Must try/all time pickups?

[Artie]

Must try? The ones that come with a guitar lol
Serious though some people rip pickups put befor they even give them a chance. Thinking that( insert fav winder here) is "superior". To me any pickup that functions correctly is a "good" pivkup...in it's correct application backed by the right amp and for the right player and style.
​style.
My next musy try....is a screw driver.
Then after giving a thorough try and tweaking. Then decide what you want to change.

I agree about 99.9 %. That .1 % goes to a Squier Tele I bought. The bridge was the epitome of "ice-pick" and the neck was dull as a shop rag. Not a big deal since it was getting Duncan's anyway, but in stock form, it was unlistenable.

 

[Chistopher]

Just put in an order for a new set of Boot Strap Golden Ale Strat pickups. Closest I can describe it is a slightly underwound SD Alnico II in the neck and middle and a Twangbanger in the bridge. All for $60 with a 7 week lead time

 

[jeremy]

i ran aps2 neck and middle with a twangbanger bridge for a long time in one of my main strats. was a killer set, hope yours is too

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I also like the Gibson 500T

I also think the Gibson 500T is an underrated pickup. It's a killer killer pickup.

 

[EmiAba]

The thing that starter it all was a 59n. In the right guitar, it’s pretty hard to beat. But I prefer to list my fav pickups paired with the guitar they are in. I suppose in different woods they would not give me the same impressions.
1. PGn in a les paul
2. JB in an alder strat
3. Custom my all time bridge pickup in a les paul
4 super Distortion in a bright wood
5 hydrid in a pra custom 24
6 black winter in swamp ash body
7. emg 81/85 at 18V in a mahogany body
8. 500t in almost everything

things I’d like to try at the moment aldridge set

 

[Rex_Rocker]

things I’d like to try at the moment aldridge set

TBH, I was slightly disappointed on the Aldrich. Like, not hugely. Not to point I don't think anyone should try it. But I suppose I had really high expectations for it, and I guess there's the chance I might have gotten a bad one too.

But if you're looking at the Aldrich, I recommend you consider the SSH+ as well.

 

[EmiAba]

TBH, I was slightly disappointed on the Aldrich. Like, not hugely. Not to point I don't think anyone should try it. But I suppose I had really high expectations for it, and I guess there's the chance I might have gotten a bad one too.

But if you're looking at the Aldrich, I recommend you consider the SSH+ as well.

I like Doug’s tone, expecially his whitesnake years . I was told SSH+ is different from the aldridge bridge. Did you try them both? How they differ? What do you dislike of the Aldridge?

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I like Doug’s tone, expecially his whitesnake years . I was told SSH+ is different from the aldridge bridge. Did you try them both? How they differ? What do you dislike of the Aldridge?

TBH, it's just a matter of not getting what I was expecting.

If I buy a 17K pickup, I expect something hot and beefy, right? It wasn't. The EQ was nice. It's kinda like a clearer JB with a bit more throatiness down low. But the output really caught me off guard. Mine was towards the lower spectrum of medium output. It hardly punched at all.

I replaced it with an SSH+, which the Aldrich is supposed to be based on, just 10% overwound, and the SSH+ had a cleaner/clearer/more open EQ, while at the same time having the power you'd expect from a 16K pickup. I suspect something might have been wrong with my Aldrich because I even emailed Suhr, and they told me the Aldrich is supposed to be hotter than the SSH+. But mine wasn't. Honestly, though, I liked the EQ voicing of the SSH+ better, so I just stuck with it. For me, louder, hotter, yet cleaner and clearer is a no-brainer. And it's not like the Aldrich was particularly uncompressed-sounding either. I mean, it's still a 17K pickup, after all.

I sound like I hate it, though. I didn't. If you like the JB, the DiMarzio AT-1, and that kind of family of pickups, you might like it. I honestly kinda did, just not as much as the SSH+ or the JB, even.

 

[EmiAba]

TBH, it's just a matter of not getting what I was expecting.

If I buy a 17K pickup, I expect something hot and beefy, right? It wasn't. The EQ was nice. It's kinda like a clearer JB with a bit more throatiness down low. But the output really caught me off guard. Mine was towards the lower spectrum of medium output. It hardly punched at all.

I replaced it with an SSH+, which the Aldrich is supposed to be based on, just 10% overwound, and the SSH+ had a cleaner/clearer/more open EQ, while at the same time having the power you'd expect from a 16K pickup. I suspect something might have been wrong with my Aldrich because I even emailed Suhr, and they told me the Aldrich is supposed to be hotter than the SSH+. But mine wasn't. Honestly, though, I liked the EQ voicing of the SSH+ better, so I just stuck with it. For me, louder, hotter, yet cleaner and clearer is a no-brainer. And it's not like the Aldrich was particularly uncompressed-sounding either. I mean, it's still a 17K pickup, after all.

