Same SH1N pickup in a Flying V and an Explorer: an experiment.

[freefrog]

Got an occasion to try the same (vintage) SH1N in two guitars of the models mentioned in the tittle.

As expected (by me at least), the tones were not similar at all.

The Flying V has its pickups swich near its pots and jack plug. There's very little "stray capacitance" there.

An Explorer has all this wiring coming back and forth between the pots and switch located in the lower bout of the body. That's 90cm (36') of inner wire added, minimum... With braided shielded wire, it adds something like 240pF of stray capacitance. As if the guitar had 2m of average guitar cable in its belly. Just like a Les Paul.

Consequence: the resonant peak of a same pickup measured from the jack plug is clearly higher pitched with a Flying V than with a normally wired Explorer. So the pickup sounds brighter in the V.

Let's add to this the big chunk of wood that an Explorer has behind its bridge and stop bar... How wouldn't it promote lower frequencies?

Result when the same vintage SH1N is played from unfretted strings to 12th fret, in chords, through the same cable, direct to the board (and set at the same height, of course)...



Red= Flying V.

Blue = Explorer.

It's possible to obtain the same kind of low mid focus and narrowed frequency response from the same Flying V: it just requires... a woofy sounding Gibson 496R. ;-)


NOTES:

-The two guitars had their respective 500k pots (wired in the same way, 50's wiring style) and I had added a cover on the SH1N before to put it in the Explorer. It increases Foucault currents and contributes to the rolled off high frequencies. But I'm pretty sure that most of this difference in the treble range is actually due to the inner wiring.

-Other guitars of the same models might give different sonic profiles, of course. Each chunk of wood is unique and so is therefore the tonal signature of each guitar. But I still agree with myself about what I'm trying to say and that I'll sum up in this awfully simplistic way:
More resonant material = more bass and mids.
More inner wire = more parasitic capacitance = less extended high frequencies.

Using some multi-conductors Mogami cable might be a good idea for those who want more treble in such situations (knowing that our lab meter has measured braided shielded wire @ 268pF per meter VS 87pF for Mogami multi-wire cables).



FWIW - very schematic report of a guitar geek tech crisis on a Sunday morning.

 

[80's_Thrash_Metal]

Very cool info. Thank you for compiling and sharing.

 

[ICTGoober]

Nice to see this kind of information quantified. It's food for thought, to be sure.

 

[beaubrummels]

So wood and wire matters. Who knew?

 

[skelt101]

So, if the selector switch on the Explorer was moved closer to the volume and output jack, it should sound more like the Flying V (but not identical)?

 

[GuitarStv]

Wow, that's a huge difference between the two guitars!

 

[freefrog]

So, if the selector switch on the Explorer was moved closer to the volume and output jack, it should sound more like the Flying V (but not identical)?

The low mids bump wouldn't change since it's due to the bassy "vibrating modes" of the big body... but the treble roll off would be noticeably higher pitched if the switch was close to the pots, since inner wiring and its parasitic capacitance would be absent. So the treble content of the Explorer would be extended and yes, it should be close to the response of the V...

For the record, I share below is a pic with three series of "resonant peaks" measured when the pickups of the aforementioned Explorer and V were electrically excited.


​

The highest pitched resonance, @ 3500hz (green and white lines) shows the response of the two coils in the neck pickup of the V.
The red line and other (black, green, pink) peaks centered @ 2500hz are those of the same pickup and its bridge counterpart in the Explorer... IOW, the inner wiring of this guitar alone causes a difference of 1000hz (!) in the location of the resonant peaks after which treble frequencies start to drop...
The blue and pink lines are even lower pitched: they were obtained from one of the uncovered stock PU's of the Explorer (a kind of DiMarzio SD clone with a high inductance / high gain and therefore a darker / beefier sound).

FWIW.

 

[beaubrummels]

Almost feel like we should sticky some of these kinds of posts into their own "basic knowledge" thread, for the days when wood and other controversial subjects come up.

