Running Strat pickups without covers?

[Zhangliqun]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Have you actually used an uncovered Strat pickup in the neck and performed with that Strat in a live capacity, or are you just speculating as to what other people should experience?

Both uncovered Strat neck and uncovered Tele neck, yes. But you forgot uncovered humbuckers which can have that problem too, and I've played live with those also without any problems.

There's just no need to hit the string in such a way that it moves far enough to get caught under the lip like that, no matter how light a string gauge you use. If you have that problem you're digging the pick far too deep below the plane of the strings, at which point you're no longer picking the strings, you're snagging and unsnagging, which will slow you down and make your playing sound laborious. You can get the same power and volume, if not more, with less pick in there, especially if you use a thicker pick that doesn't flex. (I'm partial to the Dunlop 2mm Stubbies for whatever that's worth.)

 

[DreX]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Accidents happen. You can practice to a point where it becomes uncommon, but something can always throw you off your game. I wouldn't say that just because someone occasionally snags their high E on the bobbin that their technique is necessarily deficient. A lot of blues players like SRV would assault their strings. Maybe if SRV had uncovered pickups he would have been snagging them too.

 

[Zhangliqun]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

If you have to duck a flying beer bottle or something, hey, you might impale your eye on one of the other guitar player's tuners, never mind snagging the E. But other than that, it really shouldn't ever happen. It has never happened to me. Just withdraw that pick a couple mm and maybe not pick so close to the neck....and get ready to experience the miracle of snag-free playing.

I've been playing for almost 40 years now and I've seen a LOT of other guitar players play. At least 90% of them frankly have really crappy picking technique. About half don't know anything but a downstroke, like they never heard of alternate picking. When I teach guitar, I teach my students to hold the pick in such a way that with not much more than a minimal grip I can't knock the pick out of their hand no matter how hard I try. This means not having much of the pick showing below your thumb and index finger, only a quarter of the total length of the pick, a third at the absolute outside. More than this and I can send the pick flying across the room no matter how tight the student grips it.

If half or more of the pick is showing, you will be spending more time wearing your right hand out with a death grip trying to prevent the pick from escaping than you will just making music. (This will often be compounded by you sweating more from the tight grip and making the pick slippery, not to mention corroding the strings and forcing you to replace them sooner.)

I have never seen you play so I can make no judgement about whether you are in the 90% or the 10%. But if snags like this are a frequent problem, you might want to reassess your technique.

 

[vinta9e]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

The SSL-4 is flat (usually) so it's tempting to set it higher up. Lowering it would fix the problem, but it's never fun to compromise sound on account of practical matters.

Single coils sound better when they're not stuck right up against the strings. Well, sure, that's just my opinion of what "better" sounds like - softer but sweeter and not stuffy. I swear I read Mark Knopfler say exactly the same thing.

Compromising tone is not my thing.

 

[GilmourD]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Single coils sound better when they're not stuck right up against the strings. Well, sure, that's just my opinion of what "better" sounds like - softer but sweeter and not stuffy. I swear I read Mark Knopfler say exactly the same thing.

Compromising tone is not my thing.

One time I set up this Strat and the sweet spot on the neck pickup was so low that any lower and the screw would run out of thread to hold the pickup.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD using Tapatalk

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

You can do it, but they get beat up. I dug an OEM SSL-1 from an '80's Kramer one time. The top bobbin was very beat up, and the pickup was incredibly cruddy and rusty. Still worked, though! I might suggest lots of coil tape, and possibly some sort of home-fabricated "bobbin topper." And at that point, you might as well just use a regular cover.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Heretics...

 

[DreX]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Single coils sound better when they're not stuck right up against the strings. Well, sure, that's just my opinion of what "better" sounds like - softer but sweeter and not stuffy. I swear I read Mark Knopfler say exactly the same thing.

IMO flat poled single coils are more tolerant of being nearer or further without negative effects than are staggered single coils. I just returned staggered Irish Tours because if they weren't down close to the pickguard, they had an overly strong midgrange. My flat Lollars and shallow stagger Fender, Fralin and Duncan pickups are much more tolerant of having varied heights. They sound sufficiently balanced almost anywhere they're set to.

 

[Zhangliqun]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

IMO flat poled single coils are more tolerant of being nearer or further without negative effects than are staggered single coils. I just returned staggered Irish Tours because if they weren't down close to the pickguard, they had an overly strong midgrange. My flat Lollars and shallow stagger Fender, Fralin and Duncan pickups are much more tolerant of having varied heights. They sound sufficiently balanced almost anywhere they're set to.

