Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

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tc

Uptonogood
I've had Strats since day one, so I've tried several. Since I'm contemplating selling my Ibanez Prestige I'm thinking of getting an HSS Strat (I'm never changing the pickups in my SSS Strat, those go to the grave with me) but I'm kind of running through the setups I've tried to think about what I want:

Super Distortion: This is the ticket to so many great rock sounds. It just makes the Strat sound fatter and slightly raunchy. I started playing because I loved Iron Maiden and with the right amp it totally nails that tone.

Pearly Gates: As I grew towards vintage sounds but still wasn't ready to take the leap to a full SSS Stratocaster, I ended up falling on this setup by accident. I had a PG set for another guitar and ended up selling it but kept the pickups. Whoa. Totally matched the EQ of the singles (I tried both PGn and PGb in the bridge position of the Strat) and the neck matched the volume perfectly. Like a humbucking P90/Tele pickup, bright and raunchy but not lacking in bass. This was the pickup that taught me how to tame a Strat bridge pickup and embrace the upper end cut and turn it into something good by pairing it with an amp that had some fat bass and raunchy midrange.

Invader: SUPER PHAT BOOTY and relatively round high end. I liked that it had the guitar version of the Konami Code hidden via a parallel switch. Once you go parallel you get this great balanced, low/mid output tone that's to die for. Since the pickup is sludgy, super hot and has these weird overtones going on once you lower the output and raise the brightness by wiring the coils in parallel it all balances out. But you still have those super fat Metallica riff tones at the flick of a switch. I loved how it turns a relatively plinky guitar like a Stratocaster into a wall of sound.

Honorable mention would be the Custom Custom (kinda liked the Super Distortion better for a rawk pickup) and the '59 (liked the Pearly Gates better in the PAF category).

I'm not a huge fan of the JB by the way, even though it's one of the de facto pickup choices for a Stratocaster. It sounds good, but it's just nowhere near my #1 choice.

So, what's your pick?
 
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Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

Where is the trusty old JB? If you don't like it, maybe the Custom Custom (SH-11). Powerful enough for hard rock, but not metal.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

I have played SSS Strats, and no other kind of Strats, till the past year or so. The one HSS guitar I have started life with the stock MIM HSS pickup set, which was actually quite good IMHO. But I couldn't leave well enough alone, so I started tinkering. I tried a Suhr SSH, a Seth bridge, and a PG+, mixed with an SDS-1 and a True Velvet. Of the three, I liked the PG the best. While it wasn't too hard to get any of those pickups sounding good alone, the problem was matching single coils to the bridge humbucker. I didn't like mixing vintage-style singles with the humbucker in the bridge. I preferred hotter singles. In the end, I ended up with a Red Velvet in the neck, an SDS-1 in the middle, and an EJ Custom in the bridge spot. It's now the best it has been so far, over all. The middle pickup is great for fat leads and two or three -string riffs. The bridge and neck pickups are great for rhythm.
 
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Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

I love the Invader in my HSS Strat. I have it wired so that parallel is the normal mode, and then I use the switch to put it in "turbo" mode. (Series.)
Auto-split in the #2 notch position. Sounds great.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

Hi,
My choice is Seth Lover W/A5 magnet or a SH-2 Jazz neck or bridge. The Jazz models have a very nice high end and a nice PAF sound IMHO. The Seth has a bigger sound in general but does not take over the rest of the guitar as the pup is a little lower than normal.
The SH-2 jazz b or n is a little less over powering and is a good match with single coils. All of the ones I have mentioned sound great w/single coils in the "4" position, bridge+middle. Very sweet.
I have one that I wired so that in the "4" position the bridge and NECK are engaged. Drives my buddy nuts czuse he has to put the switch in the bridge position to get the middle pickup! Also a sweet sound. Almost Bloomfield-ish. Mike Bloomfield, from the 60's-Paul Butterfield, Electric Flag, but if you have not heard it YOU MUST BUY SUPER SESSION!!!!. You will thank me.
Steve Buffington.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

