Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

[Chistopher]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

How is a pickup with two distinct voices a "one-trick pony"?

I'm with him on this one. A 59/C hybrid with a tap covers little ground that a standard 59/C won't. And if the tap does manage to make it sound like a 59, it will cover no new ground except for throwing the 59/C to a higher price bracket than ever before.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

Well, it's shaping up to be a Tele set vs. a Tele set anyhow. PA vs. steel poled. Nothing radical there either. And if you don't have a Tele, oh well.

Some people view the forum pickup as a way to go hog wild with "imaginative" designs, and some view it as a way to get a limited edition version of a mild tweak on a production pickup, for a special price. That probably isn't going to change.

I myself don't have the "act like a kid in a candy store and see what happens" approach. I have the "take a known quantity and conservatively add an additional function to it" or "take two known quantities and attempt to make both available in the same product" approach.

Neither of these approaches is right or wrong. But they are very different. This is the problem with design by committee. Not only do we have different end goals, but we have completely different ideas of what a forum pickup is supposed to be. If everyone is compromising, that's nice and quaint on a social level...but in terms of the actual product, you end up with a compromised design with limited real-world utility in the end, and very few people loving it.

I have always though that a better way to go about the forum pickup is to treat the design stages as a representative democracy rather than a direct democracy. Elect 10 or 12 "designers," based on their initial pitches. Have each one propose a pickup. Have SD vet the pitches on a technical level (we can do this, we can't do this, we can do this with this change, etc.). Then send them back to the "designers" to complete the final drafts of their pitches. Then the forum votes on the pitches. Could be done in two rounds. Free for all round to eliminate the choice that don't get at least 15 percent of the vote. Trimmed down free for all next. If any pickup takes a majority of the vote, it wins. If no pickup gets a majority, then its a runoff between the top two. Another idea, which I think is cool, is that you narrow to down to the top two, and if they finish within 10 percent of each other, they can both get ordered. That makes more people happy, and gives us two new designs.

I like it this way because each pickup is fundamentally based on a single idea from a single person. Each design is not nicked away at and compromised by direct vote along the process. Maybe the designs are good, and maybe they're bad...but at least each one is close to what was originally intended when it was conceptualized. Better to design something the way you want, put it up for contest, and have it lose, than to design something, and then hand control of it over to the crowd to be tweaked at their will during a several step direct-democratic process – with the final product not being what was originally intended.

 

[Masta' C]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

ItsaBass, the approach you propose is not worlds different from what's occurring here. Perhaps the biggest difference is in framing, rather than function. We technically have "designers" (i.e. a group of people who were willing to forward designs) and we could easily take the top ideas from both categories in this round (i.e. those that muster at least 15% of the vote, as you suggested), approach SD about them, get their feedback and then draw this out into multiple rounds of voting on feasible designs until a pair of true "winners" are determined.

Is that what everyone would like? If so, I'm totally down with it.

It's rather easy to shift gears at this point. Like I said, it's not a big departure from the current plan at all, just allows more designs to filter through initially and entails an extra round or two of voting to narrow things down.

I will say that, if we were to stay true to your approach, ItsaBass, then the idea of discussing further modifications or tweaks beyond what the designers initially proposed would be out the window. Not sure if that's a good thing or not. You seem to feel very strongly about how a pickup needs to be to fit your needs. Wouldn't you at least want a voice in the room to give *your* ideas a chance to come to fruition? A "representative" democracy works for some things, but not all. Besides, good luck "electing" anything here...you can see how hard it is just to get votes or get people to suggest ideas in the first place!

By the way, people decry "design by committee" yet seem to apply the meaning of that term in different ways. I suggest we avoid using that term in these threads. Every effort is being made to accommodate a billion different interests and views on this. If you have the "perfect" plan in mind, I invite you to start your own forum pickup effort. No harm, no foul...I'll even participate. In the end, I just think it would be cool to have a forum design get built in 2020 to commemorate the crazy time we find ourselves in.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

ItsaBass, the approach you propose is not worlds different from what's occurring here. Perhaps the biggest difference is in framing, rather than function. We technically have "designers" (i.e. a group of people who were willing to forward designs) and we could easily take the top ideas from both categories in this round (i.e. those that muster at least 15% of the vote, as you suggested), approach SD about them, get their feedback and then draw this out into multiple rounds of voting on feasible designs until a pair of true "winners" are determined.

