Do I need new pots...

[lyonk55]

...or is the Miracle Man not cut out for this guitar?

I have a Miracle Man set in an Epiphone Prophecy SG, but I'm finding it's not sounding as tight as I would like. It's fine for power chords, but palm muted sing notes just don't quite cut it.

I decided to compare it with my Tanglewood Les Paul clone with a Nailbomb bridge, both tuned to C, no change to amp settings. The Nailbomb was a lot clearer on the low strings.

This seems odd from what I've heard/expected...the Miracle Man is a higher output, ceramic pickup known for working in SGs - it should be tighter shouldn't it? Both guitars are all mahogany and I'm fairly sure the flame maple on both is either photoflame or very thin, so that shouldn't be doing much. The SG's fretboard is also some kind of ebony and the LP is rosewood. As a side note, pinch harmoincs fly out of te Nailbomb, but I have to fight with the MM to get them.

Then I realised I didn't like the Miracle Man in my Cort X-11 either; I swapped the EMGs from the SG to the Cort and the MMs to the SG...and swapped the pots too.

So, after that wall of text, could swapping out whatever guff electronics Cort put in there for some better quality ones help me here or is this a job for a Painkiller or Aftermath (wich as much as I would love to try, can't really afford)?

[Telerocker]

Use 550k pots.

[lyonk55]

Thanks, I was hoping it was something simple like that.

[Transcend]

and if that fails stick an overdrive in front of your amp.

But the miracle man should be a fair amount tighter than the NB and also cut better too

[Telerocker]

I don't know if pots will solve everything, it's worth a try. Sometimes pickups don't match a guitar totally. Besides that, BKP's are sensitive for height, so maybe you can tweak a bit to find the sweet spot. Also you can use a tubescreamer or something similar to make it tighter, as Toe-Knee suggests. Just as a boost.

[DoomBuggi]

...or is the Miracle Man not cut out for this guitar?

I have a Miracle Man set in an Epiphone Prophecy SG, but I'm finding it's not sounding as tight as I would like. It's fine for power chords, but palm muted sing notes just don't quite cut it.

So, after that wall of text, could swapping out whatever guff electronics Cort put in there for some better quality ones help me here or is this a job for a Painkiller or Aftermath (wich as much as I would love to try, can't really afford)?

I asked Tim about pots  when I was trying to figure which set of pickups would work out for me, he recommended that I get the pots that BK carries as well as the PIO caps. The pots are designed or valued to work with BK pickups.

This seems odd from what I've heard/expected...the Miracle Man is a higher output, ceramic pickup known for working in SGs - it should be tighter shouldn't it? Both guitars are all mahogany and I'm fairly sure the flame maple on both is either photoflame or very thin, so that shouldn't be doing much. The SG's fretboard is also some kind of ebony and the LP is rosewood. As a side note, pinch harmoincs fly out of te Nailbomb, but I have to fight with the MM to get them.

If your guitar is not set up properly it will be harder to get pinch harmonics.  If your string are to low, it is difficult.  You may need to have your guitar set up, intoned, truss rod, ect.  You should replace the pots with the 550k.  That is the maker's recommendation.

[lyonk55]

Thanks for more advice guys: I've tried playing with height and I already use an MXR Wylde OD to boost my Engl Screamer.

I suppose it can only make the sound better getting better pots - if it still isn't quite right it'll just be better when I find the right set.

Just for thoroughness though, could a wiring thing take something out of the sound? I can post a picture of the control cavity tomorrow if that would help.

[Telerocker]

There could be a wiring-error too.

[lyonk55]

So here's the guts. Aside from the neck pickup not connected of coil splitting, how's it look?

[darkbluemurder]

I don't see any obvious errors - from what I can see from this picture the bridge pickup's red wire has been extended with the green wire and covered with the yellow heatshrink. The green and white are soldered together and go to the push/pull pot for coil tapping, right? I cannot see where the black wire from the pickup goes - it should go to ground but I guess it does - otherwise you would not get any sound.

The wiring may not be pretty but mine is not necessarily better. Especially I do not like to cut the wires to length - I may bite myself later if I want to swap pickups and have to extend them again.

I would rather suspect the guitar than the pickup for the difficulty of getting pinch harmonics. To be sure you could swap the Nailbombs over to the SG and the Miracle Man to the Les Paul. I would imagine that the LP still cuts and the SG will still not cut it.

BTW: what bridge type do you have on the SG? It may be worth considering an upgrade here. I just swapped some bridges during the weekend and the tonal differences on seeminly alike looking bridges was astonishing.

Cheers Stephan

[lyonk55]

The Miracle Men were origionally in the LP, but I can't quite remember how it was (plus I've got better at setting my amp's EQ since then).

Bridge wise, no idea. It's whatever stock Epi TOM style they send out on these, so I don't imagine it's particularly good.

[gwEm]

are the strings fresh?

[lyonk55]

Fairly - Put D'addario 11-60s on just before Christmas and haven't played it that much since then. Top strings are now 10s after a brief experiment with Karnivool tuning.