How HOT is HOT?

[skay]

What would you define as a HOT pickup? Would anything over 8.0k be considered Hot by P.A.F standards?

  The reason I am raising this question is that I'm having trouble keeping my 8.4k Mule bridge pickup from overdriving the preamp on my Vox AC30 (I'm using it in a Gibson Les Paul) and it is sounding less-than-vintage at the moment. Have I bought the wrong type of pickup? Is this too powerful for the P.A.F tones I am striving for?

    I like crispy and edgey tones, the origional Burstbuckers did this really well but could sometimes go too far and sound shrill in the upper harmonics. I thought a set of Mules would give me more openess and vintage bite without the ice-pick highs, but it seems i've lost all the characteristics of what I liked about my guitars sound in the first place...

   I've already been in contact with Tim regarding my situation, but i'd also like some of your input into this. I have already lowered the entire pickup, then messed around with the individual pole pieces and turned down the gain on my amp etc but still all I'm getting is too much drive that is resulting in a somewhat 'mushy' sound. Anyone else have a similar experience like me?

   What am I doing wrong or is having the pickup unwound a little, like I've suggested in an email to Tim, the obvious answer? I've read that origional P.A.F's were fairly low in output and maybe the 8.4 is too powerful for the sounds I am after? I'm confused...

[5F6-A]

As far as I know DC resistance and output are completely different aspects to take into consideration. Normally high output P/Us have a high DC reading, but this is not always the case.

[skay]

Sounds confusing, but may help me make sense of what's going on...

The situation i'm in is the new Mule pickups drive my preamp more but sound quieter overall when amp settings are at their 'usual' for the Burstbuckers. The amount of breakup is much more but overall volume is nowhere near as loud. I'm not cutting through half as much as when using the Burstbuckers.

How can the Mules be more powerful to drive the amp but then be quieter at the same time?

[HJM]

What Les Paul is it??  Which AC30 is it? How does it sound with other guitars? If it's naturally bright guitar it could be the guitar colouring the pickups., it could be valves going off in the amp too.

All the Burstbuckers I've played are a touch on the harsh side to my ears, but that's not how I hear the Mules.

 I might suggest heading for a Stormy Monday as a solution.  :)

[skay]

It's a Gibson Historic Les Paul (R7) played through a Handwired Vox AC30 with some Mullard valves scattered around in there. My Rickenbacker and Teles sound very bright and cutting through the amp, the valves are all doing fine, and I use the Les Paul to help me get that 'thick harmonic' overdrive without the ice-pick attack.

The burstbuckers sounded fine on the edge of breakup with a good range overall, even the lower frequences but any higher gain the sound started loosing definition. On some settings, the Burstbuckers could become too bright  with the bottom end sounding cloudy and unrefined, but were by no means a 'bad' sounding pickup. I then thought if the generally 'poorly received' Burstbuckers sounded this good, I was hoping for really great things from some handwound pickups.

So far I am having no luck dialling these pickups in. The top end is ok, no shrill overtones, but the middle and bottom end is mushy and unclear when entering overdriven territory.

How do you think Stormy Mondays would suit my set-up?

[skay]

I know it can sound like I'm complaining about not getting a sound that I  wasn't acheiving in the first place, but the reason for my situation at present is that the Burstbuckers were getting me 85-90% near to the ideal sound I'm after, and instead of helping me get closer (i.e 100%), with these Mules I'd say I'm now only 60% near the sound I want...

The problems I wanted adressed, like taming the high frequences, has been adressed but at the expense of loosing the tightness of the middle and lower frequences of my Burstbuckers (and I'd never of dreamt I'd ever be praising a Gibson humbucker for its bottom end clarity!!!).

The sound of the guitar acoustically is very balanced across the strings, it is very resonant and when played absolutely clean the Mules really shine and bring out everything that is great about the guitars physical properties (i.e acoustics) but when winding up the gain to breaking up levels, the clarity takes a nose dive and the sound is almost compressed and mushy/fizzy in the middle to lower frequences, and the only way to clean them up is to back off the gain, but then I have no overdrive.

I want to like these pickups because the whole handwound aspect really appeals to me, they match my custom shop built guitar and handwired amp, I just never thought I'd have so much of a headache trying to dial them in and get them working for me.

All the promising reviews leads me to believe that I'm possibly using them in the wrong application or just not setting them up to their optimum, so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[5F6-A]

For me personally any pickup that is too high in output is a big no-no.

[skay]

So what would you consider to be 'high output' then? Is my 8.4k pickup 'high' in your opinion?
   