 

[freefrog]

Beau', to me, it's a question of structure and mass more than "wood" in this case. YMMV.

Now, I"ve found amusing how clearly one can see above the respective influences of resonant mass and stray capacitance and that's why I've created this thread.

Also, I don't know if my geeky rambling deserves to be included in a sticky but I wish things like the precise capacitance values of braided shielded wire VS Mogami + their influence on resonant peaks were accessible online data, if not "basic knowledge". It would have avoided to me a vain question on Music Electronic Forum back in 2011 then to have to do measurements myself with our lab meters...

Sharing my measurements had not prevented my own topic on MEF to become "controversial" (I can't forbid other people to be strongly opiniated and/or to have polemical intentions) but at least, it had allowed a first discussion about the influence of inner wiring and its stray capacitance:

https://music-electronics-forum.com/...se?view=thread

To come back to the resonant masses of electric instruments, I still find interesting these links that I've already shared here:

https://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/guitars/explorer.html

https://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/guitars/coronet.html

The Explorer used in these lab experiments had clearly lower pitched vibrating modes than the Coronet in their second example. And I find informative to see this Explorer described as having a vibrating mode @ 221hz with "a very low Q" (IOW, a broad resonance). This precise frequency is not necessarily the most prominent with the Explorer that I've used myself but the idea of a very broad resonance in the low mids due to the structure (shape and mass) of this Gibson model seems to be validated by the screenshot in my first post and that's one of the reasons why I've shared it...

Enough rambling. Work is waiting me. I wish you all a nice day...

 

[GuitarDoc]

Really appreciate your quantifiable research. I would tend to agree with your results just from qualifiable experience without actually knowing the extent of the effects. I've always seen and know that there is increased capacitance with an increase in length of wire (either internally in the guitar or externally in the cord to amp). I've also experienced a greater midrange response in guitars with large amounts of wood (like a typical LP). Those are the reasons I make my guitars with all of the electrical components close together to get short wire runs, and why I make relatively small bodies that are chambered. I like my guitars to have as much treble and clarity as possible knowing that the tone pot can reduce that however much is desired by the player.

Great post. It's nice to see the science behind the "knowledge".

 

[Demanic]

Interesting. Not surprised by the results, I find Explorers to be darker than V's. Which is why I put a set of Lace Deathbuckers in one. They are very bright clear pickups so they brought out the meat of the guitar.

Sent from my SM-A115A using Tapatalk

 

[Wound_Up]

Interesting. Makes me wonder what would happen if I swapped the SH1B from a somewhat chambered LP-style it in currently into my other one that's solid mahog with no chambering.

 

[eclecticsynergy]

So, if the selector switch on the Explorer was moved closer to the volume and output jack, it should sound more like the Flying V (but not identical)?

Nearly all Explorers seem to have deep bass and fairly fat low mids. I think that's mostly due to body geometry, not switch location.
Unless the hookup wire were super cheap (looking at you, Epiphone!) I don't expect an extra two feet would make a lot of difference.
It might open up the highs a little, but probably wouldn't do anything to alter the low end.

IMO an average korina Explorer might be expected to have slightly thinner bass and snappier upper mids compared to the average mahog.
Of course that's just based on types of wood, and exceptions come along far more often than one might expect.
Sometimes the differences between individual pieces of the same wood can be bigger than those between different species.

 

[freefrog]

Nearly all Explorers seem to have deep bass and fairly fat low mids. I think that's mostly due to body geometry, not switch location.
Unless the hookup wire were super cheap (looking at you, Epiphone!) I don't expect an extra two feet would make a lot of difference.
It might open up the highs a little, but probably wouldn't do anything to alter the low end.

IMO an average korina Explorer might be expected to have slightly thinner bass and snappier upper mids compared to the average mahog.
Of course that's just based on types of wood, and exceptions come along far more often than one might expect.
Sometimes the differences between individual pieces of the same wood can be bigger than those between different species.

