Dimarzio Air Zone

[Closed Eye]

I've been a JB player for about 2 years now and I'm looking for a bit of a change. While surfing the Dimarzio website I came along the Air and was wondering if it's a quality pickup. I play mostly "modern" stuff that's in the rock genre more often than not, so would this be a good pickup for me?

The Dimarzio website says: "It's a great match for very hot amps, allowing the player to take full advantage of massive preamp gain without turning the sound to mud or fuzzy noise."

And while I don't play my amp "hot" as I could I do have a tad problem sometimes with fuzzy noise and some mud sometimes too (constantly changing amp settings). The real question though: DOES IT RAWK?

Thanks for the help, info, look.

 

[Kommerzbassist]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I don't know if it's a good pup. but it should at least sound modern :smack:

 

[Peterku]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

The Air Zone's a very fine model. I have it in my main axe. It has a very fat and dense sound but an airy quality, too, which makes it sound rather balanced. A great improvement over the Tone Zone: a cleaner, more organic, and friendlier sound. Under high gain it does sound smooth and expressive, maybe because it has hot coils (same as the Tone Zone) but also a softer magnetic field because of the "air-trick". But it's a different smoothness than that of a similarly hot Alnico-II pickup, the AZ sounds more transparent and less raw.

 

[GTBass]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I was told by a very reliable source that the Air Zone is the production name for the pickup used in the Ernie Ball/Music Man, Eddie Van Halen/Axis guitar. Where as I have not any experience with the Air Zone the pickups in the EB/MM guitars kick ass and I do have one of those pickups.

 

[adrian]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I got an Air Zone in bridge of one of my guitars. It´s balanced and gives a clean distorsion. Guess that why it is said to sound "modern". With more gain it gives lots of Billy Gibbons-like aggressive overtones, so it´s not just smooth and friendly. Useful.

 

[Closed Eye]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

Wow. Sounds like it's exactly what I'm looking for. Thanks guys!

 

[hacker]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

+1 for the Air Zone. Great pickup, fat sounding, warm. Similar to a JB, but the emphasis is on the lower mids which most bridge humbuckers lack.

 

[Uncle]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I have an Air Zone in the bridge position of my Epiphone Les Paul. It's beefier sounding than the stock Epi pickup. Sounds great with high gain and I really like the fatness for soloing.

 

[adrian]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

Now for the more difficult part. The sound of a Air Norton is like tasting the first water that comes out of a water pump on the country side, somewhat reddish colour and a slightly taste of iron.

 

[WICKED LESTER]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I was told by a very reliable source that the Air Zone is the production name for the pickup used in the Ernie Ball/Music Man, Eddie Van Halen/Axis guitar. Where as I have not any experience with the Air Zone the pickups in the EB/MM guitars kick ass and I do have one of those pickups.

The air zone is very close but not the same to the custom wound bridge pup in the EBMM axis or EVH sig guitars
the air and tone zone BOTH use "dual resonance coils" and the custom wound one in thr EBMM axis does not ,it has two matched 8.5K coils
they both have a alnico 5 magnet and are wound to a total of 17K.
the air zone is a great pup,but the custom wound one is a bit clearer and has more crunch

 

[rinse_master]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

Now for the more difficult part. The sound of a Air Norton is like tasting the first water that comes out of a water pump on the country side, somewhat reddish colour and a slightly taste of iron.

fftopic: (sorry)

I wondered why my taps do that

Back to normal now...

BTW: What does that mean in relation to the Air Zone?

 

[adrian]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

That´s pickup poetry. Sorry if it was off topic for you.

 

[Majestic]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

EBMM axis does not ,it has two matched 8.5K coils
they both have a alnico 5 magnet and are wound to a total of 17K.

I'm telling you bro.....I'm dyin' to make a Hybrid out of one of my Axis bridge pickups.

I want the beef/chunk of the pickup, but with it thinned-out by another coil, to get more "snap". It would be somewhere around 12.5 k

Can you imagine a TZ/VPAF Hybrid? BOMB!

Better EQ curves, per my tastes, then the Duncan Custom Hybrids.....but it's all speculation until I do it.

 

[lordcliffton]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I love my Air Zone. I use it in my Alder Strat alongside 2 Tx. Specials & it balanecs out their lighter cleaner sounds perfectly.

You CAN "rawk" with it very easily & if you roll off the volume some it cleans up nicely too. I highly recommend it for just about anything except for the cleanest of desired tones.
Peace

 

[WICKED LESTER]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I'm telling you bro.....I'm dyin' to make a Hybrid out of one of my Axis bridge pickups.

I want the beef/chunk of the pickup, but with it thinned-out by another coil, to get more "snap". It would be somewhere around 12.5 k

Can you imagine a TZ/VPAF Hybrid? BOMB!

Better EQ curves, per my tastes, then the Duncan Custom Hybrids.....but it's all speculation until I do it.

majestic, did you know that if you buy two tone zones and use the two 8.5K coils from each you would wind up with the custom wound EVH dimarzio bridge pup.
the ONLY thing that is different between the two(tone zone and EVH custom wound dimarzio on the EBMM sig axe) is that the tone zone has one coil at 9K and the other at 8.5K
on the EVH version that dimarzio made for him they used two matched 8.5K coils.
Btw, your idea sounds great but i would go one coil tone zone and one air classic bridge model for cosmetic reasons(the V paf's have the glossy bobbins like duncans)
and the air classic which is pretty much the same pup tonally as the V paf has the flat, matte black bobbins like the TZ has.

 

[sosomething]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

The Air Zone rocks. I have one in the bridge of my main guitar. It's got the same tonality as the Tone Zone but with more "vintage" output. It still requires one to pull back a touch on the volume knob to get a really great clean tone out of, but it's got that vowel-like response to pick attack like the best DMZ models have in spades.

Highly recommended.

 

[FretFire]

Re: Dimarzio Air Zone

I love my Air Zone. I use it in my Alder Strat alongside 2 Tx. Specials & it balanecs out their lighter cleaner sounds perfectly.

You CAN "rawk" with it very easily & if you roll off the volume some it cleans up nicely too. I highly recommend it for just about anything except for the cleanest of desired tones.
Peace

Hey Paul, didn't know you posted over here .