Lace Sensors - Making Sense

[Silence Kid]

So I like Lace sensors- At least I was pretty fond of a Strat Plus Deluxe I played (Red/Silver/Blue IIRC.) Want to grab a set for a Strat again, and not really certain whether it actually matters if I pick up an Emerald neck instead of a Gold, or a Burgundy bridge vs. Light Blue etc.

Does anyone have any first-hand experience with any of these (compared to each other, preferably?) I'm fine with taking a wild guess at what I'd want, but does anyone have any feedback from specific examples in the lineup?

By DC, to be annoying. Light Blue has a weird inductance:

[table="width: 400, class: grid"]
[tr]
[td]Model[/td]
[td]DC[/td]
[td]Pk Fq[/td]
[td]Ind[/td]
[td]"Heat"[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Emerald[/td]
[td]5.7[/td]
[td]3450[/td]
[td]2.7[/td]
[td]6.6[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Gold[/td]
[td]5.8[/td]
[td]3600[/td]
[td]2.4[/td]
[td]6.6[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Hot Gold Neck[/td]
[td]6.0[/td]
[td]3600[/td]
[td]2.2[/td]
[td]6.4[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Silver[/td]
[td]7.1[/td]
[td]3000[/td]
[td]3.38[/td]
[td]6.8[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Light Blue[/td]
[td]8.0[/td]
[td]2894[/td]
[td]8.0[/td]
[td]7.2[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Burgundy[/td]
[td]8.9[/td]
[td]2700[/td]
[td]4.44[/td]
[td]7.6[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Purple[/td]
[td]10.5[/td]
[td]2400[/td]
[td]5.8[/td]
[td]8.2[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Blue[/td]
[td]12.8[/td]
[td]2100[/td]
[td]6.58[/td]
[td]9.2[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Hot Gold Bridge[/td]
[td]13.2[/td]
[td]2510[/td]
[td]6.1[/td]
[td]7.5[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Red[/td]
[td]14.5[/td]
[td]1850[/td]
[td]8.12[/td]
[td]10[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]

 

[Blille]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

Just played golds for your classic bell like tone.

 

[eclecticsynergy]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

AFAIK many of them were designed to sound like humbuckers, Gold being the one I know to be an exception - they're pretty Stratlike. I also have a Chromedome, which according to Lace is modeled after the Golds but a little hotter. It too is quite Stratlike in character.

EDIT: Okay, I guess the silver, emerald & burgundy are all singlecoil-ish, and the purple is P90-ish. Red, blue & light blue are the humbucker-inspired ones. Didn't know that. And I definitely can't offer an opinion how different they are from one another.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

You don't see them in stock guitars as much as you used to. I didn't mind the late 80s Fenders with them, and they certainly have their own sound. I wonder if the sound fell out of favor, or if the company isn't as big as it used to be.

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

The Emerald/Silver/Purple (advertised as the "rainbow set") combo is pretty good and covers a lot of bases. I used it in a Strat of mine with a slightly modified Clapton wiring and I could do just about anything with it.

 

[Blille]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

As a reference Corgan used the Blue, Silver, Red set for a few years.

 

[idsnowdog]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

Lace sensors sound good clean but distorted they are less spectacular. They have a resonant peak in the the 1k + range where most single coils and humbuckers are between 2-4k. Having a low resonant peak like that makes them sort of nasal sounding when distorted.

 

[Silence Kid]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

In my experience the Red/Silver/Blue combo had more muted highs/presence & twang vs. standard singles- so saying they're more modeled after humbuckers doesn't sound inaccurate but I've not had a chance to try Golds. Corgan is what I think when Lace comes to mind.

Lace makes a lot of products apart from sensors (including whole guitars) - Alumitones/Holy Grails etc. I hear about those with more frequency than sensors of late.

 

[dystrust]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

As a reference Corgan used the Blue, Silver, Red set for a few years.

I helped longcat build a Strat with the Blue / Silver / Red combo, and it definitely does the Mellon Collie sound when plugged into something Marshall-y with a good dose of gain. In terms of output it's pretty similar to the Cool / Vintage / Hot Rails setup, but Laces have their own distinct sound.

You don't see them in stock guitars as much as you used to. I didn't mind the late 80s Fenders with them, and they certainly have their own sound. I wonder if the sound fell out of favor, or if the company isn't as big as it used to be.

They tend to sound a bit processed by default IME, and I believe they were designed with the rack systems of the late 80s in mind. With that type of rig being largely out of favor these days, there are simply better sounding options available. If you're a fan of the Lace Sensor sound, I haven't really heard anything else that sounds the same.

 

[Juanhanglo]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

I had the red/silver/blue set in a stratplus deluxe. I really liked them all at the time. I sold it to build my partscaster, which blows it out of the water.
my partscaster has a set of hemibuckers with a hot gold sensor.

the hot gold is very similar to a regular strat pickup. very clear. works much better than a regular single coil under heavy gain.

loved the red. to me, it was the perfect balance between single coil and humbucker.
silver was only in the middle position, so I didn't get to compare it to many others.
blue was a bit muddy, but knowing what i know now, and with my new rig, i am sure it would sound fine.

hemibuckers are ok, but its times for a change.

 

[Chistopher]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

Blue was a bit muddy, but knowing what i know now, and with my new rig, i am sure it would sound fine.

They actually released a Light Blue version to combat this. It's nearly the same thing but with a bit less boom to it.

 

[T-Bone-BBQ]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

I have a Lace Gold and Silver in this guitar. It had a Lace Red/Blue Dually humbucker in it, but I didn't like that and replaced it with a GFS VEH humbucker. The Gold sounds great in the neck for clean and even up to heavy blues. The Silver is ok, but I never seem to use the middle pickup on a Strat much.

 

[stevie_bees]

Re: Lace Sensors - Making Sense

I had the Blue Fire set in my Legacy for a while (burgundy/silver/light blue), which is a cool versatile set. Just didn’t click with me in that guitar. They were paired with a Clapton mid-boost circuit, but I swapped them out for SD STK-S7/4/4s, which I liked better. Ultimately I got tired of the mid-boost and went back to my Antiquity Surfers.


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