Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

[STRATDELUXER97]

Hello all...As promised here's some tonal scoop on these pickups...

Neck and middle pickup I really like alot,especially the neck position...Very chimey,very articulate bell like tones with a nice fullness of tone...Compared to the Texas Hots,these pickups have alot of presence and are pretty toppy by comparison..These are probably what the real deal early pickups are supposed to sound like...These pickups are in no way thin sounding,but the eq seems to bring out the highs more...These pickups are percussive and you hear every note when playing clean...The 4th position quacks like Mark Knofler and Clapton's Blackie tones with no problem also...

The bridge pickup is pretty bright and lacks the lowend balls that the Texas Hot's bridge pickup offers in my opinion? Seems I'm a fan of the A2 poles...The bridge pickup needs to have a way to remove some of that toppy A5 vibe with a better working tone control..

The Fralin blender pot is cool and it does add the extra lowend that is needed to beef the bridge pickup up,but at the expense of changing the tonal character of the bridge position...

Also..The tone control doesn't give me anywhere near enough cut to take the extra brightness away from the bridge pickup..

Do I dislike the Surfer pickups? No,they sound great in a nice vintage way(As they're supposed to)...I think I Like the Texas Hots better though...I Prefer a strat pickup that is rounder and not as bright...As I said,I Love the neck and middle,but the bridge position needs some help...

I may need to change strings from the EXL D'Addarios over to a pure nickel string because I feel the highs are a bit to planky to my ears...

 

[Curly]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

thanks John

I've considered the Surfers, so it's good to get more feedback.

if you don't mind, which guitar was this? the blue one? maple or rosewood?

even though I prefer EBs, I think the EXLs are a little warmer sounding strings

 

[STRATDELUXER97]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

thanks John

I've considered the Surfers, so it's good to get more feedback.

if you don't mind, which guitar was this? the blue one? maple or rosewood?

even though I prefer EBs, I think the EXLs are a little warmer sounding strings

Hello buddy...This is the blue alder H1 strat with the maple neck...The EXLs are pretty bright strings and I'm thinking something like GHS Nickel Rockers or another pure nickel string? The EXLs have steel mixed in with them I think?

 

[Falstaff]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Is the bridge wound a little hotter like it is on some of the other sets? I wonder if that would help out a bit.

 

[STRATDELUXER97]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Is the bridge wound a little hotter like it is on some of the other sets? I wonder if that would help out a bit.

Yes...Just like the Texas Hot bridge,the box calls it the "Custom Bridge"...my bridge pickup is rated at 9.801K...Whats happening is that I'm hearing the effect of the A5 poles vs A2 poles on the Texas Hots...The Surfers have more presence and seem brighter than the Texas Hots,though I don't think the Surfers have less lows compared to the Texas Hots..I'm hearing an EQ difference and my ears maybe like the tone of the Texas Hots a bit more...

I Love the pickups,don't get me wrong,but the blender pot and tone control need some tweaking to get me 100% satisfied...The tone control is very weak in it's operation with only a .002 cap and this bothered me from the start...I tryed getting some advice about this .002 cap from Lew and others,but to no avail... :32:

The blender pot is cool in what it's capable of doing but I could be just as happy without it...Normally I adjust my volume and tone controls all night on the fly...

John

 

[Curly]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

John,
maybe a rosewood neck would make a difference

plus, if I read you right, standard wiring with tone on the bridge gives you more roll off - is that right?

I keep a few sets of EB pure nickel strings around for a warmer tone - they're the "Classic Rock n Roll" ones

 

[Curly]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

I Love the pickups,don't get me wrong,but the blender pot and tone control need some tweaking to get me 100% satisfied...The tone control is very weak in it's operation with only a .002 cap and this bothered me from the start...I tryed getting some advice about this .002 cap from Lew and others,but to no avail... :32:

John,
I thought someone said you should use a standard value - .02 ??

 

[STRATDELUXER97]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

John,
maybe a rosewood neck would make a difference

plus, if I read you right, standard wiring with tone on the bridge gives you more roll off - is that right?

