SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

J

JazzSinger

New member
I am trying to achieve the open, clear sound of the neck and middle Strat pickup setup, but without the problems of hum or buzz.

So far I have purchased the following single-coil sized humbuckers:

Vintage Rails, Cool Rails, Duckbucker, Lil 59,
SH-4 using one coil only with screws set to Strat pole piece heights.

I have tried and mixed the following combinations, always optimizing pickup heights:
Single coil or humbucker,
Series or parallel,
In or out of phase.

All I ever get is variations on a "honky" sound, like there's a waawaa pedal permanently connected. Sometimes it's like the waawaa is wide open, which gives me a trebly, shrill honk. Sometimes it's more closed sounding, esp. the SH-4, harsh and a middle boost.

The closest I have come is with the Vintage Rails wired with coils in parallel, but it still doesn't have any of the open, light airyness of the Strat.

The most disappointing is the cool rails. Dull. No tops.

I want to emphasize I am not a beginner in electronics.

The pickups go straight to a mixer and I am monitoring on studio headphones; the guitar has no tone or volume controls.

The guitar I am comparing mine to also has no tone or volume controls, and is fitted *only* with two genuine old Strat pickups in precisely the same neck and middle positions as on a real Strat.

Is a bright, light sound with no resonant peak impossible with a humbucker, regardless of type, even if run as a single-coil?

Or is the issue more to do with the high gain of SD pickups; i.e. the problem is the high number of windings resulting in high inductance values?

I am an an engineer and don't believe in magic. I am looking for an explanation that I can work with, one based on sound electronics principles so that I can make the right choice next time.
 
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Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

I think my findings pretty much match yours . . . for "true" single-coil sound, you need a true single-coil pickup. I'll even take that a step farther and say a vintage-wound single-coil. WHile I love the SSL-3/4/5/6/7's that I've tried, they don't quite nail that vintage quack and chime of a lower wound pup.

But there's one exception. The new Stack Plus. I've only heard clips from forum bro J LaGrassa, (sp?), but it had that classic single-coil bell-like chime.

I love the other pickups you've mentioned, but I always thought they each had their own personality and character.
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

What you're searching for is the sound of low wind, single coil resonant peak.

By definition, a humbucker will never please you, as to buck the hum it needs to cancel certain frequencies and this produces a notch in the resonance.

An overwound coil won't please you either, as it's peak will have a lower Q and a lower Fc. That is, the resonance won't be as sharp, and it will center on a lower frequency.

The first thing you should do is install pots and caps in your guitars - the pickups were meant to work with a specific load and by comparing them with no load you're exacerbating the differences. You should also use a guitar speaker, as you're hearing things through the headphones that weren't meant to be heard by the designers. The loudspeaker is the final filter in the system, and it filters a lot. It also adds a lot.
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

i gotta agree with artie the stack+ is as good as it gets and dead quiet. side by side with ssl1 you could tell the difference but its damn good. more classic alnico V tone than anything ive tried
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

I agree with everyone. Get single coils like the SSL-1 or the Antiquities for that single coil sound. Just insulate your guitar with copper tape and star ground it to get rid of the hum. It really works. My P-Bass used to hum like crazy. Now it is warm and growly and no hums.
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

ArtieToo, Jeremy - thanks for the tip.

My intention was to build a guitar that will give me as wide a range of sounds as possible. Included in that list was a strat-ish sound. At the moment, I'm just getting a variation on a theme!

Will look into the Stack+. Cheers.

Glass - Well intentioned as I'm sure that was meant to be, much of that was technically incorrect. In particular do a google on humbucker pickups and find out how they really work.
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

jeremy, ArtieToo: just to clarify:

Are you guys talking about the "STK-S4 classic stack plus"?
Or is there a newer one on the way?
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

ArtieToo said:
But there's one exception. The new Stack Plus. I've only heard clips from forum bro J LaGrassa, (sp?), but it had that classic single-coil bell-like chime.
Click to expand...

Artie's right. The Classic Stack Plus is the one to try. It's the best noiseless Strat pickup I've ever used and gets about 95% of the tone of a great '62 Fender Strat pickup without the hum. The 5% diff (very slightly thicker mids than vintage) does not compromise the tone in any negative way...in fact, some would consider slightly thicker mids an improvement.

Lew
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

"very slightly thicker mids than vintage"

- H'm.

"does not compromise the tone in any negative way...in fact, some would consider slightly thicker mids an improvement."

I have enough "improved tone" now, thanks. - always a subjective thing.

Two questions:

1. Is the Stack+ in the same output range as the Cool Rails and ESPECIALLY Vintage Rails? (want to keep the VR as a neck pup)

2. Is the Stack+ in the same output range as true vintage strat pups? (probably not - mine are very low output)
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

Oh, and another question: I just noticed the Stack+ pole pieces are not staggered.

