Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

[hermetico]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Nice Lew, you've got it!.

I agree with you.
'50s mod in Strats sucks the tone.
Overwound pickups suck the tone.
RW/RP middle pickups suck the tone.

I am hearing that RW/RP middles make notch positions bolder and quieter, but that nice quack is gone. There are some shinny frequencies being cancelled, while the bodier ones are being reinforced.
Maybe this is good for some people, I don't like myself. I want the real quack and, I can leave with the floor noise of well made strato pickups.
'50s tone mod sounds as harsh in a strat that I completely forgot the idea of using it in any further mod, once tested.
I'm using 0.047 PIO caps myself in every axe. I just find it the best way to remove all what I want remove up to number 5, which is easily achieveable.
What you name EJ mod (to assign tone1 to neck and tone2 to bridge) is something I'm doing to every strato from the beginning. I don't see any other axe that needs a complete tone control over the bridge pickup as an strato and, I've never understood why Leo designed it in that way!.

One more thing I've noticed is that massive neck makes a huge difference.
To me, Fender's Soft V neck profile is the one giving me the best of a strato.
Also, Ash bodies are da bomb.
I love their Deluxe radius and their Deluxe bridge.
LRS nut is adding a lot of fizzing high-end also, planning to substitute it with a bone nut.
A mix of all that would be my to-go strato!.

I have some exciting D.Allen's pickups a'comming.
IMHO, low DC pickups have lots of chime, bells and dynamic, specially when driven hard. Otherwise, specially neck, can sound muffled.

As per OD stuff, I've recently discovered what Jetter Gear can do for my tone (owned Jetdrive, Golden Standard is a'comming).
I'm really impressed. Head to head with other considered "to-go" pedals, it stays defined as hell with lots of gain on tap.
Hearing my rig from 15 to 18 feet away, it sounds as crazy stadium sound. I dunno how Jetter does it but, I've unloaded all my gain pedals after testing the Jetdrive.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

^ My question as well... .1uf or .01uf?

 

[Artie]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

RW/RP middle pickups suck the tone.

I am hearing that RW/RP middles make notch positions bolder and quieter, but that nice quack is gone. There are some shinny frequencies being canceled, while the bolder ones are being reinforced.

Also, I just don't get this. The part of the signal that we want, is identical, and in phase, with a non-RWRP pup. There should be no cancellations of any kind. The RWRP only cancels noise out of the air.

All of my Strats have the classic chime and quack that's expected, with RWRP middle pups. :dunno:

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Hi Artie! Nice to "see" you again. The Eric Johnson Strat uses a .1 cap. Not a .01. Here's a link from the Telecaster Discussion Page where they discuss it. http://www.tdpri.com/forum/tele-technical/202882-eric-johnson-strats-capacitor.html

My '63 Strat also had a .1 cap although I had changed it to a .02 cap. When Seymour was kind enough to restore that pickguard and return all of the wiring to stock again, he put an original .1 back in again.

I hadn't played that guitar "stock" in a long, long time. But I fell in love with its sound again. Especially the neck pickup sound and the bridge pickup sound, although being stock it had no tone control for the bridge pickup.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Just wanted to mention that conversations with Christian, the Guy Who Invented Fire, had a little influence on these insights.

Christian is a pedal lover and I've never been. But he's always kept his Strats stock in the way I've been describing (although he does like the tone control on the BRIDGE pickup mod) because he feels that gives him a better tone with pedals.

Hope I said that right. Maybe he'll comment...

 

[uOpt]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Also, I just don't get this. The part of the signal that we want, is identical, and in phase, with a non-RWRP pup. There should be no cancellations of any kind. The RWRP only cancels noise out of the air.

All of my Strats have the classic chime and quack that's expected, with RWRP middle pups. :dunno:

The reason why rwrp in the middle could potentially make an audible difference, even when only a single pickup is on, is the re-shaped magnetic field. Consider how the fields go in the two drawings below.

There is no question that the fields out extends are formed like that. Whether it makes an audible difference is the question. Obviously the distance between the pickups is critical. If they are far enough away from each other it won't. Too close, you can hear it (you can obviously hear it with two single coils very close to each other). Obviously it has more of a chance to be audible in a Strat where the pickups are much closer than in a Tele or dual P90 guitar.

Obviously the field drawn there is just one such "heightmap line" of many.

You can see that in the one I cherry-picked you obviously have a narrower focus for each of the pickups in the non-rwrp case, which means more high overtones, whereas the second one (rwrp in the middle) would favor long overtones.

