Thoughts about taming a strat bridge pup

[zionstrat]

I've got a fantastic strat that suffers from the normal strat problem of having a very nice balance of 5432 but the bridge is rather bright and loud.

It's a Mexican strat, and weirdly enough, I'm completely in love with the stock ceramic pups. They have an extremely crisp high-end for clean stuff, but they also crunch very well, so I don't think I'm going to want a pup change.

My biggest worry is any change that impacts the second position. It is absolutely Mark Knopfler, and I don't want to do anything to change the second position tone.

But of course, anything that I do to the bridge pickup is going to impact the second position to some degree, so I'm thinking about the following and wondering what you would do?

1. In the past, I've dedicated a bridge tone control for my customers and they tend to like it. But I tend to be set and forget and might be challenged opening the tone for the second position and closing it down for first.

2. Probably a better idea would be a tone capacitor that only comes into play in first position. I haven't tried to figure out the wiring, but I'm assuming this would be pretty easy with a super switch.

3. A friend has suggested a reverse slant Hendrix influenced bridge pickup... I get the idea that it could tame the highs and tighten the bass but I'm also imagining it would screw up the second position quite a bit.

4. Steel plate.. once again I've done this mod for others but not for myself, so I haven't spent a lot of time analyzing the impact on the second position.

So those are the options that jump to mind and open to any and all thoughts about these or other mods!

 

[Clint 55]

My idea is you could shield it. I noticed some taming when I tried doing that.

 

[jeremy]

right now you have the strat wired normally, yes? so neck tone and middle tone? id start by adding the tone to bridge, so its on the middle and bridge pups. assuming you have stock wiring, the middle tone is active in #2 right now, so wont change that position. adding it to the bridge will tamp down the highs a bit when its on by itself. i do like adding a baseplate but that will have a subtle effect on #2

 

[zionstrat]

right now you have the strat wired normally, yes? so neck tone and middle tone? id start by adding the tone to bridge, so its on the middle and bridge pups. assuming you have stock wiring, the middle tone is active in #2 right now, so wont change that position. adding it to the bridge will tamp down the highs a bit when its on by itself. i do like adding a baseplate but that will have a subtle effect on #2

Yep it's stock...

Jeremy, in general I like this idea, But it requires rolling off tone in first position and putting it back in second position.. I'm not sure I'm that coordinated

That's why I'm leaning toward solution number two but maybe I just need to get more coordinated..

 

[zionstrat]

My idea is you could shield it. I noticed some taming when I tried doing that.

It's funny Clint I shield almost everything and agree it would probably help tame the bridge.

However I'm dedicating this guitar to studio and home so it's one of the few that I'm not shielding because I like all the sparkle just as it is.:34:

 

[freefrog]

*Steel plates rise the inductance with AlNi(Co) rod magnets and lower a bit the Q factor of "normal" Strat pickups while reshaping their magnetic field. I may be wrong but I don't think they would work well with ceramic under the PU, especially if it's a model with two bars of ferrite sandwiching the steel poles...

*If you design a wiring enabling a tone cap only in 1st position, consider a recipe that I periodically share without never being heard, albeit it was recommended by Seymour himself in his old FAQ's : a LOW capacitance component. Only a few picofarad or nanofarad. Start with 330pF or 470pF and don't go beyond 3,3nF (3300pF) or 4,7nF (4700pF) which is already high.

[Help to find the proper value: https://youtu.be/u2sjeVQpS94?t=399

When he plays with 75 added ft of wire, it's as if he had a capacitor from hot to ground measuring between 2.7nF and 3.3nF... ]

If a reduction of the output level is required, put this cap in parallel with a resistor...



*A second solution would to use a dummy coil in series with the PU only in first position: it would make the bridge PU less loud because of the higher resistance, warmer sounding because of a higher inductance and... noiseless if properly positioned.

find a cheap single coil with ceramic mag(s), pull off the mag(s) and keep the metal slugs, it should work as a proper choke (I've paired such things with Fender style SC's and P90's).


BORING SIDE NOTE - In my main Strat, I've a TBX general tone pot enabling a LR filter parallel to the PU's when full up (for super qwacky tones) AND a 1nF (1000 picofarad) cap from hot to ground in center position. It avoids my head to explode because of brightness when I plug in a cranked Marshall and is less cumbersome than 20 added ft of cable. It also gives me "that" hint of old school low fi mids when I cover songs originally played with single coils through a long cable (early Hank Marvin, Hendrix or SRV stuff, Buddy Guy...). Last but not least, it puts normal Strat PU in the EQing range of hotter single coils, in the Schecter F500 style.