  How do you measure it (i.e define it as high) if DC resistance is not always a true representation of output?

[Steve-Mr Pig 2U]

I would consider anything approaching the 9K mark as hot for a vintage application.
What you are describing is very unusual as I never heard a Mule sounding muddy.
Perhaps something like the Riff Raff with its alnico V magnet and lower out put may help you cut through the mix better.

[skay]

I've just been researching what type of magnets are in the Burstbuckers, and apparently the stock BB's in the Historic Les Pauls are alnico 2. Could this be a reason for my sound going AWAY from what I was trying to get closer to? Whatever the characteristics of alnico 2 magnets are, could they be what I was liking about the BB's?

I have deliberatley kept away from using the word 'muddy' as I do not think this is a correct definition to what I'm hearing, It's more of a clarity issue where I lack punch and clarity that was so evident in the BB's, and these Mules do not sound as crispy and classic when playing chords or lead lines. Clean, as I said before, the Mules are wonderful. They are better than my Teles for warm chimey rhythm with just the right mix of everything, It's only in overdriven applications that the aforementioned problem situations rear their heads...

Isn't the Riff Raff higher in output as a general rule? The preamp being driven too-hard too-soon is also another issue I'm not liking at the moment either. My scope for playing clean has been radically compromised. I get to 25% on the gain and I'm breaking up already.

[5F6-A]

So what would you consider to be 'high output' then? Is my 8.4k pickup 'high' in your opinion?
   
  How do you measure it (i.e define it as high) if DC resistance is not always a true representation of output?

output is measured in milivolts. DC resistance is not a true  indication of tone and certainly not of output. Take this as an example:

DiMarzio HS3 is very low output pickup ( rated 93 ) but check its DC reading: a mighty 23.72 !!!!!!
Compare it to a DiMarzio Class of '55 ( a vintage replica of an old Strat P/U ). This one has an output of 110 and a Dc resistance of 5.75

[Ratrod]

Strange. I have Crawlers. They're very high output but I've never experienced anything like you have.

Mostly AII is more muddy than AIV. Maybe AV would be better for your aplication. And maybe a less hotter wind.

[HJM]

A2 is weaker than the rest of the alnicos, and I have found it to be the one most prone to mush! Having said that, in a really low DC pickup it can sound great - like in the Stormy Monday.

I've played quite a few Mule loaded Les Pauls, and not heard what your saying, this is most odd....I have played the Vox handwired, it struck me as not being a classic AC30 as it has a fair bit more gain, but still a good amp so I doubt that's the problem. What's the valve in the first gain stage on the Vox? You could try a lower gain valve here to open the amp up a bit.

Have you played around with the pickup height and screw height - I had a bit of mush from a VHII in a PRS, but adjusting the height sorted it out. Handwound pickups are very fickle  about height relative to strings, you need to find the sweetspot.

I hope we can get this sorted....

[5F6-A]

BTW, Mullard preamp valves if worn out can sound a bit mushy. How old are they? That might have someting to do with it.... ( 30 year old valves simply won't sound right even when they'll still function )

[skay]

I have messed around with the pickup height, balancing out the highs and lows, then testing overdrive/clean levels with the pickup close/far away from the strings, and after reading Dan Erlewine's book I even tried to adjust the pole pieces on the pickips (just a half turn here and there) but still I cannot get to a point where I'm happy.

I usually run my Vox with the master flat out using a Hotplate so i can dial in as much/little gain as I want, but this still didn't help the situation, so I went the old-school route of using the amp in it's intended way, cutting the master volume, still no joy.

If my sound was mushy and lacked power before the change I wouldn't be here supposidly running these pickups down (which i hope I'm not) I'm trying to discover the reasons why they're not working for me as opposed to just stating some unhelpful childish insult as on many other forums   .

    It's just that I HAD a GOOD sound, swapped in the Mules for a GREAT sound, and came out the other side here, all lost and confused... :?  I really want a handwound pickup to work, the whole lifetime aging ethos really appeals to me and I want to keep a pickup long enough for it to mellow and merge into one with the guitar.  The quality of workmanship on these pickups is truley awe-inspiring and will deliver the goods for a very long time and could easily outlive me!

   It may be a really sad statement, and I'm wincing even typing it, but could the answer be to re-wind these pickups as  clones of my origional BB's? (shoot me now!  :) ) I'm figuring, if I liked the BB's before, then maybe getting real close to their properties (magnet type and/or DC resistance etc) with the improved Bareknuckle workmanship and quality of parts, this could lead to a possible solution?