shrill. Not as much as a Distortion, but definitely like a JB that's running on a 1meg pot or something like that. The overall sound is pretty good but it could do with just a bit more junk in the trunk.

    I'm thinking shoving an A6 in there would boost the bass and curb the highs in one easy move.

    So, anybody tried a 'JB6'? I've searched and found a few people referencing the idea, but nobody seems to have actually pulled the trigger on it. JB8s are common but I know that'll turn up the high-end aggression, too. I tried a JB3 myself once, a few years back, and that was so warm and dark (a.k.a. muddy) I scrapped it. I know an A2 will lose too much high-end and an A4 or UOA5 won't really change much. A6 seems to still be uncharted territory.

    I forgot this guitar even existed so I'm not fussed enough to buy a whole new pickup for it, but I'm thinking if a quick magnet swap will fix it, I might as well give that a go. I'm only not jumping right into it because the pickup is covered (and I'm lazy) and because ordering an A6 will take a while, my usual UK supplier is out of stock. If nobody can vouch for the JB6 then forget it, but y'know, thought there's no harm in asking.

  • #2
    Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

    I haven’t but I’m interested to know what it’d be like.


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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    • #3
      Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

      Let's start at the beginning: a Duncan Designed p'up does NOT sound like their alleged counterpart. Their winding patterns and component's metallurgy do not equival.

      As a matter of fact, both the HB102 and HB103 are exactly the same, being the only difference the magnet they come with.

      Their neck model is actually pretty good sounding and gracefully takes magnet swaps, the bridge a little less.

      Of you're willing to invest in new pole screws, slugs and a keeper bar, then it'll be a lot more magnet-swap friendly but make no mistake: it'll still be a kinda "one-trick-pony", intended to be used in hi-gain type of music.

      Hope this somehow helps.
      Peter Pedersen aka Discharged
      Kolding, Denmark

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      • #4
        Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

        Well whichever model it is (I've not looked under the hood yet), it sounds 90% like a JB. I've got JBs in three other guitars—and had and modded several other JBs in the past—so I know what a regular JB sounds like, and this is very close. Whatever purist nitpicking may mean it's not a 100% carbon copy doesn't bother me; I'm just interested in the tone experiment, and the JB is the closest point of reference in that regard.

        In any case, I'm not sure what swapping the screws, poles, and keeper would achieve. The screws seem to be perfectly standard. (The rest is under the cover, but I can't imagine the slugs are any different.) Unless they are actually somehow plain iron rather than steel (which I doubt; I've only ever seen iron poles on boutique pickups, and they're notorious for corroding if they're not anodised) they shouldn't affect the sound. Same with the keeper bars. I've never even heard of non-steel keepers, in fact. So I really don't see what you're getting at. Did you mean the spacers? I'd assume they're just plastic and no more impactful on the sound than any wooden ones. Doesn't seem to have enough output to be magnetic spacers and I'm not seeing any DD pickups which would have that configuration other than the Invader-copy, which this visibly is not. Even if it was, those are just as easy to swap out as any other spacer, so... yeah, I'm really not understanding what you're saying there? I've been hacking up guitars for 15 years now and I think this is the first time I've heard someone suggest any pickup would need its keepers changed.

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        • #5
          Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

          I have found that an A8 rounds and subdues the high end, not accentuates it.

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          • #6
            Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

            Originally posted by Ace Flibble View Post
            I'm not sure what swapping the screws, poles, and keeper would achieve.
            I think you missed the word "metallurgy". The three elements, keeper bar, polepiece screw and slug are the very elements dictating all specs of both the magnetic flow and magnetic circuit, hence the carbon content is the principal element influencing the tone outcome, aka tonefootprint. The ones contained in DD p'ups are made of what I call "mystery meat" alloys, that's why I give'em such high priority working with the good, known ones. Alloys like 1018 for pole screws and keeper bar and 1215 for slugs are the standard used by mostly boutique winders and the most renowned american high-volume producers, including Seymour Duncan. That's the only way to compare apples to apples, so to speak.
            Originally posted by Ace Flibble View Post
            I've been hacking up guitars for 15 years now and I think this is the first time I've heard someone suggest any pickup would need its keepers changed.
            Being ten or eighty years old, there will always be a first time for something. The last first one for me, being forty-two years old, is last month, when I finished a crash-course on Wordpress. See?

