Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

[Rainald]

Hi folks,

I have a Launhardt Telecaster which is a very expensive handcrafted copy of a Fender Telecaster. I mostly play rock and love to rock (Nirvana, Gun, Billie Idol, Metallica, Him etc.) with Tele and I don`t like to play country with it at all. I love the single coil sound and the Tele has Amber vintage singlecoil. Buit I `d love it to have a bit more gain. In my other main guitar I use SH4 and Alnico Pro II in the neck (guitar is a Les Paul). I rather like the sound of an Alnico V magnet than ceramic with the Les Paul.

So here is my question for the Tele. I like to replace the single coil with a humbucker in single coil format. I`m thinking of the SD hotrail for Tele or the hot stack lead. Ceramic magnets make the tone steril to my ears (but only on what I heard in my Les Paul). The hot stack is supposed to be a humbucker. Is it just a hum cancelling humbucker or a real humbucker?

I listened to the sd sound samples. The hotstack is the tone I like and the hotrail makes the tone powerfull but steril. My only problem is the hotstack sounds more like a singlecoil than a humbucker to me. But the SH-4 sounds weak and thin on he sample page as well and in real it sounds fat to me. So maybe it is the same here? Is the hotstack sounding close to the SH-4? What should I do?

Any comments welcome.

PLease excuse my english Im german.

 

[cakire82]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

I have no experience with hot stack but I have both the STHRs in my Tele and JB in my Jacksons. STHR is a totally different beast than JB. My tele has ash body with full maple neck and STHRs (bridge and neck) sound really fat and full. I have also wired them with push pulls for coil splitting and They make the guitar perfect for all types of rock and metal.

 

[Rainald]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

THX for your answer. I`m just afraid the hotrail will colour too much the natural sound of my Tele. But maybe it is just because I made this experience with my Les Paul and a ceramic magnet.

 

[loudriver23]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

I only have experience with two different SC sized humbuckers.
1: JBjr for the strat (Decent pickup, but I went with a full HB route eventually)
2: Lil59 for TELE! (I loved this pickup, and depending on your amp would cover a large range of sonic ground.)

If I didn't get on a vintage sounding twangy tele kick, I'd still be using that Lil59.

 

[cakire82]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

THX for your answer. I`m just afraid the hotrail will colour too much the natural sound of my Tele. But maybe it is just because I made this experience with my Les Paul and a ceramic magnet.

If you are willing keep the twang, STHR is not the one for you!

 

[Rainald]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

@louddriver: The 59 in my Les Paul was to tame for mytaste and playing style. I say Rock I don`t mean Brian Adams I mean more like hardrock. THe 59 sounds cool but not enough sustain just too tame.

@cakire82: I don`t like country at all. So I`m not really looking for the twang. I just buy guitars by their sound played unplugged. If I love the tone of the wood I look for thepups to bring out that tone most naturally but as well to fit to my agressive rock playing.THe Tele sounded far better than any Fender in that store and it was quite expensive too. I guess it was aimed for blues. But that tone is perfect for my rock thing as well!!!

THe single coil that is inside really sounds cool nice trnsparent and open and delivers the sound of the wood. I believe it is a vintage kinda style pup which would put a big smile on the face of every blues style player. But I`m a rock guy loving this Tele. If I play "Smells like Teen Spirit" or "Zoombie" for instance with just one guitar in the band I want a bit more drive on my sound. The rest s cool. If they had the SH-14 in single coil format for a Tele I guess that would be kinda what I`m looking for.

SD offers the hotrail and the hotstack as the two pups to fit for me. I`m afraid the hotrail with a alnico V or so propably could be it. But I don`t want to get into magnet swapping.........

THX for your thoughts. Does anyone know if the hotstack is a hum canceling humbucker or a real humbucker?

 

[loudriver23]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

@louddriver: The 59 in my Les Paul was to tame for mytaste and playing style. I say Rock I don`t mean Brian Adams I mean more like hardrock. THe 59 sounds cool but not enough sustain just too tame.

Well, in that case I'm guessing the Hotrails might be the best fit in the Duncan line.

 

[cakire82]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

@cakire82: I don`t like country at all. So I`m not really looking for the twang. I just buy guitars by their sound played unplugged. If I love the tone of the wood I look for thepups to bring out that tone most naturally but as well to fit to my agressive rock playing.THe Tele sounded far better than any Fender in that store and it was quite expensive too. I guess it was aimed for blues. But that tone is perfect for my rock thing as well!!!