Is that what everyone would like? If so, I'm totally down with it.


It's rather easy to shift gears at this point. Like I said, it's not a big departure from the current plan at all, just allows more designs to filter through initially and entails an extra round or two of voting to narrow things down.


I will say that, if we were to stay true to your approach, ItsaBass, then the idea of discussing further modifications or tweaks beyond what the designers initially proposed would be out the window. Not sure if that's a good thing or not. You seem to feel very strongly about how a pickup needs to be to fit your needs. Wouldn't you at least want a voice in the room to give *your* ideas a chance to come to fruition? A "representative" democracy works for some things, but not all. Besides, good luck "electing" anything here...you can see how hard it is just to get votes or get people to suggest ideas in the first place!


By the way, people decry "design by committee" yet seem to apply the meaning of that term in different ways. I suggest we avoid using that term in these threads. Every effort is being made to accommodate a billion different interests and views on this. If you have the "perfect" plan in mind, I invite you to start your own forum pickup effort. No harm, no foul...I'll even participate. In the end, I just think it would be cool to have a forum design get built in 2020 to commemorate the crazy time we find ourselves in.

Firstly, I am just banging around ideas. Nothing more, nothing less. It isn't an attack on you or an attempt to take over your project.


Secondly, the whole point of my thinking on the idea was specifically to eliminate the endless specs-based – as opposed to concept based – tweaking that goes on in these threads/polls. So it goes without saying that this goes out the window. It's the point.


The only real difference of note is that you'd put forth several fully conceptualized designs before voting – as opposed to voting on a bunch of technical specifications in a series of polls until you finally arrive at a "design"...like what happened with the Fuglybucker.


I don't really know what you mean when you say I "feel strongly" about how a pickup needs to fit my needs, or what you said about having a voice in the room. It's really more simple than that. I am not alone here in that I simply have a pretty specific idea, and I'd, of course, like to see it get built. I'd rather put an interesting batch of those sorts of ideas up for vote, and let the votes lead us where they may. Better to run a bunch of single-minded designs and see only one of them get selected and produced in its originally intended form, than to have the design moved forward and get changed along the way by popular vote, losing a bit of itself with each poll.


Again, the only big difference is that the designs become more finalized before voting takes place. It's just a slightly different approach – more conceptually driven and less technical. The idea is to keep the decisions on the technical minutia out of the hands of the voters, instead letting them choose between a spread of ideas that have already been flushed out. In the same way that you don't want the citizens of the U.S.A. directly voting on every single law.

I'm not saying screw you guys, I'm going home, or get out of the way and let me handle this. Not at all. We're simply talking here.

 

[Masta' C]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

I agree, just looking to have a conversation, as well. And I'm trying to be as flexible with this process as possible, if that hasn't been made clear up to this point.

If people want me to start the process over, simply let me know. If enough people want to (and I'm not talking one or two), we can design it to allow a little more time for initial ideas now that there is quite a bit of interest and we can lay out the selection process more clearly.

I will say that I suggested starting the Fuglybucker process over about half-way through because people were getting uppity and I caught tons of flack for that, even from those who were upset at the process. I just want peeps to recognize that no approach is going to be perfect and represent every idea from everyone ever. If too many people have input in a design, people get mad. If only a handful get the say over a design, people get mad. If you could make everyone happy with one approach, we'd all be playing the same pickups to begin with

ItsaBass, I can see the desire and maybe even extra convenience to having something "fully conceptualized" from the start. But I would also argue that many of the suggestions here technically are...I mean how straightforward is a "JB/Custom hybrid with double-thick A5"? Others, like my QuaranTele set are rough concepts that clearly need some attention and direction from SD.

