Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

Mark Abbott

Mark Abbott

New member
I own a Danelectro reissue, and I like it, as it has personality.

It has a good acoustic volume for goofing around at home without bugging neighbours in my apartment block. As anyone who's ever noticed the various advertisements for Dano's realise, the pickups in the original reissues weren't too popular, in fact the site now advertises the guitar with better pickups, tuners and tuneable bridge.

I have replaced the pickups with Kent Armstrongs which was a vast improvement on the originals, I also had the rosewood bridge "cut" so that it plays in tune (a real improvement too!)

The thing is it still doesn't sound too huge (when distorted) through my amps (Boogie Mark 1 and a Kendrick Roughneck.) My Strat actually sounds bigger and that is strange as the Dano's pickups are in series and should have greater output.

Many years ago I played a Silvertone guitar with one lipstick pickup and it sounded huge, much bigger sounding than any of the Strats on hand at the time (thick yet defined, you had to hear it.)

I did consider the Duncan lipstick pickup at the time of purchase, but as the Armstrong had a higher impedance it should offer the fatter tone that I was after.

Should any Dano fans have any advice, I love to hear from you.

Yours Sincerely

Mark Abbott

P.S. I do realise that kent Armstrong sells a hotter version of the vintage pickups, though I'm not sure this is the solution.
 
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Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

i dont have much experience with the different lipsticks. two pups in series will be fatter and thicker than two pups in parallel, but there will still be some cancelation of frequencies by having two pups on. the tone of a single pup will be quite different. how does a single pup sound?
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

Thanks for the reply Jeremy.

The sound of both pickups on together sounds like just the front pickup on with a little extra brightness.

Yours Sincerely

Mark Abbott
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

I have some experience with Danelectros and with a few different lipstick pups. "Huge" and lipstick pups is an oxymoron. SRV used Dano lipstick pups in Charley when he wanted an ultra clean tone his regular Strat pups couldn't give him. Here is some info about Charley:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stevie_Ray_Vaughn

Charley was a custom-made Stratocaster built for him by the late Charley Wirz, a friend and owner of Charley's Guitar Shop in Dallas, Texas. It was made for Stevie in late 1983, but had a neck plate with the engravement "More In '84". It had three Danelectro lipstick tubes and it had a hardtail bridge. The guitar was also rewired with 1 tone knob and 1 volume. This guitar was said by Stevie to have a lot of "bite" in the guitar's tone.
Click to expand...
 
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Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

yeah, in general lipstick tubes don't sound huge. At least not in my experience. They do have a good jangle and chime to them.
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

Yeah, I hear what you are saying, but if you'd been there I think you'd find yourself agreeing with me. It didn't sound like a P90 or a Tele. This Silvertone had these great mids, but with this clarity too. I had my Strat there and the guy who owned the Silvertone also had a Strat. The Silvertone had the best tone of all these guitars.

If your asking for a logical reason, sorry but I can't give you one. I didn't have any gear there to measure the DC resistance of the pickup. It was a rather unassuming looking guitar, but it sounded huge.

I'm wondering if the Jerry Jones guitars have something going on that Danelectro has missed?

Completely aside, I played a 57 Strat recently at a Vintage guitar shop, as you'd expect it was expensive, I have played some 50's Strats that were amazing. This guitar was a very ordinary Strat, it looked and sounded like a reliced Japanese Strat (a good sound, but nothing special) in fact the best Strat I've heard in recent times was a Strat built by Frank Grubisa (Australia) it had amazing presence, I thought it sounded like SRV and Jimi Hendrix. It had a Callaham bridge and Fralin pickups which may have helped it along. ;)
You never can tell by just looking at guitars.

Anyway I'm rambling. :oo

Thanks for your replies.

Yours Sincerely

Mark Abbott
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

all I can add is that sometimes, DC ratings don't tell the whole story -- for instance, Rickenbacker lap steel pickups had a low resistance, but sounded big; the same is true for some of the Gretsch pickups.

I think wire gauge plays a factor also.
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

Actually to add something to this old thread, GFS makes a custom set which has a 6K neck pickup and a 8K bridge pickup. Sounds like a good thing for a Dano.

The volume pot on a Dano is 100K, if SRV used a 250K this would account for extra brightness. Another thing about Dano's is the tone pot is 1 meg!

There is no brightness roll off at all. I find putting the tone control at about half way gives a very subtly treble roll off not dissimilar to a Strat.

As far as great Dano tones, try using both pickups on together and fully turn down one of the tone controls, then turn everything back up and turn down the other tone control. You get interesting and usable tones.
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

I was also curious if anyone had tried to do the Page mod and put a Bad Ass bridge onto a Dano. I had heard hat this does drastically alter the tone of the instrument.
 
Re: Danelectro and Silvertone pickups?

I own a 1959 Silvertone 'Suitacase" single pup guitar, sold by Sear & Roebucks....

Tone is different than any other guitar I own or have ever played.

Fat - No
Clear - Yes
Huge - No
Better than a Strat - In it's own way.
Different than a Tele - Not a Lester...

I love that guitar
 
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