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Post by LeoThunder on Jul 4, 2018 5:42:41 GMT
I wonder if the first upgrade to do is not to change the electronics instead. The values of resistance and capacitance play a major role in determining the cutting frequency of the system, so I would expect adjusting them could help as much as replacing pick-ups while costing a lot less. Has anyone done that? Response of a Fender Stratocaster pickup with 470 pF load capacitance and different Ohmic loads: Response of a Fender Stratocaster pickup (1972) with 10 MOhms ohmic load and eight different capacitive loads:The above is taken from The Secrets of Electric Guitar Pickups
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Post by oghkhood on Jul 4, 2018 7:27:33 GMT
It depends if you can do with the original pups : I never could And yes, I always upgraded caps and pots with the pups
The very least there was to do was to re-do all the solders. But I heard that they are done better since HB are made in Vietnam
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Post by LeoThunder on Jul 4, 2018 7:35:18 GMT
It depends if you can do with the original pups : I never could And yes, I always upgraded caps and pots with the pups Well, no. The point here is that changing the values of pots and caps will change how the whole system sounds, so it might reveal the original pick-ups, dull them out or colour them depending on what the changes do. You never heard the original pick-ups on their own, only together with the rest. They might have been terrible or only built into a terrible match. I would expect manufacturers to optimise that match, each pick-up type receiving its own fine tuned electronics, but I wonder if cheap brands do this. I don't think "upgrading" pots and caps changes anything unless their values change. This is very much their only quality aside from their ability to resist the passing of time unchanged.
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Post by Harmann on Jul 4, 2018 8:41:58 GMT
I'm not really a jazz player, but the clean sound I love the most is defintely in the region of Jazz. (Toots Thielemans on guitar is what I prefer) What's most important to me, is the first sound you hear when attacking a string: the scratch of a thick pick or even better the slightly slower slide of your fingertip when hitting a note. I'm talking about the first quarter of a second. Then you you will hear a "slow wooden plock" (dont' know what else to call it).
This sound I can find with most humbuckers & p90's, the lower there output the better. (I always seem to fight with hot pickups) When lowering my pickups I get closer to that wooden sound. Put some heavy flatwound strings on your guitar en you'll be in heaven. I prefer my HB SC550 tobacco to get this sound, even more than my epiphone dot. In my mind the hollow part is something you can feel more than you can hear it. I think it's not necessary to get a Jazz tone. Unless you get a real archtop jazz guitar with a small wooden bridge, that makes a big part in the jazz sound. (but these guitars are uncomfortable)
I know I sometimes have a strange way of looking at things, but the only tip I can give is to try different things untill you find what you like. Think outside the box & don't listen to what other people say or think & make up your own mind. (I clearly don't listen to myself since the point of giving an opinion seems meaningless to myself)
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Post by LeoThunder on Jul 4, 2018 8:53:44 GMT
What's most important to me, is the first sound you hear when attacking a string: the scratch of a thick pick or even better the slightly slower slide of your fingertip when hitting a note. I'm talking about the first quarter of a second. Then you you will hear a "slow wooden plock" (dont' know what else to call it). Yes. I wouldn't know how to call this but I think I understand. This is all in the high frequencies. Is it clarity, presence, texture, definition? It makes the sound real. It also makes it worth varying pick attacks or the type of pick used. Lose this and the instrument feels truncated. I might round off the tone to get the "regular" highs down (that twangy stuff) but I want to hear that raspy presence. One day, I'll want to look at the frequency spectrum of a guitar amplifier. I'm pretty sure it looks completely funny, not flat at all.
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Post by Harmann on Jul 4, 2018 9:19:23 GMT
Indeed, That higher frequencies (I call them mids , since the jazz guitar frequency band spectrum is very limited) + the moment where the body of the sound comes in. Those are the things that make the sound to me.
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Post by LeoThunder on Jul 4, 2018 9:21:54 GMT
I think these are the higher highs, actually.