In another Strat I've a switchable dummy coil in series with the pickups and it does what I've explained above (reduced output, warmer tone, noiseless effect).


FWIW. hope you'll find a solution.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Your possible solution (#2.) WOULD be very simple.

 

[whatthe]

I was thinking about this the other day. I dont use the tone control on my strats most of the time and have no problem with the bridge most of the time. In fact my favourite position on strat is the bridge, middle and the neck last. The neck seems to me to be a little bit cliche because its been used so much by everybody.

I thought about dedicating one of the tone control for the bridge and use smaller value pot to tame the treble. Also i play with my vol knob a lot and rarely live at 10 so that really helps with rounding out the treble on the bridge position.

 

[McD]

Simple approach here, but maybe try lowering it just a bit on the treble side. Start with 1/64th and you might be surprised.

 

[zionstrat]

Thanks McD... It does reduce treble but it also kills quack... I'm guessing one of the reasons the second position is so good on this strat is because the bridge is considerably stronger than the middle pup.

 

[zionstrat]

*Steel plates rise the inductance with AlNi(Co) rod magnets and lower a bit the Q factor of "normal" Strat pickups while reshaping their magnetic field. I may be wrong but I don't think they would work well with ceramic under the PU, especially if it's a model with two bars of ferrite sandwiching the steel poles...

*If you design a wiring enabling a tone cap only in 1st position, consider a recipe that I periodically share without never being heard, albeit it was recommended by Seymour himself in his old FAQ's : a LOW capacitance component. Only a few picofarad or nanofarad. Start with 330pF or 470pF and don't go beyond 3,3nF (3300pF) or 4,7nF (4700pF) which is already high.

[Help to find the proper value: https://youtu.be/u2sjeVQpS94?t=399

When he plays with 75 added ft of wire, it's as if he had a capacitor from hot to ground measuring between 2.7nF and 3.3nF... ]

If a reduction of the output level is required, put this cap in parallel with a resistor...



*A second solution would to use a dummy coil in series with the PU only in first position: it would make the bridge PU less loud because of the higher resistance, warmer sounding because of a higher inductance and... noiseless if properly positioned.

find a cheap single coil with ceramic mag(s), pull off the mag(s) and keep the metal slugs, it should work as a proper choke (I've paired such things with Fender style SC's and P90's).


BORING SIDE NOTE - In my main Strat, I've a TBX general tone pot enabling a LR filter parallel to the PU's when full up (for super qwacky tones) AND a 1nF (1000 picofarad) cap from hot to ground in center position. It avoids my head to explode because of brightness when I plug in a cranked Marshall and is less cumbersome than 20 added ft of cable. It also gives me "that" hint of old school low fi mids when I cover songs originally played with single coils through a long cable (early Hank Marvin, Hendrix or SRV stuff, Buddy Guy...). Last but not least, it puts normal Strat PU in the EQing range of hotter single coils, in the Schecter F500 style.

In another Strat I've a switchable dummy coil in series with the pickups and it does what I've explained above (reduced output, warmer tone, noiseless effect).


FWIW. hope you'll find a solution.

Wow Freefrog, that's a lot of cool thinking!

1. Plate- in retrospect I think you're absolutely correct. I've only done it with traditional pups and for some reason hadn't considered that these aren't traditional.

2. Dummy coil- that's a really cool, out of the box approach. Normally, the loss of high-end is one of the negatives for dummy coils, but in this case it makes a whole lot of sense and its humbucking to boot! Got to try this one one way or the other.

3. Could you expand on the TBX with the LR filter? I'm vaguely familiar with LR theory but not entirely sure what to do in the real world. But controllable hyper quack is definitely interesting!

 

[zionstrat]

Free frog, one more question, an LR circuit is like the Bill Lawrence q inductor? I've got one of those sitting in a box somewhere cuz I was never quite sure what to do with it

 

[eclecticsynergy]

A plain cap to ground works fine, though you might not hit the exact value you want on the first try.
I would run two wires out temporarily and experiment with a few different values.

Same if you go with cap+resistance-in-series like a regular tone control: external wires would allow you to adjust the rolloff with a pot.
Once you find the right resistance, you can hardwire it with a static resistor around that value. [EDIT: Or a trimpot.]

Would hate to have to tweak a tone knob every time I flip to the bridge pickup.
For me a superswitch or half-superswitch would be better by far.
If you might sometimes want the fully-bright bridge tone, you can add a push-pull or mini toggle to bypass your rolloff.

 

[zionstrat]

Right on... I use long alligator clips, close everything down and then change out caps for as long as it takes.

