What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

[zionstrat]

The Prail is one of the few SD pups that I have never installed and I'm working on a design that will put one in then neck of a tele thinlineish design. So I'm trying to imagine how it will sound and if I should mount it rail high, or rail low (as normal).

One of the factors I am considering is how close or far the rail is from a traditional tele neck pup? I'm one of those rare types who has no luck with stock tele neck pups- For me, they don't have enough clarity to break through on the high end or enough midrange to punch through the middle- So if the Prail rail is a lot like a tele neck, I would probably keep it at the bottom and only use it to complete the humbucker.

On the other hand, if it is brighter than a tele, I could imagine mounting it high to grab 24th fret harmonics.

If it's more of a midrange, hotter wind it seems like it could make sense in either position and appreciate thoughts on all of this-

Cheers,
Zstrat

 

[BriGuy1968]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

I find the rail on my neck P-Rail to be plenty bright... much more so than a typical Tele neck pup, but not overly bright either.

To be fair, though, it's in my Ibanez Artcore AS-83 (335-ish semi-hollow), so not at all similar to a Tele.

Here's a link to me playing it. In the first quarter of the song I start out with the neck pickup set to rail only.

(After that it's bridge series, and a quick neck rail to end the first half. 2nd half starts with bridge series, to neck series, back to bridge series and ends with neck series).

https://youtu.be/v2zD1yuo3oQ

 

[dystrust]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Like BriGuy I find the rail coils to be plenty bright, and IMO they sound nothing like a Tele pickup in either position. It's really it's own beast; the closest I've played tone-wise is the Vintage Rails for Strat.

 

[Dave Locher]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

I find the rail on my neck P-Rail to be plenty bright... much more so than a typical Tele neck pup, but not overly bright either.

To be fair, though, it's in my Ibanez Artcore AS-83 (335-ish semi-hollow), so not at all similar to a Tele.

Here's a link to me playing it. In the first quarter of the song I start out with the neck pickup set to rail only.

(After that it's bridge series, and a quick neck rail to end the first half. 2nd half starts with bridge series, to neck series, back to bridge series and ends with neck series).

https://youtu.be/v2zD1yuo3oQ

Sounds great! Straight into amp? What is your amp?

 

[BriGuy1968]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Sounds great! Straight into amp? What is your amp?

lol... you're gonna laugh!

It is indeed running straight into the amp, and the amp is a little Fender Champion 40 that I use for practicing at home. It's a modeling amp, and the amp model is a '65 Princeton with the gain on about 8.

 

[Dave Locher]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Not laughing. I am ALL about getting good sounds out of atypical equipment.

 

[zionstrat]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Thanks guys- Great input.
Assuming both of yours are normal installs with the rail at the bottom?

 

[BriGuy1968]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Thanks guys- Great input.
Assuming both of yours are normal installs with the rail at the bottom?

That's correct... the OCD part of me won't let myself mount a pickup with the logo upside down! [emoji12]

 

[dystrust]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Thanks guys- Great input.
Assuming both of yours are normal installs with the rail at the bottom?

Mine are as well.

Per Frank Falbo mounting them with the rails on the inside will yield tones similar to Strat bridge/middle with both rails active. It doesn't sound exactly the same, but definitely in the same ballpark. The bridge rail is also VERY bright when installed farther from the bridge, so I didn't want to make it brighter still by mounting it closer.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

 

[zionstrat]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Mine are as well.
mounting them with the rails on the inside will yield tones similar to Strat bridge/middle with both rails active.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

Strat is very good- Sounds like I will mount as designed and looking forward to trying out!
Thanks all

 

[Mincer]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

I did inside rails on mine, but mine was on a Steinberger which is about as anti-tele as you can get. They worked for many things, but I think I would have liked the neck pickup in a 22 fret guitar better than 24. I don't think that the distance to the bridge is right for the best sound out of the P-Rails...at least I wasn't capable of getting the sound I had in my head.

 

[zionstrat]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

I would have liked the neck pickup in a 22 fret guitar better than 24.

Thanks Mincer, you hit one of the related issues- It's a 22 and I'm routing out space below the tele pup- I would rather rout down as opposed to getting closer to the neck pocket.

My initial thinking is that mounting the rail high would keep it in the sweet spot, while the p90 coil would be a bit south.

Now I'm rethinking, if single blade has enough highs by itself, it might be better to the P90 higher (as is normal) because it may have a stronger need for the 24th area harmonics.

So it's something of an experiment, but will be nice to see if prails does what I need for this build-

Cheers,
m

 

[Mincer]

Re: What does the neck rail in a Prail sound like? Better to mount up or down?

Yeah, I would think that you can do some experimenting to make sure the most favored coil is where you want it. I don't like my neck pickup (which I use the most) to be anywhere but the sweet spot. So I might experiment with the orientation. I liked the P90 coil the best, though other combos were good, too. I liked series the least.