How essential is this feature for a true Strat sound?
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

Just a mention: I sent my Classic Stack Plus pickups to Christian (the Guy Who Invented Fire) to compare to some Kinmans. The Kinmans are regarded by many as the ultimate noiseless Strat pickups. Christian (who's ears I trust as much as anyone on this forum!) prefered the Duncan Classic Stack Plus pickups to the Kinmans and felt that the Duncans had the more accurate vintage tone.

I doubt it's possible for a noiseless Strat pickup to get closer to the tone of a vintage '62 Strat pickup than the Classic Stack Plus Pickups do. I mean, they ARE built differantly than a true single coil and to get within 90 - 95% of a single coil tone from a stacked pickup is probably as close as it's possible to get.

Lew
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

The stagger is important to matching a true strat string to string tone, but the vintage stagger was optimized for a wound G string, which most of us are not using these days. The Classic Stack Plus isn't dead flat, it's got what I'd call a "modern stagger" on it, which is tantamount to an even radius across the strings.

Some of the terms you're using to describe the tones you're getting are a bit confusing. Any time someone refers to a wah pedal type of sound they're generally listening to two pickups out of phase with eachother. But as an engineer who's not new to electronics I'm sure that you've considered that.

Many people are very satisfied with the sound of two Vintage Rails (designed to be wired in parallel) and when on together (neck and middle) I think they do a great job of producing the clear vintage cluck. The Classic Stack Plus behaves like a true single coil magnetically though, and perhaps that's the answer for you. I have two in a guitar right now (neck and middle) and when I use them together, they automatically convert to true single coils (top coil only) they are RW/RP so they cancel hum with eachother. That may be the best of all worlds for you.
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

JazzSinger said:
Glass - Well intentioned as I'm sure that was meant to be, much of that was technically incorrect. In particular do a google on humbucker pickups and find out how they really work.
Click to expand...
As snide as I'm sure that was meant to be, I got a good giggle out of it. If I said anything you didn't understand, I'd be happy to explain it.

Take a peek at this graph of a humbucker's output:
Tech Tips, Fig. 2

See the notch on the right side?

Oh, and Fig. 1 ought to be of interest to someone looking for a "a bright, light sound with no resonant peak".

So, uhm... er, exactly what is it that you engineer?
 
Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

Lewguitar - you read my mind regarding the Kinmans. You saved me going down that alley.

frankfalbo - I see the thinking behind the original stagger pattern now, thank you. "Modern Stagger" - Good name for a jazz rock band! The wah description was to explain the mid boost in layman's terms. I do indeed find the VR in parallel the closest to what I am looking for. Switching Stack+ to single-coil only as you describe is a good plan.

Glass - I was trying to be diplomatic. I failed. - Not sure what you're telling me by posting links to these two diagrams, but I managed to trace back to the techtip they belong to and I assume it's the damping the recommended pots provide?

Measuring the two coils in my SH-4 gives me two different resistances which is reflected in the notch shown in Fig. 2. It also shows that after the second peak, the top frequencies roll off rapidly to zero. Damping reduces the curve which is responsible for each pickup's characteristic sound but does not change the loss of high frequencies. Some guitar manufacturers wire the volume pot with the wiper on the pickup side, giving you full live control over the damping effect discussed in the tech tip.

Fig 1 shows a coil of lower inductance. The peak is shifted to the higher frequencies. If the inductance is low enough, the peak will be out of the audio range, giving a bright, light sound with no (audible) resonant peak. From what I had read, I assumed the Vintage Rails were classic wound, not overwound. Wired in parallel, they get close but not as near as I'd assumed.

Using no volume control has the advantage of ensuring maximum available signal level at all times, minimising noise picked up by the cable or introduced by effects pedals.

The pot values recommended by SD are pretty academic. Modern amps and pedals have input impedances in the 250k-1Meg range. If you have a 500k pot and you connect it to a 500k effect pedal, the peak will be dampened by about 3dB. Since this is the smallest difference in level the human ear can detect, it is not worth worrying about.
 
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Re: SD pickups: Middly or dull sounding, never bright

Lewguitar said:
Just a mention: I sent my Classic Stack Plus pickups to Christian (the Guy Who Invented Fire) to compare to some Kinmans. The Kinmans are regarded by many as the ultimate noiseless Strat pickups. Christian (who's ears I trust as much as anyone on this forum!) prefered the Duncan Classic Stack Plus pickups to the Kinmans and felt that the Duncans had the more accurate vintage tone.

I doubt it's possible for a noiseless Strat pickup to get closer to the tone of a vintage '62 Strat pickup than the Classic Stack Plus Pickups do. I mean, they ARE built differantly than a true single coil and to get within 90 - 95% of a single coil tone from a stacked pickup is probably as close as it's possible to get.

Lew
Click to expand...

Not to nitpick, but on kinman's website, he says that he is aiming for a caricature of the classic strat tone, not the classic strat tone per se. So, it makes sense that the Classic stack plus is closer. Sorry if I sound like a douche, I'm just trying to clairfy.
 
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