I have an H-S-S alder body shredder with a Floyd - essentially a Strat with a Floyd. The bridge JB sounds fantastic.
I also have an ESP Strat style guitar with S-S-S pickups, but I have a Tone Zone S at the bridge. Also sounds fantastic. So the full size Tone Zone would be one I'd wanna consider in a Strat routed for a bridge humbucker.
My reasons for liking them both are the same- both are super crunchy, have nice percussive palm muted tone, great edgy attack when playing lead, and great harmonics.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

A problem for many HSS set ups is that single coils are usually used with 250k pots and most humbuckers like 500k pots. The following humbuckers work fine or even "need" 250k pots:

Pearly Gates
Pearly Gates+
JB
Dimarzio 36th

Those pickups all sound good in strats with 250k pots and the JB and 36th also split very well.

However depending on the guitar, neck and middle position single coils usually still work fine with 500k pots, so you can use a humbucker that likes 500 pots as well. What I have on my HSS is a 500k volume pot and a 500k bridge tone pot with a .022 cap. The remaining pot is 250k and it goes to the neck pickup. With a .047 tone cap the neck pickup sounds fine.

I hardly use the middle pickup by itself.

Some people like the bridge humbucker to have a jump in power when in series compared to the other positions and some like it to balance the singles. I like it to balance well with the singles, but that's a personal preference.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

The Tone Zone will work great. I used a JB with 250K pot in a Strat once. Loved it.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

Depending upon what I'm doing, I love JBs, CCs, and Customs, but absolutely my favorite, especially with singles, is the good ol' Pearly Gates bridge.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

RIght now I have a Pearly Gates in my Strat with Antiquity Texas Hots. Great combo!
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

My all time favourite is the Tyler Secret Humbucker.

They're impossible to get but incredible.
They work perfectly with 250k pots and split beautifully.

I've never found anything that sounds like them.
I wish I could as I'd have them in every guitar.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

Dimarzio super distortion gets my vote. It sounds good in any guitar and can pull off many different genres of music
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

Lake Placid Blues said:
A problem for many HSS set ups is that single coils are usually used with 250k pots and most humbuckers like 500k pots. The following humbuckers work fine or even "need" 250k pots:

However depending on the guitar, neck and middle position single coils usually still work fine with 500k pots, so you can use a humbucker that likes 500 pots as well. What I have on my HSS is a 500k volume pot and a 500k bridge tone pot with a .022 cap. The remaining pot is 250k and it goes to the neck pickup. With a .047 tone cap the neck pickup sounds fine.
Click to expand...

I kind of favor the second approach here - Having two tone controls with a strat, you can wire one up to the neck + middle, and the bottom one up to the bridge. That way, you can get great sounds out of both without sacrificing anything. I use 500k pots all around anyway, but for the player that likes the reduced treble of a 250k pot a setup like this is a great compromise.

I also prefer a more subtle tone control - .022 uf/50s mod with my telecaster - because IME it allows you to shave off just the piercing frequencies without sacrificing clarity.

As for my favorite HSS bridge humbucker, it depends. Best all around I've tried is the P-Rails because you can get so many good sounds out of it. Best humbucking bridge pickup I've tried in a strat is probably a dimarzio virtual hot PAF. Second place in both categories is the 59/custom - it can't get the fat and rich p-90 sounds of the p-rails, and it kind of straddles the line between 'vintage' and 'hot' whereas with the p-rails you have parallel and series, respectively. But, if you don't want to fiddle with having 4 different and distinct sounds, IMO the 59/custom is a great option.
 
Re: Favorite bridge humbucker for HSS Strat?

I used a blackout AHB-2 to go along with 2 blackout AS-1 in my HSS setup. It is wired as master volume + master tone + blender.
Without blending any of the AS-1, the guitar sounds "metallic". With blending, it kinda goes into "PAF-ish" territories.
 
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