Nearly all winders are with you on this (I know for sure Lollar is). And not only for the purposes you describe above but, counterintuitive as it sounds, flatpole is actually the very best for string-to-string balance. I learned this the hard way once by making a set for a guy who wanted the stagger to match exactly the radius of his Strat. It sounded reasonable and logical and I'd never tried it before so I figured I'd give it a shot. Well, on testing through the amp, the A and B strings were marginally there, the E-strings disappeared or sounded like they were in a room down the hall somewhere, and all you could hear was the D and G. I talked him into flatpole and disaster was averted.

Also, because they are flatpole (assuming flush with the cover surface), you can get the coil itself closer to the strings without worrying about Strat-itis, so they can generate a beefier signal.

 

[DreX]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Well, on testing through the amp, the A and B strings were marginally there, the E-strings disappeared or sounded like they were in a room down the hall somewhere, and all you could hear was the D and G.

I'm glad it's not just me. Lollar talks customers out of staggered with the copy on his site and by charging extra for staggered, but BNP doesn't show preference, so I got staggered thinking it wasn't make or break, but it was break. The new Texas Specials are tall stagger, my 90's models where shallow, so I can understand why people say you have to lower them if they have the modern Texas Specials. It is sad that flat pole doesn't have that vintage correct look, that's where the shallow stagger really comes through.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Nearly all winders are with you on this (I know for sure Lollar is). And not only for the purposes you describe above but, counterintuitive as it sounds, flatpole is actually the very best for string-to-string balance. I learned this the hard way once by making a set for a guy who wanted the stagger to match exactly the radius of his Strat. It sounded reasonable and logical and I'd never tried it before so I figured I'd give it a shot. Well, on testing through the amp, the A and B strings were marginally there, the E-strings disappeared or sounded like they were in a room down the hall somewhere, and all you could hear was the D and G. I talked him into flatpole and disaster was averted.

Also, because they are flatpole (assuming flush with the cover surface), you can get the coil itself closer to the strings without worrying about Strat-itis, so they can generate a beefier signal.

The magnetic field of the rods is probably very wide, so the center pieces have 5 or maybe all 6 magnets working for them.

 

[Rockstar216]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

If your strings are constantly getting caught under the lip of any pickup hum or single then you just have $hitty technique. Would I run without cover most likely not because I wouldn't want to risk killing a coil on accident when a cheap cover could have avoided it.

 

[Zhangliqun]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

The magnetic field of the rods is probably very wide, so the center pieces have 5 or maybe all 6 magnets working for them.

They're not very wide at all or all you would even need is just the two rods in the middle and us winders could save money on the other four. And you certainly wouldn't have the problem with the radius described above. Haven't you noticed some drop-out on neck pickups when you do string bends that put the string between the rods? The magnetic field of a little .187" rod magnet is not very wide at all, at least not the full strength part of it.

 

[DreX]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

The magnetic field of the rods is probably very wide, so the center pieces have 5 or maybe all 6 magnets working for them.

Technically the magnetic field extends to infinity, but the range at which they're able to produce an audible inductance in the coil is relatively very small.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

I think you guys understimate how complex the field gets with 6 rod magnets in a row.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

If your strings are constantly getting caught under the lip of any pickup hum or single then you just have $hitty technique.

Oh, give me a break.

 

[DreX]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

I actually made a mistake, I never got it caught under the bobbin on the SSL-4. It was actually on the bobbin of the old style Lil '59 before they went to the full enclosure style. I took a look at my SSL-4 Strat, and it's actually almost impossible to get the high E to the end of the bobbin without some serious effort.

 

[LtKojak]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

Did anyone ever kill a Strat pickup by running without covers?

I had a string stuck under it a couple times but no coil damage.

WHY would anybody use strat p'ups without a cover?

What's the point in doing that?

Well...?

 

[Zombiwoof]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

When Bruce Springsteen first hit the national scene, he was using 1/4 Pounders in his main Tele, and I remember reading that he had them potted in Epoxy because he kept shorting out the coils with sweat and dirt (he sweated a lot during those 3-hour shows). So, if you use uncovered Strat pickups I would at least seal up the windings with tape or pot them well to keep the coils from shorting, as the wire is basically exposed when uncovered. As someone else said, there is a reason that Strat pickups have covers, and it's not just to keep from catching strings under the bobbins.

Al

 

[uOpt]

Re: Running Strat pickups without covers?

WHY would anybody use strat p'ups without a cover?

What's the point in doing that?

Well...?

It looks RAWk.

Too lazy to order black covers, which would require I measure the pole distance first.