Which Pickup ??

Hi.

I use a Goldstar Sound S***t pretty much solid for 20 years & I wouldn't part with it, or change it for anything.
I installed a set of Bill Lawrence L220 Stacked H Buckers when I bought it & it's my sound.

My dilema is, I just got an identical Goldstar off ebay last week & the Stock Pickups I know are superb, but I want something hotter in the bridge, so it can sound more Gibson like.
I have a Duncan Hot Rails I picked up cheap, again courtesy of ebay, but the more reviews I read etc, I'm put off by the comments about muddiness To Hot to control. Only good for Metal etc, so I'd really appreciate any comments/suggestions from anyone out there.

Thanks.

Im a big fan of the Tom Holmes pickups. They have gotten really expensive and difficult too find though so i dont know how many more of them I will be buying. The ones I have will never be for sale.

The next set of pickups I try will be from this guy:

http://www.wolfetone.com/

I got a chance to play a very recent custom shop '62 SG gibson reissue side by side with a virtually identical gibson '61 SG reissue that had the 57 classic pickups in it and I was really impressed with the custom shops pickups. I dont know the details, but they had really improved something about them. I didnt have a guitar loaded with Holmes pickups to compare it to.

goddardo said:

I have a Duncan Hot Rails I picked up cheap, again courtesy of ebay, but the more reviews I read etc, I'm put off by the comments about muddiness To Hot to control. Only good for Metal etc, so I'd really appreciate any comments/suggestions from anyone out there.

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Did you try the Seymour Duncan forum already?

http://www.seymourduncan.com/forum/search.php?

Hello mate,
Have you checked out these?:
www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk
The guy who owns the business is very knowledgable about how to achieve different sounds etc with his pickups and does all kinds of custom stuff. There's a forum on the site which is worth looking at for what he's done already.
I've heard several of the humbuckers and I have one of his P90s in one of my guitars - they're all as least as good as anything anyone else is putting out.

Fender Collectors Edition Stratocasters have the Texas Special Single coils, I have literally had over 100 Fender Strats and Tokai Strat's- These Texas Special pickups are the PHATEST sounding Single coils I have ever heard-I'm a Les Paul man and these are the only one's I have played/heard that cut the mustard and come close tto the Humbucker sound.

Go for the Bare Knuckle pickups. I have a Trilogy Set which are 15.5kOhms in the Bridge and 11.5KOhms in the Mid and Neck. They are
awesome

He sells a single coil called The Sinner that is wound to 22kOhms :evil:

Tim @ Bare Knuckle also rewinds pickups to your taste for ?32 each !!!
I've just sent him two of my Fender Texas Special Pickups to be rewound.
They will be rewound as "Irish Tours" - to give a SRV /Hendrix /Gallagher sound.

I sent them Saturday and he returned them the folowing Thursday !!!!

Check out the Bare Knuckle Pickup website and go to their forum section. There is a sub section called players where people have uploaded MP3's of them playing with their new pickups.

Tim is the lead guitarist in Ozzmosis, an Ozzy Tribute band. He is one hell of a player, he's got Rhodes' tone nailed. He's uploaded a few of their tracks, Diary of a Madman. Check these out !

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=544&highlight=diary+madman

Hans-Jurgen Check this out mate

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=440&highlight=ozzmosis

Strat tone demo's for the Irish Tours

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=456&highlight=strat

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=390&highlight=strat

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=389&highlight=strat

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=298&highlight=strat

Enjoy

I have a Dimarzio ProTrack, that I think makes an excellent complement to singlecoils. No routing required. It's not totally humbucker-hot, but it's pretty close. A real humbucker is hard to balance with single-coils anyway, I think. I like it. Great 2-position sound too. I have a Cool Rails and I like the Dimarzio better. It also looks higher quality. I think the construction on the Duncan Rails looks kind of cheap.

chrisheyes said:

Hans-Jurgen Check this out mate

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Err... right... err... which one? :-? And... err... why? :-? :wink:

Hans-Jurgen

I was pointing you in the direction of their humbucker sounds, as they are cool

chrisheyes said:

I was pointing you in the direction of their humbucker sounds, as they are cool

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OK, now I got it... :wink: Well, I confess having tested and even owned overwound pickups in the past (e.g. that Super Distortion clone in my LS120 right now with 12 kOhm or the Jeff Beck from Seymour Duncan in my H?fner semi-acoustic), but usually I would rather prefer a PAF style pickup somewhere in the 7-8 kOhm range nowadays. Aren't those Bareknuckles quite expensive, too?

You are quite right Hans-Jurgen, the Bare Knuckles are expensive, but that's because they are hand made.

I've ben lucky and picked up fully sets of strat pickups on ebay for what one idividual one would cost brand new 8)

I've also sent dead texas special pickups, which I've been given to them for rewinding. They came back to me, within 4 days re-wound, wax dipped and new vintage hook up wires installed !! All for ?32 each. Excellent valve, see in the photo below.



Bare Knuckle don't just do hot overwound pickups they do vintage sets too. In your persuit of the perfect PAF Hans-Jurgen then a "Stormy Monday" humbucker would be to your taste.

http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/ZH-stormymonday.html

I've also just put some MudCat pickups from Leosoundsinto my Breezysound. They are handmade and scatter wound too by a guy called Michael Pantleon in Germany.

At my request he staggered the pole pieces and put cloth type vintage wire on them to give tem the vintage vibe. I'm really happy with their open vintage sound

Check out his website and MP3's

www.leosounds.de

Hi Everyone.

Thanks for all those suggestions.
Those Bareknuckle's sound promising
I'm also spending a bit of time scanning ebay for that elusive bargain.

I did mail the guy at Bareknuckle & for my playing style, IE 60's-70's Blues/Rock in the vein of Page, Allmans, Robben Ford, Steely Dan & getting a bit cleaner for SRV & Hendrix tone, he suggested Irish tour pickups & that the Sinner would be too hot for my tastes.
I love the Rory Gallagher tone too, so that might be the way to go.

What do you think of the Duncan Lil 59 or JB Junior for my styles ?
Those are another option I'm thinking about.

Just out of interest, has anyone experienced Bill Lawrence stacked Humbuckers ? I've had a set of cream coloured L220'S in my other Tokai for 20 years & there they'll stay forever. Absolutely superb, but not quite as hot as I'd like for my 2nd Tokai.

Thanks.

Has anyone tried these yet?

http://www.wolfetone.com/

I talked to Wolfe on the phone last week and these pickups sound very promising. His guarantee cannot be beat. If you dont like them he will rewind them until you are happy. Cant ask for more than that. The covers look right. The only covers Ive seen other than the Holmes pickups that have the sharp edges like a real PAF.

goddardo,

I had a little '59 in the same Strat that now has the ProTrack for a few years. It wasn't bad, but it's thin and a little harsh compared to a full size 'bucker. I still vote for the ProTrack. You probably won't find one on ebay. I don't think they are that popular, probably due to the relatively poor description on DiMarzio's site. They do say it sounds like a "vintage PAF", but they push it mostly for the neck position.

I'm pretty sure the "Tightrope" on our website is mostly position 2 with the ProTrack and the middle single coil for the rhythym parts. The end solo on "I Wish" is the ProTrack alone (rhythym parts on this are pos. 2 as well, I think).

http://www.swampcoolermusic.com/music.htm