Nov 11, 2009 12:43 am raising the pick ups wont mess anything up.
if your pick ups are passive then you can raise them up quite a bit.
Quick Question on pickups
Posted on Nov 11, 2009 12:31 am
Fragile
Member Since: Sep 30, 2009
On my epi les paul, i had a set of seymour duncan pickups installed (jazz and jb). I notice that the neck pickup is much louder than the bridge, is this a problem? Or is that somewhat desirable for tone one way or another?
I've considered raising the bridge pickup, but i don't want to mess it up. The guy that installed them seemed like he knew what he was doing, and they certainly look"fine tuned" like he took his time setting them up once they were on.
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Nov 11, 2009 12:43 am raising the pick ups wont mess anything up.
if your pick ups are passive then you can raise them up quite a bit.
Nov 11, 2009 01:21 am I would lower the louder pickup instead of raising the quieter one. Or find a middle ground between the two, raising one and lowering the other.
The reason being is that the higher you raise a pickup, the more magnetic pull the pickup will impart on the strings. This tends to dampen the vibrations of the strings and it will negatively affect sustain.
Nov 11, 2009 01:27 am Gotcha. I'll experiment then, and try to go lower. thanks guys.
Nov 11, 2009 02:14 am well if you go too high yeah, but you'd be pretty much right on the strings for that to be an issue.
if you dont go high enough it sounds thin.
Nov 11, 2009 08:47 am I dont know anything about pickup calibration and hopefully not hijacking this thred, but Deon, could u elaborate on this whole high low thick thin issue? i dont even know wat high is
Nov 11, 2009 09:33 am hahaha, yeah sorry bout that,
high as in pick up height, and thin as in thin sounding.
yeah want too informative.
actually i was messing with my pickups today and you can absolutley got too high towards the strings with yer pickups, and it sounds like you say, as if the sound is thrown around all over the place tone wise.
a result of the magnets being too close to the strings.
go too low and you miss out on the fullness of the strings.
there's a small window where the pick up is operating best.
gotta take into account also when you play, you push down on the strings toward the pick ups.
maybe thats getting a bit too silly with it but, if yer pushing it height wise then its something to consider.
i play kinda hard (which ive been trying for years to back off abit) so im more inclined to back my pickups off a bit.
one thing that does seem to happen with EMG actives is, if you go too high with em, it almost sounds like they overload, like they are clipping. the response just isnt there along with a crapy tone.
Nov 11, 2009 09:33 am I suspect that the difference in volume is more due to the way it has been installed than the hight-to-strings issue.
Here's a page I found that may help explain it a little better for you, Fragile ...
ashbass.com/AshBassGuitar/parallelseries.html
Nov 11, 2009 10:22 am Hmm. I'm not too sure, from what i gathered this seemed to be more for the combined pickup signal, right? I could be wrong haha but i think my problem lies in each pickup being compared with each other, like the switch on the neck vs switch on the bridge. Either way, nifty article and a good read :]
@ deon, thanks a lot! that made me consider quite a bit more. I'll probably raise them a bit, i did really like how my neck pickup sounded. Those jazz pickups have a beautiful tone, especially with a bright switch on my amp (I'm hoping when i buy the line6 model packs I'll be able to find a modeled amp with a similar sparkling clean tone).
Oh yeah, when you adjust the pickups, do you just sort of raise the entire pickup to where you like it, then match the other pickup to it, then "fine tune" with the individual string magnet things? Like, is there any particular order of operations you go in to get the best tone?
Nov 11, 2009 11:44 am Here's an article from Gibson.com that should apply to you since you're playing an Epi.
www.gibson.com/en-us/Life...ckup%20Heights/
They recommend putting the neck pickup slightly lower than the bridge pickup and explain why. They also suggest going slightly lower than standard height. Since you're playing a LP, you're using humbucking pickups that have enough output to compensate for slightly lower height settings. This gives the strings more "elbow room" so to speak, and you have plenty of other places in your signal chain to make up for slight gain reductions right up front.
