rowdybeagle
New member
Hello Duncanites! I'm a longtime Duncan user. I've found tons of great info on this forum. But..I'm just not a humbucker person lol - I get lost with all the options. My guitars are all vintage low output Fender Strat and Tele pickups, Filterton, and mini-humbucker which used to be P-90's. Can you help?
I have a self built guitar that's been collecting dust for a while. It's routed for humbucker-soapbar-humbucker. I could never find a neck and bridge pickup that worked well together on it so I parted it out. I want to get it up and running again as a backup in my spare room / office. It will be for practice with a Fender mustang modelling amp. And when the future rock star youngsters in the family visit they can jam on it. I use the 60's and 70's amp models mostly and some will use the modern high gain. So pickups that are versatile without being one dimensional would be ideal. And also solve some of the shortcomings on the guitar.
The guitar's a mashup of PRS and Carvin features. It's 25.5" scale 22 fret maple/ebony Set-neck. Body is alder with a thin Koa top. It has a good quality PRS clone 6 screw tremolo and locking tuners.
The problem was it always sounded dead to me unplugged. Like a lack of volume and snap compared to your standard maple neck alder body Fender bolt-on. Then on top of that, the bridge pickup I routed based on where a Strat or Tele bridge pickup is centered. But I found out later this is about 3/16" closer to the bridge then Fender does their HH or HSS super Strat bridge pickups. It makes the bridge position naturally weaker and thinner. So I could never find a pair of humbuckers that had a reasonable volume and tone balance when switching from neck to bridge. Its master volume and tone, not LP controls.
I had a covered 59 in the Neck for a while before I parted it out. It was too bassy for me. I thought about trying a Jazz Neck but never got around to it. I know it from another guitar and I like it but I'm not a JB fan. I don't remember them all but I know in the bridge I tried the Whole Lotta HB, a DIY '59/Custom Hybrid, original Slash, and even a Super Distortion. Another factor, because the bridge pickup is so close to the bridge, its real close to needing a trembucker with the 2-1/16" tremolo. I remember the Dimarzio was not F-spaced and the E strings sounded weaker they weren't over the hex polepieces.
I'm kind of ignoring the middle soapbar because I left it with an empty cover most of the time lol. I was thinking a Custom P-90 Neck would be good so it could be set lower out of picking hand way and still have decent output.
I ended up in the spiral of swapping pickups more than I played this guitar for several years which is why I eventually parted it out and left it in the closet.
So any suggestions to get me on the right track and avoid that again would be appreciated!
I have a self built guitar that's been collecting dust for a while. It's routed for humbucker-soapbar-humbucker. I could never find a neck and bridge pickup that worked well together on it so I parted it out. I want to get it up and running again as a backup in my spare room / office. It will be for practice with a Fender mustang modelling amp. And when the future rock star youngsters in the family visit they can jam on it. I use the 60's and 70's amp models mostly and some will use the modern high gain. So pickups that are versatile without being one dimensional would be ideal. And also solve some of the shortcomings on the guitar.
The guitar's a mashup of PRS and Carvin features. It's 25.5" scale 22 fret maple/ebony Set-neck. Body is alder with a thin Koa top. It has a good quality PRS clone 6 screw tremolo and locking tuners.
The problem was it always sounded dead to me unplugged. Like a lack of volume and snap compared to your standard maple neck alder body Fender bolt-on. Then on top of that, the bridge pickup I routed based on where a Strat or Tele bridge pickup is centered. But I found out later this is about 3/16" closer to the bridge then Fender does their HH or HSS super Strat bridge pickups. It makes the bridge position naturally weaker and thinner. So I could never find a pair of humbuckers that had a reasonable volume and tone balance when switching from neck to bridge. Its master volume and tone, not LP controls.
I had a covered 59 in the Neck for a while before I parted it out. It was too bassy for me. I thought about trying a Jazz Neck but never got around to it. I know it from another guitar and I like it but I'm not a JB fan. I don't remember them all but I know in the bridge I tried the Whole Lotta HB, a DIY '59/Custom Hybrid, original Slash, and even a Super Distortion. Another factor, because the bridge pickup is so close to the bridge, its real close to needing a trembucker with the 2-1/16" tremolo. I remember the Dimarzio was not F-spaced and the E strings sounded weaker they weren't over the hex polepieces.
I'm kind of ignoring the middle soapbar because I left it with an empty cover most of the time lol. I was thinking a Custom P-90 Neck would be good so it could be set lower out of picking hand way and still have decent output.
I ended up in the spiral of swapping pickups more than I played this guitar for several years which is why I eventually parted it out and left it in the closet.
So any suggestions to get me on the right track and avoid that again would be appreciated!