            PS: I have tried an A6 in a Seymour Duncan in a swamp ash bodied, maple neck superstrat, and for the player was exactly was he was looking for. Although, it doesn't automatically mean that'll be the same for you, with an unknown DD in a different guitar.

            Only you would know what "good" sounds like. Full stop. /thread

            /Peter
            Last edited by Discharged; 11-13-2019, 09:03 AM.
            Peter Pedersen aka Discharged
            Kolding, Denmark

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            • #7
              Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

              Originally posted by Ace Flibble View Post
              I've been hacking up guitars for 15 years now and I think this is the first time I've heard someone suggest any pickup would need its keepers changed.
              I don't know what pickups need - or more exactly: I don't know what YOU(RS) need(s) - but IME, different keeper bars / pole shoes can alter the tone significatively. Some are stamped, others are milled. Their holes are not necessarily similar. Their alloy, shape and mass vary. They have been annealed or not. These specs change how these parts cooperate with the magnet. One can check it with a lab teslameter measuring the magnetic field from the poles (such measurements change when a different keeper bar is used, in our experience with these things at least).
              That's why various boutique winders do mill their own keeper bars, AFAIK.


              Good luck in your mods, whatever they are. :-)

              POST SCRIPTUM posted instead of an answer 10 -Sounds like I’ve over-estimated the possibility to share peacefully my own experience in an argumentative context. :-))

              So, for anyone possibly interested: among the lab tests on guitar pickups archived here since 2003, I’ve a comparison between keeper bars, with their effect on induced resonant peaks. I’ll PM one of the related screenshots on request, within the limits drawn by intellectual property and if time permits.
              Now, of course, it would be quicker to search what other pickups makers say about keeper bars (like in the answer 28 of this thread: https://music-electronics-forum.com/...ead.php?t=6024 )...
              Last edited by freefrog; 11-14-2019, 12:44 AM. Reason: Added a post-scriptum.
              Duncan user since the 80's...

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              • #8
                Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                A6 is $$. It does round the top a little. But it doesn't change the character a big amount like going from A5 to an unoriented mag would. You should give it a try.
                The things that you wanted
                I bought them for you

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                • #9
                  Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                  In hundreds of pickups I've only ever seen steel keeper bars. I know 1016 steel is vintage correct and most pickups get 1018 steel now as the next-closest available alternative, but regardless of the nitpicking make-up of the steel, I'm struggling to believe that two types of steel keeper bar could A) cause that much of a difference, and B) interfere with changing magnets. Same with poles, as long as they're of the same basic type. I mean, tone doesn't care if something is a metric thread or imperial.

                  Sounds like a couple of y'all are drastically over-thinking these things, to me.

                  Originally posted by Clint 55 View Post
                  But it doesn't change the character a big amount like going from A5 to an unoriented mag would.
                  That's my theory, a subtle tweak, not the total overhaul that a magnet swap is usually done for. The big changes—A2, A5, A8, ceramic—are well-documented but what these less-significant magnets can do intrigues me.

                  In any case, since nobody's come forward to vouch for a JB6 (or 'close enough') I guess I'll be the one to take the plunge and report back once my supplier has restocked A6s.

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                  • #10
                    Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                    Originally posted by Ace Flibble View Post
                    Sounds like a couple of y'all are drastically over-thinking these things, to me.
                    It's ok.

                    “A man maie well bring a horse to the water, but he can not make him drinke without he will."
                    - John Heywood's proverb collection. Year 1546, London, UK -
                    Peter Pedersen aka Discharged
                    Kolding, Denmark

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                    • #11
                      Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                      Originally posted by Discharged View Post
                      Only you would know what "good" sounds like. Full stop. /thread
                      Maybe you should post this as the first reply to every thread. Wouldn’t that apply to every question anyone has about gear?

                      Or, people with relevant experience could reply and answer the question, like Clint did.
                      “I can play the hell out of a riff. The rest of it’s all bulls**t anyway,” Gary Holt

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                      • #12
                        Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                        Meant to update this. I placed an order for a job lot of A6s from my supplier a couple of weeks ago and I'm waiting for them to come in. They should arrive some time in the next week and then I'll be putting one in the HB-102, a JB, a Custom and a Full Shred. I'll play with them for a day then record some direct-in A/B samples. I'm getting 10 magnets and have a few other humbuckers laying around spare so I might experiment further. Seems the A6 is potentially under-reported, if it does offer anything different to an A5 or A8.