Great input and thanks again to everybody on the thread!

 

[freefrog]

Free frog, one more question, an LR circuit is like the Bill Lawrence q inductor? I've got one of those sitting in a box somewhere cuz I was never quite sure what to do with it

Hey man, glad if my rambling gave you some ideas to chew and sorry for the delayed answer: it's 8:30AM here while I write this so I was simply sleeping before . )

The LR filter in my main Strat includes a custom made humbucker multi-coils choke measuring 6H and a resistor of 24k (if memory serves me).

If you want such a high inductance filter, a high gain humbucker or a P90 deprived of their magnets would do the job but it's cumbersome in a cavity (albeit a dummy P90 properly positioned would also open to noiseless operation once in parallel with your pu's).


Anyway, yes, you can absolutely do the same with a Bill Lawrence Q filter: @ 2H or so, it has practically the same inductance than a CS69 single coil so this inductor in series with a resistor (avoiding a too severe volume drop) would give you super qwacky tones once in parallel with your 2d and 4th positions. A bit as if BMN pickups were enabled altogether in parallel but without the added bass due to the N pickup...

BTW, a no-load blender for the neck PU is another road to more qwacky tones: if the N unit is enabled @ 6,5/10, it accentuates the qwack of the 2d position without making the bass too present. I've that also in my Strat number one (my center tone pot being a no-load blender and a push-pull for parallel / series operation) . ;-)

If you want a Lawrence Q filter to be selective and to open to fake acoustic tone, just pair it with a 22nF capacitor. It will add a notched dip in the mids.

In my number two, I've also such a low inductance choke paired with a cap: my goal was to emulate the "Gresco Qube" (a Japanese Q filter variation) supposedly used by SRV and it works reasonably well. I enable it to play "Lenny"...
The cap associated to the Qresco Qube is a 33nF, FWIW. And I think to have used a 3H inductor for it (my old brain is not sure). But a 2H would work too.

Last but not least, a 2H or 3H inductor paired with a properly sized resistor and a 4.7nF cap gives a reasonably convincing emulation of 2d or 4th position once in parallel with a single pickup.

HTH. Let us know which solution(s) you'll have applied and if it works for you.

 

[idsnowdog]

You could move the tone control from the middle to the bridge while leaving the middle without a tone control. That would accentuate the quack in positions 2/4.

 

[jeremy]

right, though it would change the neck/middle setting tone. even just putting the tone control on the bridge pup, as i mentioned above, will load it down a bit and soften the high end. even with the control on 10. subtle, but it wont effect anything else

 

[zionstrat]

Guys thanks for another "Wow" thread! There's a whole bunch of yummy goodness in this one.

Thanks so much for all the great ideas and now I've just got to narrow down the options.

 

[zionstrat]

Hey guys reviving the thread to give you an update and it's not what was expected..

I broke a string on my Parker nightfly, which is my do everything guitar, so I decided to take my Reverend for all the heavy stuff and try out the strat for the stratie stuff. It's the first time I've ever taken it out... I don't tend to like single coils in the real world due to noise but I know that this venue was quiet.

As mentioned earlier in the thread, the strat did all the wonderful stratty things that I like in 234&5 positions but I got lazy and didn't switch guitars as planned.

The song was Shook me all night Long, I rolled off a little treble on the amp and I played very lightly in the first position for the intro because I was afraid to push it.

But when I hit the cords it was entirely unexpectedly wonderful. Everything that I dislike about this ceramic Mexican pickup for strat sounds, was completely made up for by its extended high end and thick sound. I ended up using it on all my "humbucker songs" that night and was just amazed.

It had never entered my mind, that a single coil that has a lot of high-end as well as a lot of output can really come close to a bridge humbucker. For the fun of it, I later compared it to many other bridge pickups and find that this particular pickup is very, similar to my firebird pickups.

Of course, a firebird (or Joe Barden) is a much safer choice in the real world due to all the buzzing and hissing out there, but I think I've decided to leave the bridge pickup as it is. I'm bound to modify it before long, probably with the Gilmore mod, but that's just because I can't sit still for long. Frankly if it wasn't for the noise potential, I could use this strat as is to cover pretty much everything that I play.

Considering I always needed a hundred guitars before, maybe I'm getting old or maybe it's in the fingers

Thanks again for all the great recommendations and sorry I didn't end up generating any feedback about the original question.

 

[Mincer]

In the end, appreciate the guitars for what they actually do rather than what we think they do. We are so inundated with messages that certain guitars can only do one or 2 things, and you can't play that song on that guitar.
I say, prove them all wrong and make your own path.