Piledriving

[Sal Paradise]

Hi all. Forum newcomer here.

In posts I've read here on the BKP Piledriver, a lot of people seem to match the Pildriver bridge with other Tele neck models -- say, a Yardbird or Boss neck.

Does this offer more tonal flexibility than going with the straight Piledriver set?

Also, is there any common ground, tonally speaking, between the Flat 50 set and the Piledriver set? I'd previously understood that the Piledrivers were intended to give that meaty Broadcaster-type growl?

Could anyone offer some insight?

Thanks!

Btw, would love to hear some Piledriver sound clips if anyone has some.

[TwilightOdyssey]

Welcome! I combined both of your threads to avoid confusion.

[Sal Paradise]

Bump! Hey, did I come to the right forum?   :?

[ailean]

Hi Sal

Welcome to the forum.

I'm affraid I can't offer much information on comparison, but my wife put a set of Piledrivers in her Tele and it sounds lovely, it lost some of the top end compared to the stock fender pups but the sound was much clearer and it has loads more mid range now.

When the others wake up they'll be able to give you a better answer, or try emailing Tim, he always comes back with a good answer.

[38thBeatle]

Yeah sorry, welcome from me too.I have a Tele however I have Country Boys in mine so I am of no use but hopefully others with knowledge of Piledrivers can ship in.

[badgermark]

I'm keeping a close eye on this thread too, looking for a set of BKP for my tele, and thinking of a piledriver set.

[CJ]

i'd definitely email tim. most users here appear to be humbucker users. i don't see many threads about single coils. not that they're not great, it just seems to me like there's more metalheads here.

[PhilKing]

I have 3 BK Tele bridge pickups, Piledriver, Brown Sugar and flat pole Blackguard.  I also have a couple of other Teles to compare them with too.  If I tell you that the tone I had on the amp (Marshall Silver Jubilee with 2 Celestion Sidewinders), was set to give the exact ring for the Brown Sugar opening chords, and that the Brown Sugar really had it nailed, I can compare the Blackguard and Piledriver with that.

The Blackguard was jsut as capable of the Brown Sugar sound, however it has a bit more air to the tone and is not quite as powerful as the Brown Sugar itself.  It is a very classic tele tone and sounds great for blues as much as when you drive it for rock.  It has the sweetest clean tones of the 3 pickups.

The Piledriver will get the tone of the ending to Stairway (as she walks on down the road......).  It is a darker tone than the BS and BG, with more power.  It can still deliver head cutting cleans, but there is not quite the same top end.

Overall the BG is very versatile, but if you want the darker Broadcaster sound then the Piledriver has it.  If on the other hand you love the sound of the Stones, then get the Brown Sugar!

You can see the teles with a bit more description in the Guitars, Amps and Effects section.

[Sal Paradise]

PhilKing, thank you for the helpful reply!

I also received a very comprehensive response after emailing Tim, which I've pasted below in case other Tele players are interested.

Thanks to all.

+++

When I design the sets I voice the neck pickups as a good tonal match and to balance with the bridges output-wise so you get a got matched pair as it were.

Mix/matching is fine and will produce varying tonal effects -- the Boss neck is quite close to a PD neck so there's not going to be such a noticeable difference, but the YB neck is Alnico IV which will produce a more organic tone in the neck slot and also a more unique in between tone as you'll be hearing AV and AIV together which has a lovely cluck to it.

The PD and BG Flat 50 are very different sets altogether. The PD set reflects the very hot lapsteel coils that the early Tele coils were modeled on -- fat, almost P90/humbuckeresque richness to the tone -- not a typical Tele voice in comparison to contemporary Tele coils but certainly retains  the Tele flavour with a lot of extra power.

The Flat 50 is a reproduction of the original Broadcaster/Esquire/Nocaster coils -- much closer to what you'd be used to in the terms of Tele tone but more muscular than later 50s and early 60s coils which started the trend for the brighter coils and eventual "icepicks" of the 70s.