JB in a fender Sixty Six?

K

Killertofu

New member
hi everybody.

So, I recently picked up my favorite thing fender has ever made. It's called a sixty six. But alas, it is not perfect. I replaced the vintage string trees and saddles with modern comfortable low friction variants. The humbucker has plenty of grit but I'm suspecting its EQ is leaning more towards the higher end. It sounds kinda thin. I need something to punch through the mix. It has a pretty steep cutoff when I roll the volume back and lots of feedback at full trot with my big muff (op amp) and tubescreamer stacked. My hotrails in the tele never had that problem, nor do any of the other pickups, so I'm thinking of swapping it out in favor of a JB but I'm open to other suggestions.

here's the new girl and the old tele (98 mim, I refinished it last summer, refretted it, and it has a hotrails in the bridge with a quarter pounder in the neck).
axes.jpg

I'm open to pedal suggestions as well but I'm suspecting the humbucker at the moment. I like its sound generally but there's just something about it I can't quite put my finger on.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Welcome to the forum!

If you want a higher output pickup there, but EQ'd lower, I am not sure the JB is the best choice. You might look at the Black Winter and the Custom Custom, both shave off that high end, yet still are higher output.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

I remember reading on here that the closest thing to the Hot Rails in a full sized humbucker version is the Invader. It may be worth a shot for you.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

I've never seen an offset strat before. Looks cool. If that's a low wind hum in there, a JB will fill things out. I like it.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

If you keep the (presumably) 250K pots, I'd go with the JB.

How do you like the singlecoils?
And how do you like the guitar in general?
Pretty interested, since I love the 70's P-Bass look (kind of disappointed it doesn't have the block inlays though).
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

I second the Black Winter suggestion. It's marketed towards metal heads, but it can do just about anything you throw at it. Think of it as if the Distortion went back to highschool to finish it's GED.

My question about the Sixty Six is do the neck and middle single coils sound like Tele pickups or is it just aesthetics?
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Hey guys thanks for the advice. I took some readings through a guitar cable with the multimeter and there is definitely something up with the humbucker fender is using in the bridge.
I would expect the bridge to be higher resistance than the others but its actually LOWER than the neck pickup and all of them are waaaaay lower than the setup in my tele.


7.97 - neck
8.15 - middle
7.64 - bridge

could that be why when I run high gain my bridge pickup feeds back and my single coils don't?

Telecaster
11.09 - Quarter pounder neck 11.8K
14.21 - Hot Rails bridge16K

I know going through the electronics and cable will change things a bit, i just wanted some kind of metric for what I know works (and the hotrails doesn't feedback ever, it just gives and gives).

and here's another twist for ya, I've grown to appreciate the warmth and fullness of these pickups so I don't necessarily need something that sounds like a hotrails.

I was thinking of keeping the bridge pickup but seeing this it makes sense that it wouldn't be great for really high gain.

I'm leaning towards the 59/Custom Hybrid Trembucker at the moment in the hopes that it would be near the existing tele pickups in the sixty six at 11.7K

thoughts?
 
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Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Low winds are good for high gain. But if you want to fill out the sound, you have to go higher output.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

The 59/Custom Hybrid is more of a true medium. It has 1 coil from a high output pickup, and 1 from a vintage output pickup.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

An another vote for the Custom Custom. If treble is a beast, CC is the leash. It keeps things tamed without pulling out the teeth. It made a perfect match with an unrealistically trebly guitar of mine.

JB is a good match with a balanced sounding guitar in my experience. I never met a 66 but it works pretty nice (= bloodshed, mayhem and mass destruction) in my basswood '51 and a couple of more guitars that has a balanced tone like alder & mahogany (not too trebly and not too bassy).

The Invaders I have has drastically less high response than the JB (similar to the CC) and much bigger punch, on the paper working nicely in bright guitars. At the end of the day it could not save the trebly guitar of mine that the CC could.

I admit that I have no experience with Black Winters. Blackouts yes, Nazgul - Sentient yes but BW has avoided my radar so far.
 
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Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Clint 55 said:
I've never seen an offset strat before
Click to expand...

You still haven't seen one, buddy. That's no offset Strat body.

That is a Jazz Bass body shape, which makes the Sixty Six even crazier than it already is.
Now you can't unsee it!
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

That guitar would look way better with a single coil sized pickup in the bridge position. How about a hot stacked Tele neck pickup or a Quarter Pound Tele neck pickup there?

The new guard required would also give you a chance to convert to a single piece guard/control plate, which would also make the thing look a lot better IMO.

It also sounds like you would prefer a linear taper volume pot.
 
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Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Diego said:
You still haven't seen one, buddy. That's no offset Strat body.

That is a Jazz Bass body shape, which makes the Sixty Six even crazier than it already is.
Now you can't unsee it!
Click to expand...

Wowee!
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

ItsaBass said:
That guitar would look way better with a single coil sized pickup in the bridge position. How about a hot stacked Tele neck pickup or a Quarter Pound Tele neck pickup there?

The new guard required would also give you a chance to convert to a single piece guard/control plate, which would also make the thing look a lot better IMO.

It also sounds like you would prefer a linear taper volume pot.
Click to expand...

I was looking at performer strats until I played this one and it just has the mojo. I love the way it looks and prefer the HSS configuration. I hope fender brings it into the regular lineup, it's the most comfortable guitar I've ever played and the controls are in the proper place instead of right under the bridge pup.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

I'd be interested in trying that shape, but I don't like where the controls are.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Mincer said:
I'd be interested in trying that shape, but I don't like where the controls are.
Click to expand...

The controls are the primary selling point for me. I hate the location of strat volume knobs.

Anyhow guys, a little update on the journey, I'm currently mulling over the Jason Becker Perpetual Burn trembucker for now.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

I frankly don't see a JB ever not working in anything Fender.

They're amazing in Strats, easily my favorite guitar to drop a JB in. They might be a bit too pokey in some Telecasters I imagine, since their natural tone is a bit more penetrating than a Strat. I'd give it a shot, everyone needs a JB in their life at one point or another.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

I wonder if that bridge humbucker might be factory wired in parallel, to give it a more single-coil character? That would make it's "true" DCR closer to 15k.

Killertofu said:
Anyhow guys, a little update on the journey, I'm currently mulling over the Jason Becker Perpetual Burn trembucker for now.
Click to expand...

I've recently acquired one. Killer pup. One of my favorite Duncans.
 
Re: JB in a fender Sixty Six?

Got the perpetual burn trembucker in and GUYS, lemme tell ya, this thing is exactly what I've been wanting. the output pairs perfectly with my existing tele pups and mixing it with the middle pickup gives it more low end without changing its character too much.
this sucker is as clear as crystal. all I can think to describe it as is smooth. its just smooth ALL over the place but it has grit and handles high gain extremely well.I like to stack my big muff op amp and tubescreamer or my dark matter with the tubescreamer and the stock hb would just squeel anytime I wasn't playing. NOT the case with this thing. I haven't had a lot of time with it yet but I'm very happy so far.

jbeck.jpg
 
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