My Schecter PT - What Next?

[Rich_S]

The Guitar: Alder Schecter PT body, Fender MIM maple Tele neck. 6-saddle Tele-style bridge for humbucker. Trem-spaced ceramic Duncan Custom bridge, 59n neck. Wired with a coil split )which I use a lot) on the Custom, two volume controls, no tone.

The Rig: My #1 is a Tele with vintage-voiced single coils. I have a pedalboard and a Marshall 18 Watter clone with two knobs: volume and tone. My rig is dialed in to give me a great sound with the Tele.

The Sound: My "thing" is sort of Brit-pop jangle: The Police, The Pretenders, Johnny Marr. The PT is for when I need some humbucker oomph - in my book, "good" humbucker tones come from people like Jimmy Page, Paul Kossoff, Rick Neilsen, Neil Geraldo (early Benetar with the original B.C. Rich's), and Pete Townsend. I'm not looking for Eddie or Zack or 80's shred or hairmetal.

The History: When I built this guitar, I put in a 59b. Sounded good, but weak. Its split coil was useless. I ignored the guys who told me to try a Custom, and put in a CC (figuring erroneously that the maple neck made this a "bright guitar"). I HATED the CC - it was muffled mush. One magnet swap later, I had the Custom that's there today. (I should add here that I love the 59n - that's staying.)

The Problem: With my rig dialed in for the Tele, the PT is just lifeless. Very honky midrange that just gets buried in the mix. Lows sound okay. The high E and B strings don't ring clearly. If I max the tone on the amp, it brings out the E and B so I can hear them, but the mids are still very honky and harsh. I'm working up the tunes for the big reunion of my old 80's frat-party band. I have the Tele dialed in and I'm loving it, but the PT is pretty bad. When I practice along with the original recordings, my guitar just gets buried.

We're doing a couple of Benetar songs - "Promises in the Dark" and "Precious Time". A lot of Neil Geraldo's parts are 2-note barre chords on the bottom, and then he fancies them up with those jangly chorused arpeggios on the high strings. It's that kind of stuff where I'm having the most trouble - the jangle's missing.

Another example (though we're not actually going to play this one at the reunion) is Rush's "The Spirit of Radio". You know... the big chords with the open B and E on top. It's supposed to be roar & jangle, but I have neither. It's all lumped together in a big BLAAAAT.

Leads don't cut - the sound is all mid-hump, like a stock SD-1. Sounds OK on its own, but has no clarity in a band context.

Well, this has gone on long enough. What's next, guys? What do you recommend and why? Different magnet in my existing Custom, or a different pickup entirely? Help!

 

[saladin]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

Try an A5 mag in the Custom. The Custom5 works well in a Tele. I've tried all the Custom family pickups in mine and the C5 was clearly the best. You'll get your "jangle' back.

 

[butnut]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

With the Alder bod, Maple neck, ya got my PT style Tele beat in the wood dept...mine is the Fender all Mahogany set neck (rosewood), pretty dark woods...with the Custom 5 SH14 bridge, I got the same issues....the Custom ceramic was strongly suggested. Gonna put it in tonight and see if I can get this Tele to cut the mustard. Great musical tastes, very similar to mine. The coil split sounds good, but the volume really drops. The Ceramic won't allow me to coil split, but I'll be happy if it rocks.

 

[Rich_S]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

Sunday afternoon bump.

 

[alex1fly]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

You can't expect your rig to sound stellar with both guitars when dialed in to your #1 guitar's best settings. Maybe swapping magnets or pickups will get you what you want, but I doubt it. I think your best bet is to figure out the best possible settings for your PT, then mimic it somehow by running your PT into a separate pedal, like an EQ. In my experience, magnets and pickups make a LOT less difference in a live situation than EQ, and the Custom is supposed to be rather lively and organic for a ceramic pickup when you work the guitar knobs.

Can you just do a little cable rearranging before cranking up your PT, to run it into its own EQ pedal? If you can deal with that on stage, or find some way to rig up a separate pedal for the PT, I think you'll be very pleased.

 

[seymourized]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

To tell you the truth, its gonna be very difficult to get an amazing sound from you PT if your amp's set to your tele tone. I have 2 teles, both with ash bodies, one with SC"s and one with HB's. I have to re-tweak stuff everytime I switch between those 2 guitars. So why dont you just change the amp settings? A little twist on the tone knob's probably all you need.

 

[butnut]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

In a club situation, ya need something that's gonna work without much more than swapping a guitar as quick as possible. When I break a string , I just have to grab the 2nd guitar and go...no time to fiddle with knobs, the band's not gonna wait. I was shocked the first time I swapped the Tele (broke a string) and how day and night the tone was. I'm not expecting my MIK Tele to sound as good as my Gibby, but it needs to fill my needs as I'm very picky about my tone. Swapped in the Custom....so far, I like it. It was late so I played at 1/2 live volume, I could hear that it was much clearer, yet had a soild crunch, cleans were nice too, I did hit a few full chords at volume and WOW, huge balls with tons of crunch and that clarity I was seeking. I'll crank it up and A/B it with the LP later today.

