Nailbomb = Compressed Sound?

[shagga]

Hi Gang,

first up, i love my BKP pups! (Nailbomb in the brige and custom wound Stormy Monday in the neck)

i have the Nailbomb in my custom warmoth guitar, and compared to other guitars, this one sounds a little compressed.. Like in "not as dynamic" or "open sounding".

I am now trying to narrow down the reasons as to why this is like that.

My first guess is the type of woods used in the guitar (the neck especially):
It's a Korina body with flamed maple top (should'nt be any problem here!), whereas the neck is made of Wenge and has a Pao Ferro fingerboard. My guess would be the compression comes mainly from the Wenge..

But a friend of mine said, it might also be the pickups, as the wood alone would'nt make that much of a difference..

So, has anyone of you had this issue of a compressed sound with his nailbomb pickup too?

I also have a custom circuitry going on, where both pups are switchable (series - singlecoil - parallel) and a special "inductor coil" is also switchable into the circuit, so i can filter out mids rather than highs.. (makes your buckers sound more like singlecoils, as it does not cut off the highend!)

Could it be, that there is too much load on the pickups because of this circuitry, and that might cause the compressed, a little flat sound?


Any ideas and hints are very welcome, thank you all!

Cheers,
Chris

[syr2012]

I'm not familiar with any of the woods you listed (except for the maple, of course), but I've never heard of a compressed, closed-off, non-dynamic nailbomb. As I see it, the maple adds a bit of stability for dark woods and strengthens the highs and stabilizes the lows a bit. I'll look into the tonal qualities of the other woods you've used, but woods play a huge role in determining the final sound. For example, what could sound like nails on a chalkboard in alder could sound quite substantial in mahogany. A major culprit in cases where everything sounds closed-off are the pots. Do your pickups have independent tone/volume controls? Most importantly, what are their values? 250k pots for humbuckers could land you square in mud city.

[shagga]

Hi syr2012,

thanks for the reply m8!

Well, i was thinking along the same lines about my problem, must be something in the wiring of this whole thing..

Yes: I have separate vol / tone knobs for each pickup. If i remember correctly, these are 500K pots for the volume, i am pretty sure about that.. I don't get muddy tone btw, it's just that it sounds somewhat compressed, not as "lively" as some of my other guitars.. You know it's hard to explain sounds by words.. ;)

Maybe there's just something wrong with the wiring of the whole circuitry and it's "special features".. I will order some new pots and redo the whole wiring i guess. get lost of the inductor coil too, never really used that feature anyways..
RS Guitarworks has some very appealing products..

[MDV]

I havent found the NB to be terribly comressed. Its obviously got a bit to it being quite powerfull, but not much in the grand scheme.

I wouldnt think the woods would do it. Wenge is pretty bright and open, the santos wont make that much difference and the korina should be fine too. I can see how maybe, just possibly, if your guitar was acoustically midless it might give the impression of compression, but those woods shouldnt be midless!

So, that leaves your electronics, and since I have no idea what your wiring setup would do to the sound, I'm going to blame that. Try installing one pickup, without all the gubbins you said, and one vol, or even straight to jack; then you know what the pickup really sounds like in that guitar :)

[shagga]

Thanks MDV,

i guess you are right: That's the way to go figure this out..
I'll report back once i accomplished this.. might take a while though, as i am pretty hefty stressed job-wise right now.. :(

Thanks guys! :)

[Will]

Have you played with the pickup height? I don't think this is what you are describing, but if you have it a bit close to the strings, you get more output and the lows thicken.

[Henk]

Could it be, that there is too much load on the pickups because of this circuitry, and that might cause the compressed, a little flat sound?

Yes that is possible, just solder the NB to the jack and try that. The NB should be quite compressed in your guitar from what ive heard in clips, but the mids should cut trough mercilessly!

[pagan7]

Are your pickup cavities sheilded ? I know from my own experienes that  Nailbombs definitely don't take kindly to cavity sheilding. especially the thick copper tape type and sound compressed - well more nuetered actually, nowhere near as dynamic and organically "breathing" as they are without sheilding.  Just a thought.

[Whitestrat]

Nailbombs? Compressed? That's odd. the reason why I bought the NB7s for my Ibanes S7320 is PRECISELY because they're NOT compressed. They're some of the most open tones I've ever heard in the neck, and some of the most loose chuggings in the bridge. I can't really get that tight chunk of rhythm tone for some metal sounds, but they work well, and people have told me my tone isn't tight at all like it's a bad thing. hahaha... I don't care. I love the NB tones!

[sebby123]

Im thinking its the Pau Ferro which is way tighter then wenge Pau Ferro has one of the quickest responses of any wood thing of the sag of a marshall compared to the super high plate voltage of a mesa its so quick.

[ericsabbath]

I like the idea of the nailbomb sounding compressed :D
my next les paul will probably have nailbombs
I want something with a bit more mid grind than the holy diver

[sebby123]

I like the idea of the nailbomb sounding compressed :D
my next les paul will probably have nailbombs
I want something with a bit more mid grind than the holy diver

Im thinking the same wonder if its more compressed then a cold sweat due to the ceramic vs alnico

[syr2012]

I like the idea of the nailbomb sounding compressed :D
my next les paul will probably have nailbombs
I want something with a bit more mid grind than the holy diver

Im thinking the same wonder if its more compressed then a cold sweat due to the ceramic vs alnico

I'm sure the cold sweat would be more compressed, because of the ceramic being hotter. I thought the HD had more mid roar than the Nailbomb. If I'm wrong, it would be a pleasant surprise for me.

[ericsabbath]

I like the idea of the nailbomb sounding compressed :D
my next les paul will probably have nailbombs
I want something with a bit more mid grind than the holy diver

Im thinking the same wonder if its more compressed then a cold sweat due to the ceramic vs alnico

I'm sure the cold sweat would be more compressed, because of the ceramic being hotter. I thought the HD had more mid roar than the Nailbomb. If I'm wrong, it would be a pleasant surprise for me.

the cold sweat was the ultimate winner in my jap les paul
but I want my next les paul to have something different
I thought about black dogs or riff raffs, then I came back to really... I can't live without MASSIVE tone :D
I will test my old and now homeless holy diver in the guitar first as a parameter just to check the guitar voicing (I had the diver in 2 les pauls e 1 SG, so it makes the impressions about the guitar easier to catch) and then I'll ask for our One True God's advice
I want something similar voiced, but a bit dirtier, since the diver is a very clean pup
that's the impression I had when I played the alnico warpig, but it wasn't in a les paul
I think a nailbomb might be half way between the diver and pig, but I may be wrong
BKP dilemmas are always win/win hard choices  :D

[sebby123]

Nice! Im thinking C-Bomb for my next as its similar but a little hotter and darker