You peeps let me know how you want to see this proceed

:beerchug:

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

I think this ship has already sailed. I had no intention of changing this installment with my comments. I assumed it was too late.

I am speaking in the hypothetical, i.e. maybe we should try a different approach next time.

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

I think if we do a forum design next, we should split up into teams and design pedals. I've got several ideas for circuits I could draft up if there was some sort of Forum Pedal competition.

 

[nexion218]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

Could we re-start the poll with just the Black Plague and Super Spreader and then approach SD with the first two?

 

[Masta' C]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

I am speaking in the hypothetical, i.e. maybe we should try a different approach next time.

That's totally fair. Like I said, we can still adapt this to some of your suggestions, as well, including putting the designs through an additional round of voting to more accurately narrow down interest and reaching out to SD relatively soon (how successful that would be given the current situation, I'm not sure). So far, there are at least 4 ideas that could potentially be dropped from this poll alone.

I think if we do a forum design next, we should split up into teams and design pedals. I've got several ideas for circuits I could draft up if there was some sort of Forum Pedal competition.

A forum pedal design would be really cool. However, that is one area SD has been incredibly focused on in the past couple of years. We'd have to come up with something that was significantly different from what they've already created themselves (or might have in the works). I feel like they've really been covering the bases recently.

 

['59]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

Could we re-start the poll with just the Black Plague and Super Spreader and then approach SD with the first two?

If the vote doesn't end up going that way, it wouldn't be that hard to try them out for yourself. If a can get enough free time after this whole pandemic blows over, I might even offer to do it for you.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

Looked more closely at PATB bobbins. They are cast, as I had thought they probably were.

I can't imagine SD would engineer two brand new bobbins for us and have them cast just for this.

And I don't see the PATB concept living up to its design if using pole pieces that are not parallel to the strings. Is that not the whole meaning of the "parallel" in the name? I don't know for sure; that's not a rhetorical question.

An option I can see is hand punching Forbon flatwork, or producing a die to do it. They'd punch the flatwork to accept the PA pole pieces, and then perhaps wrap the pole pieces between the bobbins prior to winding; they need something to go in between the pole pieces and the windings, and to round out the corners created by the outer poles. I can't see that being worth Duncan's while. It's some majorly specialized engineering and manufacturing just for a small scale discounted run. It'd only be worth their while if they were actually going to introduce the PA Tele set to the public.

 

[dr.barlo]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

Molds are expensive and the break-even threshold is not low.

B

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

This is why my vote is to move the concept forward with a Strat design. They already have the capabilities to make a set, now it's just a case of making a standalone set instead of a pickup designed to be the S in an HSH.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

This is why my vote is to move the concept forward with a Strat design. They already have the capabilities to make a set, now it's just a case of making a standalone set instead of a pickup designed to be the S in an HSH.

Same issues as the Tele set: the pole pieces should be angled on the bridge pickup.

For the Tele neck, they could shave down a bobbin. Still a PITA in numbers, but eminently more doable than having SD have new bobbins produced.

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

I was actually just thinking about that. I don't think the pole pieces being parallel to the strings make nearly as big a difference as we think they do. The key function of the design is to spread the magnetic field in a way that promotes note to note separation and give the impression of increased sustain. The polepieces themselves don't drastically increase sustain by any means, which can easily be found by playing them unplugged.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

It’s all about how the magnetic field is shaped in relation to the strings, I would think. Change the relationship of the pole pieces to the strings, and that idea no longer applies, I’d think. It’ll produce sound, but not in accordance with its design.

Right? I dunno for sure.

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

If it's just rotated slightly I wouldn't suspect it would make all that much of a difference, definitely not one they couldn't account for.

 

[Masta' C]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

Any other thoughts? Poll closes in 4 days

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

My main thought at this point is a combined poll after these two are over. Single choice only this time, including anything that got at least 20 percent of the votes cast in this round.

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Forum Pickup Poll #2: Everything Else

My main thought at this point is a combined poll after these two are over. Single choice only this time, including anything that got at least 20 percent of the votes cast in this round.

Agreed.