THe single coil that is inside really sounds cool nice trnsparent and open and delivers the sound of the wood. I believe it is a vintage kinda style pup which would put a big smile on the face of every blues style player. But I`m a rock guy loving this Tele. If I play "Smells like Teen Spirit" or "Zoombie" for instance with just one guitar in the band I want a bit more drive on my sound. The rest s cool. If they had the SH-14 in single coil format for a Tele I guess that would be kinda what I`m looking for.

SD offers the hotrail and the hotstack as the two pups to fit for me. I`m afraid the hotrail with a alnico V or so propably could be it. But I don`t want to get into magnet swapping.........

THX for your thoughts. Does anyone know if the hotstack is a hum canceling humbucker or a real humbucker?

Swapping the magnet of a SC humbucker is very delicate and dangerous operation. It is not recommended at all by SD.

Would you consider the Quarter Punder? It is also a very strong pickup which can easily compete with HBs and P90s. It had a very clear definition and you can wire them for coil tapping if needed.

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/telecaster/progressive/quarter_pound_f_1/

 

[brisk]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

I have toyed with hotrails, lil 59 and hotstack (all tele bridge models). Hotrails is way too hot (duh!) and hotstack is not hot enough for rock'n'roll. I found lil 59 to be ideal (great clean and warm yet articulate dirty).

If you want "balls to wall" hot, go with hotrails. Otherwise go with lil 59, which also has a nice single coil sound when split.

 

[Rainald]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

This forum ist just great cause you always get quick respond. THX to you all. I guess I will try the hotrail first and see what happens. If it changes the sound toomuch I will try the 59 next. But I`m also thinking about the quater pounder that was a good advice as well. I give you guy a feedback once I found the best solution.

THX again.

 

[astrozombie]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

I have a hot rails, while it is a very "hot" pickup, It can clean up. Granted, it wont give you the best clean sounds, but it works for me. I was thinking of trying out the Hot Stack, but I keep hearing it's not very "hot" at all. maybe the little 59 is more my thing.

 

[macki]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

Just so that we are talking about the same thing.....I have the Hot Lead Stack (STK-T2b) in my Tele. Its a great pickup, but definitely, I think, more on the twangier side though I am using 500K pots and I also split the pickup. I don't find it overly hot in "full" winding mode (that is what I wanted). When I was researching the different PUs the hot stack had a slightly higher high freq response than the little 59 or hot rail.

I can get a really good rock sound from my guitar but I think that has more to do with my amp (Marshall, 2204, '83). If I pull up the mids and the gain it sounds great for R n R.

 

[Rainald]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

Well on the german SD homepage they state that the hot stack STK T2b is ahum cancelling humbucker. I think that is what you hear quite well at the sound sample page. THe sound i sgreat but much more like a single coil than a humbucker. THe 59 might be a good option. I had a 59 in my SG and it was not hot enough for me and a bit too tame. So I`m quite afraid it will be the sam with the Lil59. ON the german page they said it has a ceramic magnet which totally confused me I rather guessed on an alnico II magnet or so. However.

THX to you all for your comments. I don`t understand why SD don`t makes a SH-14 or SH-4 humbucker in single coil format for tele. THat would be it I guess. If I remember right they do it for Strats but not for e Tele.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

The rails are always more high-fi. I actually like Duncan's hot rails although I generally prefer more organic.

A stack is a humbucker in the sense that it does have a second coil. But it's a blind coil with no magnets.

I wouldn't worry about the ceramic magnets in the single coil sized humbuckers too much. The smaller size screws things up anyway. For example, a little demon sounds surprisingly close to a real demon, although the former has ceramic and the latter has alnico.

Not liking the little '59 in your case I think you should have SD make you a little Demon with a Tele baseplate. That's a real humbucker, although a narrow one, it has good sound and if you custom order anyway you can have them put Alnico in it if you really like.

 

[Rainald]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

Wow I didn`tkonw you can make custom orders at SD? Is that true did I get that right?

 

[cakire82]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

Wow I didn`tkonw you can make custom orders at SD? Is that true did I get that right?

yes, you can believe it. It is true Just give SD custom shop a call.

 

[Rainald]

Re: Hotrail for Tele or rather hot stack lead

Wow that is cool. Well I already ordered the hotrail so I wait and see if it will be my solution. If it is not I will call SD. Cool thing.