Agreed about the fatness due to the body geometry but regarding the wiring and its capacitive effect, check my post 7 (where a pic had vanished. I've just uploaded it again right now): in the guitars that I've tested, the inner wiring has introduced a difference of 1khz between resonant peaks of the same pickup paired to pots of the same value... So the high frequencies drop 1khz lower. It matches my past experience with Les Paul's (and some past topics that I had dedicated to this question). That's why I've shared again in my first post the capacitance of braided shielded wire VS Mogami as it had been measured with our lab meter.

FWIW (just my own experience, YMMV).

 

[freefrog]

Wound_Up : the resonance of solid vs chambered bodies is a whole other can of worms... I've somewhere in my archives the traces of tests done with a mic capturing acoustic resonances of such bodies from various locations. Maybe I'll create another topic to share a part of this stuff if time permits.

 

[Aceman]

The one thing you can't quantify here is that you might be playing differently...because different guitar, different playing position etc.

 

[freefrog]

for Aceman and others, a tech side note...

When I share a frequency response chart translating a recording, it's always about the same sequence played in the same way, with the same kind of pick, strings, cable and so on. To minimize the residual playing inconsistencies, I play several times each sequence.

Then a frequency analyzer stacks the frequencies produced. I mean that if a peak happens @ 82hz and 2.7dB, it will remain on the screen until the end.

After a while, all frequential peaks are engraved on the pic and the screen of the analyzer doesn't change no more, even if one can hear the guitar keeping to play.

That's how I obtain almost totally identical frequency analysis even at several years of distance. If it wasn't the case, I wouldn't even think to share my findings online.

 

[GuitarStv]

Does this mean that on pickups like a Seth Lover that come with braided wire connectors you could brighten them up by replacing the connectors?

 

[freefrog]

Does this mean that on pickups like a Seth Lover that come with braided wire connectors you could brighten them up by replacing the connectors?

Well, that's the official reason why a luthier / winder for whom I work wired some of his high end models with Mogami BUT...

... honestly, a single pickup with 1ft of braided shielded wire VS 1ft of Mogami would vary of 60pF only. It's not enough to be noticeable in itself, when any part of a transducer + its wiring harness has its own parasitic capacitance.

Now, if we coil a cable on itself, its capacitance should increase. If we sit on it, the pressure of our weight should make its stray capacitance even higher...

So, capacitive wiring starts to be sonically noticeable when coaxial conductors go back and forth in a guitar and are tied/cramed/packed altogether (while adding their capacitive load to those of pots, plugs and so on). It can be a good thing with bright PU's and a bad thing with dark sounding ones...

All that being said, 4-conductors cables are potentially able to brigthen the tone of pickups by themselves because of a "double tuning" effect due to asymetric capacitive values. I've tried to share some findings about that among other things in a topic posted there: https://music-electronics-forum.com...ve-mag-transducers-a-few-thoughts?view=thread

FWIW - an answer botched while I was sipping a coffee at work.

 

[freefrog]

For the record, I post below the stacked responses of THREE neck pickups in the Explorer aforementioned when played in chords from unfretted strings to 12th fret.

Yellow = the original high gain pickup (DiMarzio Super dist / Dual-Sound clone). One can clearly see how its inductance of 6H (1.5 times higher than with P.A.F. clones) makes the sound bassier...

Blue = vintage SH1N, covered. Orange = modern PG1N, uncovered (it's the last neck PU mounted in this instrument, while the vintage SH1N has been transplanted in bridge position)...

In each case, screw poles and height setting screws were set differently, for a better pairing with the bridge unit.

But it doesn't cancel what all screenshots have in common.

Looks like this Explorer is definitively a "low mids heavy" guitar, no? ;-P





NOTES - Such screenshots obviously ignore the dynamics at play. So the pickups mentioned above sound more different when played than suggested by their mere frequency response.

BUT one can see how the acoustic resonance of the guitar and the parasitic capacitance of its inner wiring tend to dictate their voicing to different transducers (with for example this narrow bump before 400hz, with a dip after it, or the drop after 2khz).

FWIW (2 worthless geeky cents).