I came to this forum to have one good whinge, I will have it and then may never be seen here again. Hopefully, I may get a better result in the right places than I have elsewhere.
Recently, I bought this Squier guitar. The reviews were good, it felt lovely to play, it sounded good with its Duncan Designed Hotrails and at less than the equivalent of 250 bucks, I didn't think I could go wrong.
I say it sounded good, but somehow it didn't sound right and this caused me to try a little experiment that I have done with other guitars of mine recently. I plugged a short cable in, put a meter across the end of the cable and measured the resistance of each pickup (not accurate, I know, but for a quick comparison, perfectly acceptable).
Bridge = 11.5 K ohms
Middle = 22.5 K ohms
Neck = 11.5 K ohms
I had half expected something like this. I chose not to go back to the shop I got it from because I thought it would just be an open invitation to keep the guitar for a couple of days to look good, do nothing and then just say 'Sounds okay to us - don't forget it is just a cheap old Squier', so I threw my warranty in the bin and lifted the scratchplate.
Now, a set of Duncan Designed pickups is just that, a SET of Duncan Designed pickups and so to sound exactly as they were intended to sound, they need to be in the right positions, not the bridge pickup in the middle position, the middle pickup in the neck position and the neck pickup in the bridge position, which is where these were. According to the serial number, the guitar was built by CorTek in Indonesia and the obvious conclusion here is that someone does not understand what he is doing or simply hasn't been taught properly.
Ten minutes with a screwdriver and a soldering iron and what did I have? One of the most awesome sounding guitars I have ever had with a bridge pickup that absolutely screams and a neck/middle combination that exudes creamy neck/middle-through-a-Marshall-stack through the clean channel of a little 20 watt Ashdown tube amp with not much gain set at all.
I tried emailing Fender UK and got no response at all - they probably don't even understand what the problem is, or else don't want to know because I am not complaining about a 2000 buck plus American custom shop strat. :banghead:
It saddens me that such a stupid, easily rectifiable little problem could drive people away from what could otherwise be a little gem of an instrument or else means that existing owners are not getting the full benefit of the sounds available. It should also worry Seymour Duncan that a not so good sounding set of incorrectly installed pickups is not going to enhance their reputation - If this forum is actually monitored by anyone from the company, I wish they would get in touch with Fender US and let them know about this.
Or maybe I should just not worry about it, be thankful that MY guitar sounds great and to hell with all the other suckers who buy one and are then disappointed with it - but I have never been able to do that - which is probably why I am on this site now
Rant over, have a good day everyone
Schecter C1 Classic (SH-2 and SH-4 factory fitted)
Schecter Ultra (Duncan Designed HB-102 set factory fitted)
Kramer (Gibson) Baretta Pro (SH-2 and SH-4 factory fitted)
Squier Double Fat Tele Deluxe (SH-2 and SH-4 retro fitted)
Squier Deluxe Hotrails Strat (Duncan Designed HR-101 set factory fitted)
Recently, I bought this Squier guitar. The reviews were good, it felt lovely to play, it sounded good with its Duncan Designed Hotrails and at less than the equivalent of 250 bucks, I didn't think I could go wrong.
I say it sounded good, but somehow it didn't sound right and this caused me to try a little experiment that I have done with other guitars of mine recently. I plugged a short cable in, put a meter across the end of the cable and measured the resistance of each pickup (not accurate, I know, but for a quick comparison, perfectly acceptable).
Bridge = 11.5 K ohms
Middle = 22.5 K ohms
Neck = 11.5 K ohms
I had half expected something like this. I chose not to go back to the shop I got it from because I thought it would just be an open invitation to keep the guitar for a couple of days to look good, do nothing and then just say 'Sounds okay to us - don't forget it is just a cheap old Squier', so I threw my warranty in the bin and lifted the scratchplate.
Now, a set of Duncan Designed pickups is just that, a SET of Duncan Designed pickups and so to sound exactly as they were intended to sound, they need to be in the right positions, not the bridge pickup in the middle position, the middle pickup in the neck position and the neck pickup in the bridge position, which is where these were. According to the serial number, the guitar was built by CorTek in Indonesia and the obvious conclusion here is that someone does not understand what he is doing or simply hasn't been taught properly.
Ten minutes with a screwdriver and a soldering iron and what did I have? One of the most awesome sounding guitars I have ever had with a bridge pickup that absolutely screams and a neck/middle combination that exudes creamy neck/middle-through-a-Marshall-stack through the clean channel of a little 20 watt Ashdown tube amp with not much gain set at all.
I tried emailing Fender UK and got no response at all - they probably don't even understand what the problem is, or else don't want to know because I am not complaining about a 2000 buck plus American custom shop strat. :banghead:
It saddens me that such a stupid, easily rectifiable little problem could drive people away from what could otherwise be a little gem of an instrument or else means that existing owners are not getting the full benefit of the sounds available. It should also worry Seymour Duncan that a not so good sounding set of incorrectly installed pickups is not going to enhance their reputation - If this forum is actually monitored by anyone from the company, I wish they would get in touch with Fender US and let them know about this.
Or maybe I should just not worry about it, be thankful that MY guitar sounds great and to hell with all the other suckers who buy one and are then disappointed with it - but I have never been able to do that - which is probably why I am on this site now
Rant over, have a good day everyone
Schecter C1 Classic (SH-2 and SH-4 factory fitted)
Schecter Ultra (Duncan Designed HB-102 set factory fitted)
Kramer (Gibson) Baretta Pro (SH-2 and SH-4 factory fitted)
Squier Double Fat Tele Deluxe (SH-2 and SH-4 retro fitted)
Squier Deluxe Hotrails Strat (Duncan Designed HR-101 set factory fitted)
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