I sound like I hate it, though. I didn't. If you like the JB, the DiMarzio AT-1, and that kind of family of pickups, you might like it. I honestly kinda did, just not as much as the SSH+ or the JB, even.

Thanks for your reply. Have you tried to remove the tape and check the ground connecting the coil and baseplate? I hard a similar issue with a 500t. I wanted to swap the main magnet with an A8 and doing that I damaged the ground. Once installed the pickup sounded like your Aldridge.

 

[Seashore]

Thanks for your reply. Have you tried to remove the tape and check the ground connecting the coil and baseplate? I hard a similar issue with a 500t. I wanted to swap the main magnet with an A8 and doing that I damaged the ground. Once installed the pickup sounded like your Aldridge.

I'm curious, did you find a double thick A8 somewhere or did you use a single thickness with a spacer underneath? I have a single A8 that I haven't yet found a home for.

 

[Rex_Rocker]

Thanks for your reply. Have you tried to remove the tape and check the ground connecting the coil and baseplate? I hard a similar issue with a 500t. I wanted to swap the main magnet with an A8 and doing that I damaged the ground. Once installed the pickup sounded like your Aldridge.

I did not! I sold it now, but that might have been worth a try.

 

[EmiAba]

I'm curious, did you find a double thick A8 somewhere or did you use a single thickness with a spacer underneath? I have a single A8 that I haven't yet found a home for.

A regular A8 with a plastic spacer. Cermag ltd is where I buy magnets and if you need a double thick A8 I bet they have it

 

[alex1fly]

I put a Super Distortion in my new V last week. Haven't used it at rehearsal yet, but at home I'll just say that its the most immediately impressed I've been with a pickup, ever. Every note is huge and the tone is just classic.

 

[Archer250]

IMO no such one pickup exists

But as for "archetypes", one should try a basic 5-6k Formvar strat pickup, a grey bobbin style strat, a tele bridge pickup, a P90, a PAF style humbucker, a JB-style humbucker (countless of clones), and a Super D/Custom style pickup that has a moderate wind, driven by a strong magnet.

 

[freefrog]

For an old fart like me, "must try all time" pickups are those used to play the soundtrack of my youth - hence my tropism for real vintage pickups.

The older I am, the more I even lean toward outdated designs... got much pleasure these last years with single coils like DeArmond Silver Foil, lipsticks, Tri-Sonic or the complicated and cumbersome Dyna'Sonic - which is in fact a lot more versatile than most players would think. I bet I will end with a real Charlie Christian SC, whose giant perpendicular magnets can fit ony in a hollow body guitar.

All that being said, I've more recent and typical Duncan / DiMarzio / Bill Lawrence pickups that I'd also consider as "to try", along with a collection of boutique products - if it wasn't the case, I wouldn't have way too much gear at home. ;-)

 

[zionstrat]

Here's two off the beaten path...

RailHammer Hyper Vintage..
Imagine how a pearly gates adds some character to PAFs. Now imagine a lot more character in different directions..

This is a really nice tweak on a standard PAF. It has rails on the bass and big fat poles on the treble.. as a result the bass is tighter than standard PAF and it has humongous slugs on the treble side which gives more bloom and warmth in the high end.. I'm convinced this would be a very popular pickup if it didn't look unusual.

It's standard on a number of Reverends

Vox coaxe
It's a shame these pups were never sold individually.. All the ones I've collected have come from people who replaced them from vox guitars without understanding what they had.

It's a really unusual design that gets you 2 distinct humbucking tones. A p90-ish tone and a mini humbucker tone.

The way it works is it has a center coil that is strat-like with a second coil wound around the center. The second coil is very low impedance so it retains a sparkling kind of high-end with a mini humbucker footprint.

It's also tapped and the tapped tone is very p90-ish and the untapped is very much like a mini humbucker..

I like both of these guitars so much that I've built guitars around them for customers.

 

[jeremy]

i have a set of the hyper vintage, and i like em a lot. im such an a2 bucker junkie, that i pulled them to swap the magnets but havent put em back in yet. ill get around to it one of these months

 

[zionstrat]

i have a set of the hyper vintage, and i like em a lot. im such an a2 bucker junkie, that i pulled them to swap the magnets but havent put em back in yet. ill get around to it one of these months

Crazy I'd never thought of that mod! Those highs are going to get really smooth. Wondering if the bottom might get a bit flabby or maybe the rails give you lots of wiggle room.

If you think about it, PM me on the outcome.

 

[jeremy]

yeah, im curious how itll turn out. we shall see, eventually

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I think the real deal must try pickup that we all should experience, but more than likely won't, would be one of the good original PAF's from the 50's-60's. I bet those sound killer.