But it is just one cherry-picked line of the magnetic field out of an infinite number. It is hard to measure how strong these ones are compared to the ones that are confined to a single pickup in both cases.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

I'm no scientist. But I have noticed that when I loosen my strings to being totally slack (when I want to remove the pickguard but not remove the strings) that the loose strings are attracted to a NORTH (reverse polarity) middle pickup as much as they are the two South (non-reverse polarity) neck and bridge pickups.

But just in thinking about it, I picture the strings getting a little confused when the guitar has that RW/RP middle pickup! :wrf: And I can imagine that confusion kind of choking the tone of all of the strings, but especially the wound strings, just a little bit.

Right or wrong, that's what seems to happen. And if so, why having a RW/RP middle pickup would affect the sound of the whole guitar...not just the sound from one pickup.

However, I can sure see the benefits of having humcancelling in position #2 and 4. I've played gigs where it was real God send to be able to quiet that hum. That's why I started using a RW/RP middle pickup in the first place.

 

[LReese]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

I'm getting my Jackson back in a few days - now I got to be on the lookout for a Standard polarity SSL-1 as I gave the repairman a set w/RWRP. I'm looking forward to having it back - all my repair damage done in my boneheaded youth reversed.

 

[LReese]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

The reason why rwrp in the middle could potentially make an audible difference, even when only a single pickup is on, is the re-shaped magnetic field. Consider how the fields go in the two drawings below.

There is no question that the fields out extends are formed like that. Whether it makes an audible difference is the question. Obviously the distance between the pickups is critical. If they are far enough away from each other it won't. Too close, you can hear it (you can obviously hear it with two single coils very close to each other). Obviously it has more of a chance to be audible in a Strat where the pickups are much closer than in a Tele or dual P90 guitar.

Obviously the field drawn there is just one such "heightmap line" of many.

You can see that in the one I cherry-picked you obviously have a narrower focus for each of the pickups in the non-rwrp case, which means more high overtones, whereas the second one (rwrp in the middle) would favor long overtones.

But it is just one cherry-picked line of the magnetic field out of an infinite number. It is hard to measure how strong these ones are compared to the ones that are confined to a single pickup in both cases.

I hear others mention that scenario but I've never noticed a difference in the single pickup positions. In the combo positions is where I hear it. Not what I'd call a big difference, but noticeable.

 

[Artie]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Hi Artie! Nice to "see" you again. The Eric Johnson Strat uses a .1 cap. Not a .01. Here's a link from the Telecaster Discussion Page where they discuss it. http://www.tdpri.com/forum/tele-technical/202882-eric-johnson-strats-capacitor.html

That's interesting Lew. I'll have to try this out. Maybe with a switch, so I can hear the difference "real time".

The reason why rwrp in the middle could potentially make an audible difference, even when only a single pickup is on, is the re-shaped magnetic field. Consider how the fields go in the two drawings below.

That actually makes sense. It's something I've never considered before. Now I've got something else to try out.

Artie

 

[uOpt]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

I'm no scientist. But I have noticed that when I loosen my strings to being totally slack (when I want to remove the pickguard but not remove the strings) that the loose strings are attracted to a NORTH (reverse polarity) middle pickup as much as they are the two South (non-reverse polarity) neck and bridge pickups.

But just in thinking about it, I picture the strings getting a little confused when the guitar has that RW/RP middle pickup! :wrf: And I can imagine that confusion kind of choking the tone of all of the strings, but especially the wound strings, just a little bit.

Right or wrong, that's what seems to happen. And if so, why having a RW/RP middle pickup would affect the sound of the whole guitar...not just the sound from one pickup.

However, I can sure see the benefits of having humcancelling in position #2 and 4. I've played gigs where it was real God send to be able to quiet that hum. That's why I started using a RW/RP middle pickup in the first place.

There's no reason to ridicule that theory. The strings are only passively magnetic. However, passively magnetic materials become actively magnetic on a temporary basis when in the field of active magnets. Iron is particularly "good at it".

So yes, a certain place in the string can easily have been magnetically polarized, thereby having an orientation, thereby being more attracted to other magnet's north than south or vice versa.

If you want to expand that theory the next step is to place north and south on the string. There is no magnet that doesn't have north and south both. So you would probably have to claim that the string is magnetized along the whole length, with south the bridge and north at the nut. The problem with that is - how did that come together? Alternatively you can say the upper half above the pickup is one pole and the lower half is the other pole. Then you need to explain why the south pole up pickup doesn't get any action, however you can explain that by saying that the fields above the pickup are so wide they overlap and hence the two north-up pickups' fields chip away at the middle field.

You could try to verify this by measuring the magnetic field but you need to be quick. I forgot how long iron holds a temporary polarization but I think it's seconds or minutes. So you probably want to use pickups that are not mounted for the magnetization so that you can dump them within a second before measuring.

