Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Pickups => Topic started by: aris17561 on May 20, 2013, 11:50:27 AM
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Hello everyone...
I have a jackson sl2h usa ... It is a great guitar with a perfect neck but... :cry: :cry: dark sounding... Its not that I am playing van halen , but I have a suhr and it is way way brighter... To be more specific , Jackson is mat sounding ... I was ready to sell it , but everytime I make the descision , I play it for last time... and when I feel this neck , i change my mind... So there must be a solution... This guitar costs every peny as far as the constraction but the sound is moderate... !!! Now I have changed the Seymour duncan Jb that has , and i have put the duncan distortion... Stil mat , and dark...
I want heavy tuning , brightness BUT NOT FIZZYNESS... I hate fizz sound...
It is neck through so , regardless that jackson says its an alder body guitar , I say that it is more a maple body guitar with alder wings because the neck is maple and it goes through body.Eboy fretboard . So help.... You are responsible for the future of this guitar... 8)
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If you want a guitar to come alive I would say your best bets are the Emerald and the Rebell Yell. Those are the two brightest BKPs after all. They both are really tight and work for lower tunings, though I think the emerald might even take the cake on the later.
Fizzyness is not something I have ever felt in a BKP, so I would not really worry about that much.
If you could tell a bit more about how low you tune and a little more on which styles you play I can specify my recommendation more, but right now I think you just canīt go wrong with the Emerald.
Cheers
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If you want a guitar to come alive I would say your best bets are the Emerald and the Rebell Yell. Those are the two brightest BKPs after all. They both are really tight and work for lower tunings, though I think the emerald might even take the cake on the later.
Fizzyness is not something I have ever felt in a BKP, so I would not really worry about that much.
If you could tell a bit more about how low you tune and a little more on which styles you play I can specify my recommendation more, but right now I think you just canīt go wrong with the Emerald.
Cheers
To be honest I have in my mind the emeralds but are they gonna push hard my soldano slo ? Ι am playing mostly iced earth style music but now , i got a les paul so , it will be my main iced earth style guitar... No I feel that I want to tune the jackon in c or drop a , but this is not something surely , so I want a pup that can work good in low tuning but If i decide to tune my guitar in e flat or d# which is my favourite , to work well.
My amps are soldano , evh 5153 , and marshal jvm..
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Check the tone pot. Mine had a 250K for the factory, probably to tame the high end of the stock JB.
I never noticed when I swapped in a Holy Diver, and it sounded a little dark. 2 years later I'm cleaning the switch and noticed the pot, swapped it for a 500K and it's perfect.
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Kiichi has hit the nail on the head here, I'll second his suggestion, the Emerald or Rebel Yell are the way to go if you want it bright :)
Regarding the guitar:
I don't consider Jacksons to be dark sounding, especially not with a Maple Neck, Alder Wings and an Ebony Fretboard. Neither is the Duncan Distortion a dark pickup. Have you bought the guitar used? Maybe someone changed the pots to 25k ones (used with active pickups like EMGs) and hasn't put proper ones back into it. Or have you checked the wiring? I would try to sort those things out first, especially get some 550k BKP Pots or even an 1 Meg Ohm Pot and see how the sound changes.
Cheers
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I just open the back of the jackson and saw that the volume control is the small one... I cannot see if it is a 500k or a 250 k because it is erased but it is tiny pot. The tone for exaple is double the size of the volume... I dont know if you can understand something from this... I made a quick clip to see what i mean.. I am not sure its clear here because the disrtotion comes from a pod farm using impulses... I ussually rec with a mic in front of a cab but now i needed something quick... If it is not noticable tell me to make another clip... Suhr is brighter in real...
https://soundcloud.com/aris17561/jackson-sl2h-vs-suhr
Until the 20 sec is jackson... The rest is suhr
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The size of a pot does not say anything about the value far as I know. I only use the small ones for my pedal and mini amp builds and they come in every value.
Guess you would have to measure them if you can to be sure.
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I guess I can maybe be of some assistance here as I own a Jackson SL3 so although it's the cheaper Japanese cousin, it's still maple neck-thru with alder wings and OFR so it can't be a million miles away in terms of tone and I've tried quite a few pickups in it. The guitars aren't dark but they can be flat so I certainly recognise what you're saying there. I think that maple must be a really difficult wood for a pickup to cut through as everything I've tried sounded better in other guitars. Anyway, here's a rundown of my experiences with pickups in maple neck-thrus:
JB
Flat, dull and could turn to mush under gain. Nothing special at all but sounded a LOT better when I dropped it into a Yamaha Pacifica. It really made that guitar come alive but you're right, it's not for your Jackson.
Alnico Nailbomb
Bright enough to cut through any mix and as tight as hell. VERY aggressive sounding with a real 90s Metal, hairy feel to it. Not particularly versatile in the Jackson but good if you liked that really aggressive, tight sound. Not for me in that guitar so I sent it back.
Holydiver
Awesome pickup. Tonally in the same ballpark as the JB but significantly better in every respect. A thick sounding pickup with plenty mids which some may find too much on a neck-thru Jackson, which is naturally quite middy anyway. Fortunately I like mids. Very articulate but once I got a PRS with a Holydiver I started wanting something with a slightly more aggressive edge to it.
Miracle Man
This is what currently resides in my Jackson and it works beautifully. The slightly scooped nature of the pickup complements the middy nature of the guitar so you end up with a sound that is quite thick, smooth and balanced. It's tighter and more aggressive than the Holydiver but retains that thick smoothness while not having the balls out brutallity of the Nailbomb.
Emerald
This was actually bought for a PRS SE Custom 24 (mahogany body, maple neck) but while the Emerald neck was fine, the bridge version was way too bright. I tried it very quickly in the Jackson and while it cut through that flatness of the Jackson very well, it could be a bit bright and shrill. I'd only use the neck version myself unless it was in a Les Paul style guitar.
Cold Sweat
This was actually in an Ibanez rather than my Jackson but it was still a maple neck-thru with locking trem so I think its inclusion here is warranted. Like the Emerald it's a bright pickup but it's not as open or shrill sounding. Less compressed or thick sounding than the Holydiver or Miracle Man but if you're considering an Emerald I doubt if that bothers you. It was very articulate, cut through the maple beautifully and had enough openness left to give at least a suggestion of a super-hot PAF.
Out of all those, I like the Miracle Man best in my Jackson but if you want something a bit more open and brighter, I'd look to the Cold Sweat instead of the Emerald. If you used a Cold Sweat bridge, an Emerald neck would go really well. It would with a Miracle Man bridge too.
Final two tips:
1) Get your pickups open poled. Getting covered pickups on a maple neck-thru just makes it harder for them to cut through in my experience and you're stuck with that 'flat' sound you want rid of.
2) Install BKP 550k pots and a Jenson BKP 0.022 capacitor regardless of what's in your Jackson stock. It REALLY helps.