 

[Rich_S]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

For me, the purpose of having two guitars is so I can have two different sounds. I don't want them to sound the same. What I want is, based around the tonal center of "my rig", a single-coil sound (got it) and a fatter, humbucking sound. (In the case of a broken string or other malfunction, they can substitute for each other to a degree - that's one reason I use a coil split switch on the PT - but that's not the main point here.)

I don't mind making minor tweaks, but my problem now is that my "humbucker sound" is lacking, but even with tweaks. I'm not trying to make the PT sound like the Tele, I'm trying to make its sound better, through the rig I already have.

 

[WhoFan]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

hey Rich... you can try tweeking with PU's but my gut is saying the body wood itself may be the real issue and not the PU's...

another weird thing is a tele bridge cut for a humbucker always sounds much brighter to me because the humbucker in those is mounted pretty close to the bridge... on my strats i mount the humbucker closer to the neck then most people would on a non-floyd axe... on guitars with Floyds they moved the bridge PU farther away from the bridge that resulted in a thicker mid and bass responce... so even on my strats without floyds the bridge humbucker is moved forward... slightly farther forward then a modern American Fat Strat Fender HSS pickguard...

so i find it odd that on your PT that you are not getting any jangle......

 

[Rich_S]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

Well, this guitar sounds pretty good unplugged, better than my Nashville, in fact.

Also, PTs are known to sound great. My original '83 was quite similsr in construction - alder body, fat maple neck, 6-saddle HB Tele bridge. It sounded great. Details on what those pickups actually were are scarce.

My take-away from all this is that this guitar can sound good, but not with the Custom. Given where it is now, and where I want it to be, what pickups should I consider?

 

[alex1fly]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

In a club situation, ya need something that's gonna work without much more than swapping a guitar as quick as possible.

precisely why I think a separate EQ pedal optimized for the PT's best tone is the cleanest, quickest way to make it all work. A tap or two with your foot and you're good to go (PT EQ on, tele EQ off if you have one for it). Easy.

 

[butnut]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

Good point, good idea. I used to play a Strat and LP, when I was the only guitarist. In my band, the other guitarist play the Strat and Tele to cover that jangle as well as cutting lead work. My end is the heavy mid crunch and neck cleans if needed, works great and we get a big 2 guitar sound mix. So my 2 guitars need to hold that end down, I can see Rich needing 2 different animals, I'd have to say, the eq pedal may solve the issue as you can dial in your preferred tone. I used to use the 10 band eq, got my settings, step on the eq and it made the tone huge, left it on all the time.

 

[viewaskew2k5]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

your all looking at this at the wrong way!! It's a tele! Get a Phat cat N, stuff it in the bridge with an a3 and a5 mags...and for a little magic get some copper string saddles

 

[tone4days]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

i hesitate to sound so obvious, but isnt a JB (maybe with 250K pot - but probablynot if you want to max jangle) the defacto bridge pup for a tele gib?

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

Fat twang in a humbucker slot?

You, my friend, need a Muy Grande humbucker in there.

 

[jeremy]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

500k controls all around on the pt?
so the 59n is ok thru your amp, its just the bridge sounds consipated and choked right?

 

[Rich_S]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

Yes - two 500K volume controls.

Consipated and choked? Maybe. Honky and lacking clarity, for sure.

BTW, it does not sound like there's anything wrong with the pickup or wiring - just that this pickup is wrong for this guitar/application.

 

[Rich_S]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

One Alnico 5 magnet, and the problem's fixed.

The difference it made was actually less than I expected, but it was enough to bring out the high end. It's not super jangly (but I have a real Tele for that). What it IS, is well-balanced. The skinny strings ring out better.

I now have a humbucker guitar that works with my rig.

BTW, it's wired with 2 volume pots, both push/pull: coil split on the bridge, and a phase switch. I really like both middle-position sounds; they're not all-the-time sounds, but they're both interesting & useful.

I still need to do some pickup-height tweaking, but we'll call the operation a success.

 

[super rad stuff]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

One Alnico 5 magnet, and the problem's fixed.

The difference it made was actually less than I expected, but it was enough to bring out the high end. It's not super jangly (but I have a real Tele for that). What it IS, is well-balanced. The skinny strings ring out better.

I now have a humbucker guitar that works with my rig.

BTW, it's wired with 2 volume pots, both push/pull: coil split on the bridge, and a phase switch. I really like both middle-position sounds; they're not all-the-time sounds, but they're both interesting & useful.

I still need to do some pickup-height tweaking, but we'll call the operation a success.

cool, seems like you've got your guitar all worked out btw rich have you tried coil swap out?

 

[Rich_S]

Re: My Schecter PT - What Next?

btw rich have you tried coil swap out?

No.