I keep a few sets of EB pure nickel strings around for a warmer tone - they're the "Classic Rock n Roll" ones

Curly...I've never used the blender pot before so that's new to me? Yes..I get alot of correct lowend cut with the bridge pickup wired stock with the jumper added to the tone control for bridge tone..Normally I'll use a seperate .015 cap on the neck and neck/middle tone pot and a .02 or .047 on the bridge and bridge/middle tone pot...The neck pickup normally doesn't need any cut if at all and I Like the taper to be very slow...

I haven't used EB strings in years,but it's a great consideration...I don't have a rosewood neck Curly and I really like the look of the maple on the blue...

 

[STRATDELUXER97]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

bump

 

[jeremy]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

very cool. i have a set of these that are waiting to go in a guitar. alder body rosewood neck and a reverse slant bridge pup which i think will help with the brightness

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Hi John, Ax the .002 cap and go for a .02. Sorry I didn't address that when we talked. I've never used a .002. I pretty much always use a .02. Also, you might want to ax the NO LOAD tone pot...might be making things to bright. (I have the NO LOAD tone pot on my Strat with the APS-2/Twangbanger set up and I'm starting to feel it's just to bright with the NO LOAD tone pot) And if you want the tone pot to be more effective, connect the tone control to the input of the volume pot...the usual connection and the same terminal the output of switch is connected to. Connecting it to the middle terminal (50's mod) might be making it less effective too. But I suspect the main culprit is that .002 tone cap and the NO LOAD tone pot. I think after you do a little tweaking to personal taste, you're going to really love those Surfers. The Surfers remain some of my favorite Strat pickups that I have ever used. Lew

 

[dr.barlo]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

John,

Great to get your opinion.

Has your HW1 the modern wiring? I mean does your bridge have a tone pot connected? If so couldn't you wash off the high end with it?

I am seriously thinking of losing my Fralin vintage hot (neck middle) an Ant custom bridge set, and getting a set of Ant2s.

B

 

[dr.barlo]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Silly me1 I see it now, you have a blender pot, thus master vol and master tone! Hence my question is not valid in the first place.

B

 

[Gearjoneser]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

I like the idea of having the vintage Alnico 5 neck and middle, but maybe you should just swap out that bridge pickup for a hotter, warmer one?
My favorite strat has 2 Fat 50's in neck and middle, and a really nice sounding bridge single coil A5 that MJ wound in the Duncan Custom Shop.

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

I thought that the bridge position on my strat (Fender CS '62 strat set), , so I wired a tone control to that pickup alone (leaving the mid pickup without one) and using a .12mfd orange drop cap in place of the stock .047 ceramic. It rounded off the highs a bit and gave me more control. I also added a steel bassplate to the ridge pickup.

 

[STRATDELUXER97]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Thanks for posting on this all..I get the feeling that getting the right tone cap into this guitar will fix my problems...I Like the way my volume control works with Duncan's treble bleed mod of using a 100k in parallel with a .002 cap...Lew,maybe I should listen to you and change the tone pot wiring like you say...The pickups are really great sounding,though I don't have a 63 strat to compare them to like you do Lew! LOL

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Thanks John, I'll be in all day friday and saturday from 10-6 and sunday from noon to 5. I'd love to hear from you. Now I gotta get back to work myself. Take care, Lew

 

[sonnyblu]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

Man, what a collection Gearjoneser! Real beauty gear. Nice. Hey guy's...... What's the best value for a volume treble bleed cap for humbuckers w/ 500K pots? TIA

 

[Twang Man]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

You might want to consider swapping the Antiquity II in the bridge for a 5-2 Custom (hotter wound) bridge pup. This will be hotter than the mid and neck pups just like with a custom wound bridge for the Antiquity II or custom wound bridge for Antiquity TX Hot. It will still have A5 magnets for the wound strings but A2 for the small strings which will warm it up and soften the brightness.

 

[Jeff_H]

Re: Surfer Antiquity pickups...Early Reviews..

My favorite strat has 2 Fat 50's in neck and middle, and a really nice sounding bridge single coil A5 that MJ wound in the Duncan Custom Shop.

Now that's a killer idea. I love the neck/mid of my CS 54's, but the bridge is just not quite right. A custom wind 5/2 that's slightly less output than the SSL-6, but hotter than some of the others...with my steel baseplate. That could rock!