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Post by oghkhood on Jul 4, 2018 19:51:00 GMT
I don't think "upgrading" pots and caps changes anything unless their values change. This is very much their only quality aside from their ability to resist the passing of time unchanged. Ooooh yes it does, but not the way you think. When I'm talking about upgrade, I'm keeping the same values, but change for better quality parts, wire and soldering. Better pots mean oubviously more progressive thus exploitable commands of tone and volume, and the better they are, the more you will find a use to them. Using better wires, and moreover soldering the whole stuff the way it has to be done also brings a perceptible change to your guitar voicing, in terms of clarity and dynamics : it sounds more defined, the responsiveness to your gameplay is better, that's all... and you get an incomparable reliability of course
I won't engage any discussion about caps : too much chit chat about this since the first caveman plugged a Strat into a tube amp
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Post by salteedog on Jul 5, 2018 0:05:54 GMT
I wonder if the first upgrade to do is not to change the electronics instead. The values of resistance and capacitance play a major role in determining the cutting frequency of the system, so I would expect adjusting them could help as much as replacing pick-ups while costing a lot less. Has anyone done that? Response of a Fender Stratocaster pickup with 470 pF load capacitance and different Ohmic loads: Response of a Fender Stratocaster pickup (1972) with 10 MOhms ohmic load and eight different capacitive loads:The above is taken from The Secrets of Electric Guitar PickupsLeoThunder Spreadsheet at the following link might interest you. It models guitar circuitry electrical response.
www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/new-volume-tone-simulation-spreadsheet.950647/
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Post by LeoThunder on Jul 5, 2018 3:42:01 GMT
Yes, thank you. This seems to be just what one needs to start making sense instead of supposing things. I'll be playing with this. Then of course, it would make upgrading a guitar a conscious, calculated thing. I am left with my question, of course, which I don't expect anyone here to answer unless they'd have some inside knowledge. Do guitar manufacturers fine tune their electronics to precisely match pick-up characteristics or are they merely selecting "usual" values out of a short list (250 kOhm pots for single coils, 500 kOhm for humbuckers…). Will this differentiate a cheap guitar from some more expensive one? Do Roswell sound bad because they were stuck in circuitry designed for Wilkinson? Or do they sound better because they are designed with the common component values in mind? This is actually what I would do as Harley Benton R&D Manager: "Hey Roswell, I want to use a very restricted variety of standard components so I can buy them in bulk at the lowest price and reduce complexity in production or repair. We'll just have one single coil and one humbucker variants. Make sure your pick-ups sound best with them." But then, you still want coil split, high and low output pick-ups and more, so there's no miracle.
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Post by LeoThunder on Jul 5, 2018 4:32:56 GMT
I don't think "upgrading" pots and caps changes anything unless their values change. This is very much their only quality aside from their ability to resist the passing of time unchanged. Ooooh yes it does, but not the way you think. When I'm talking about upgrade, I'm keeping the same values, but change for better quality parts, wire and soldering. Better pots mean oubviously more progressive thus exploitable commands of tone and volume, and the better they are, the more you will find a use to them. Using better wires, and moreover soldering the whole stuff the way it has to be done also brings a perceptible change to your guitar voicing, in terms of clarity and dynamics : it sounds more defined, the responsiveness to your gameplay is better, that's all... and you get an incomparable reliability of course
I won't engage any discussion about caps : too much chit chat about this since the first caveman plugged a Strat into a tube amp I don't think short wires make a difference but a guitar cable is a long capacitor and I guess sloppy soldering could also introduce that sort of thing. Why don't we just put cameras on guitars and use real time analysis of finger movements to trigger pre-recorded samples? We could even cheat and recognise popular solos…
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3,968 posts
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Post by salteedog on Jul 5, 2018 7:29:34 GMT
No. Guitar makers just use standard values - usually 500kohm pots for humbuckers and 250k for single coils. They do not fine tune for each pickup model.
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