 

[the guy who invented fire]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Good stuff Lew and you and I have already talked about this once before.

I'm sort of glad to see guys going back to vintage spec pickups in Strats and other guitars for that matter...

It's funny, several years ago I ordered a set of Strat pickups from the Duncan CS and when I got to the part about all 3 being the same DC and the middle NOT being RW/RP MJ kept asking me if I was sure...once I got her to understand that to me that was the only way to get a vintage Strat sound she agreed to do it but she kept telling me how odd she thought it was.

As for the RW/RP part I got away from it years ago...it just bigs me what it seems to do to the tone...in fact the only guitar I still have with any RW/RP stuff is a Tele with an RW/RP neck pickup and I've just been too lazy to send it back to MJ for a rewind and frankly I am afraid I'll loose something in the rewind process so I might just replace it first and see where I land...

 

[LReese]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

It's funny, several years ago I ordered a set of Strat pickups from the Duncan CS and when I got to the part about all 3 being the same DC and the middle NOT being RW/RP MJ kept asking me if I was sure...once I got her to understand that to me that was the only way to get a vintage Strat sound she agreed to do it but she kept telling me how odd she thought it was.

As for the RW/RP part I got away from it years ago...it just bigs me what it seems to do to the tone...in fact the only guitar I still have with any RW/RP stuff is a Tele with an RW/RP neck pickup and I've just been too lazy to send it back to MJ for a rewind and frankly I am afraid I'll loose something in the rewind process so I might just replace it first and see where I land...

I got that too from another pickup winder. I generally say they're for 3 different guitars (which is a possibility).

But why not try to remagnetize with opposite polarity and reverse the leads 1st if you're worried about a rewind?

 

[King IzzO)))]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Doesn't a humbucker have one set of poles with N and one set with S polarity? Discuss.

 

[Artie]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Doesn't a humbucker have one set of poles with N and one set with S polarity? Discuss.

Yes, but because the two coils are in series, we aren't quite as concerned with the loss of treble. Just a thought. This is whole new territory for me.

 

[ParameterMan]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Well this thread is making me feel better about myself. I've "felt" a difference between RWRP and non-RWRP strats but was pretty certain I had to be crazy. I'm with ItsaBass on the variable hum, too - I feel having it(the hum) switch on and off abruptly as you change positions makes it certain the audience will notice.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Doesn't a humbucker have one set of poles with N and one set with S polarity? Discuss.

Yes, a side-by-side humbucker completely kills (as in, to zero db) the overtones that have the right length on the string (they have the amplitude in one direction over one coil and the opposite amplitude over the other coil). That overtone is gone-gone. Most prominently, a Stingray bass with it's wide humbucker will completely kill overtones at 1500 Hz on the open E string. This is also very visible in frequency charts.

In a humbucker this is wanted to a certain extent, there is this "roar" coming in which is probably to a good part based on these random holes in the frequency distribution.

A major reason why some people prefer single coils is that they are free from these effects, but things can be more complicated in the case of a Strat with rwrp. Dave Gilmour for example doesn't seen to like his guitars cutting anything and even when playing a Les Paul he uses P90s.

 

[AlexR]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

And the best humbucker for open tones are the vintage ones where the direct cancellation is less.

Also the magnet itself isn't near the strings......and the N/S polarity is horizontal rather than vertical.

 

[Rockstar216]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

I'm surprised to see so many people who don't care for a RWRP middle strat pup. Me personally I've never cared one way or the other about since I mostly use buckers. I'm not sure how he does it but Bill Lawrence builds his strat pups with out a RWRP polarity middle but they hum reduction is incredible in all positions. Only time I use a true single is in a H-S-H set up so I don't really need the RWRP.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Strat pickups: I've stopped using a RW/RP middle and a hotter bridge pickup

Good stuff Lew and you and I have already talked about this once before.

It's funny, several years ago I ordered a set of Strat pickups from the Duncan CS and when I got to the part about all 3 being the same DC and the middle NOT being RW/RP MJ kept asking me if I was sure...once I got her to understand that to me that was the only way to get a vintage Strat sound she agreed to do it but she kept telling me how odd she thought it was.

That's the bottom line for me: dumping the RW/RP middle pickup and having all three pickups be pretty much identical in magnet, wind and output seems to be the way to get a vintage Strat sound.

Now if you're not obsessed with getting a vintage Strat sound go for a RW/RP middle pickup and a hot bridge pickup - you'll have a modern Strat sound instead.

That's cool too, and having two humcancelling positions is very helpful sometimes.

But for the way I've playing lately, plugged into a Klone, the vintage Strat sounds, sounds better to me.