And if your pickups have individual adjustable pole pieces, it's suggested to keep them flush with the pickup. Then, if you can detect any imbalance in the volume of any particular string, then adjust that string's pole piece accordingly.
Here's a video at Seymour Duncan's website that shows how to install and adjust pickups for LPs, Strats, and Teles. You can forward to about the 7 minute mark where he talks about height adjustment:
www.seymourduncan.com/sup...nstalling-pick/
Good luck, hope this helps.
Nov 11, 2009 12:21 pm Very cool video, there. Nice find Tad!
Nov 11, 2009 12:44 pm Very nice indeed! Thanks for the research! Haha it never occurred to me to look up videos from the manufacturer, duh. Thanks tad :]
Nov 11, 2009 02:21 pm Ok one last thing, my neck pickup. Ever since it was installed the guy left it sort of angled up, like... hmm lets draw a picture
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Haha not the most beautiful pic but thats sort of what it looks like. Is that a problem being slanted like that? also, it sort of slopes up, the side closer to the neck is higher, the side towards the bridge of the guitar is lower.
Nov 11, 2009 02:23 pm Glad to help. I think that Seymour Duncan is one of those rare companies that has a very helpful website that's full of good technical advice. There's lots of helpful into about selecting, installing, and troubleshooting pickups on their site.
Nov 11, 2009 02:28 pm Oh and actually, my bad. It slants in the opposite direction haha. crap. yeah i'm not redoing my picture so you'll just have to make due.
The top of the pickup is touching the left side, the bottom of the pickup is close to, but not touching, the right side.
if you guys want a real picture, i could supply one later.
Nov 11, 2009 04:06 pm I'm no expert on pickup installation, but from what I can gather, as long as the pole pieces are generally in line with the strings, it'll be OK. The magnetic field extends around those pole pieces for a distance, and as long as you don't think that it sounds bad, then I wouldn't sweat it.
But I'd think that your tech would have at least put that pickup in straight...I think that's just a little bit of a rushed installation.
If you think it sounds off, and none of the available adjustments can make it sound right to you (your ears are the most important customer here), then take it back to the tech and see if he'll stand behind his work and correct the alignment for you.
Otherwise, plug in, turn up, and jam out!
Nov 11, 2009 08:05 pm There are a billion tweaks out there and even angled pickups are in there.
Everything else has been covered for the most part so I'll leave this as is.
Nov 12, 2009 01:53 am ive never hooked up a tuner when adjusting pickups, im thinking the more "out" so to speak the pick ups are, the harder it would be to get a good tone, and therefore it will be harder for the tuner to pick up the correct tuning.
just a thought.
i know when i raise mine too high it sounds terrible. the tuner's gotta have a **** of a time trying to get the gist of what's going on.
maybe even trying to adjust the git/pickups with your amp miked up and use headphones.
might give that a go myself, sounds interesting.
it could also be total crap, i dunno.
just dribbling a bit.
Nov 12, 2009 09:18 am Yeah, i've been messing around with it while pluged in, i definately heard it raised too high and heard an out of tune harmonic, just like you said!
Its hard for me to remember where it sounds better, i really outta record it low and slowly raise it, then playback and see where i like it best. I'm not sure why i haven't done that yet haha.
Oh and also, i took the pickup out (not off the wire, just out of the hole). I tried putting it back in strait, and i think i did a slightly better job, its not being pushed up any longer. But still, its like the screw holes or something either on the plate or on the pickup aren't meant to be lined up. The screws pull the pickup into that slanted position. Ah well, shouldn't be a big deal.
Nov 12, 2009 07:51 pm oh now i know what you mean, yeah the screw threads are in on an angle.
Yeah not much you can do about that really. should be cool anyway man. wouldnt worry.
as Devin Townsend once said...."play that stupid piece of ****!"
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