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                        • #13
                          Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                          Originally posted by Ace Flibble View Post
                          Meant to update this. I placed an order for a job lot of A6s from my supplier a couple of weeks ago and I'm waiting for them to come in. They should arrive some time in the next week and then I'll be putting one in the HB-102, a JB, a Custom and a Full Shred. I'll play with them for a day then record some direct-in A/B samples. I'm getting 10 magnets and have a few other humbuckers laying around spare so I might experiment further. Seems the A6 is potentially under-reported, if it does offer anything different to an A5 or A8.
                          I look forward to this, as I've never used A6 magnets, and I suspect that most here haven't, either.
                          Administrator of the SDUGF

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                          • #14
                            Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                            +1 to that. I too would love to hear your evaluation.

                            I've got a couple A6s in my stock but haven't gone to the trouble of trying them out yet. I'd like to know a bit more about them first (my time is at a premium right now and can't spare it to do magnet testing).
                            Originally Posted by IanBallard
                            Rule of thumb... the more pot you have, the better your tone.

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                            • #15
                              Re: Anyone tried a JB with an A6?

                              Okay so, this took longer than expected. First there was more of a delay actually getting the magnets and then I threw my back out and have been bed/sofa-bound, so today is actually the first day I've been able to even carry a guitar from one room to another to change parts out. Since this HB-102 was what started the whole thing, I stuck an A6 in that first. I was able to slacken the strings enough to get the pickup out without restringing, except the high E broke so that is a new string. I don't think that's made any audible difference, though, as the existing strings are only a couple of weeks old and with me in bed they haven't had many hours put into them regardless.

                              So, I'll get to the other guitars and pickups as and when I can, but for now here is just a handful of real basic clips of the HB-102 in the Schecter, stock A5 vs A6.
                              Short demo of putting an A6 magnet in a Seymour Duncan HB-102, in an old Schecter 006. 'Raw' open chords recorded direct, no amp, no pedals, no effects or software simulations, just the raw signal.


                              'Raw' is a couple of open chords direct in. No amp, no physical effects, no software effects or simulations. This is the only example which really matters and shows the difference the most.
                              'Software Dist' is some palm muted power chords, recorded direct in then with an allegedly-Mesa-style scoopy, harsh distortion patch running in GR5. The 'amp' settings are all 7/10 except mids on 5/10.
                              'Pedal Dist' is power chords running into a Blackstar LT-Dual overdrive+distortion pedal before the interface, with everything set to 7. Then GR5's cabinet simulation as above plus a touch of reverb. No amp simulation.

                              There's no 'real amp' recording yet because that requires me to move some heavy stuff about, which I can't do in my current state. I'll do that if/when I am able to do the mag swaps in the other pickups, but for the HB-102 this'll have to do. (For pickups examples I prefer just direct-in recordings anyway.) You'll have to forgive my sloppy and inconsistent attempt at playing; with the amount of painkillers I'm on even strumming a power chord the same way twice is a bit of a stretch and I needed a rest after swapping the magnet over, so hey, it's crappy playing, live with it.
                              Still, the tone change is fairly clear, I reckon. The A6 brings a really solid low-end thump in all conditions. Especially with the two distortion types, it's causing both the wound strings to be more distorted but also the sheer volume of the low-end is bumped up, too; you get a louder sound both going into and coming out of the pedal/amp sim. (I doubt this would be audible with a real valve amp as I would expect any power amp compression to make the difference in volume coming out of the preamp pretty irrelevant.) For the raw input I think the rounding-off of the high-end is the most obvious difference, it's a much warmer sound.

                              Given that my main problem with many high-wound A5 pickups is that the low-mids are too lacking, they don't actually generate quite as much of a signal as I expect them to, and the high-end is often piercing, I'm pretty happy with this change up. The bass gets a small bump, the low-mids get a big bump, the high-mids don't really get touched, and the treble gets reined in. As someone whose task is mostly to fill in the gap between the bass guitar and the lead guitar, this suits me greatly. (Though I suspect I'll be moving the preamp gain on my actual amp down one notch if I do stick with any A6s; I can see the down-tuned guitars getting muddy with the extra output.)

                              Of course it might be that the other pickups don't react to the change in the same way, but for now where the mission was to get more whack out of a thin-sounding pickup, it seems A6 is working as hoped for.
                              Last edited by Ace Flibble; 12-22-2019, 11:03 AM.

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