Now I'm confused

[Slartibartfarst42]

A short time ago I asked Tim about pickups for a PRS SE Custom 24 that I wanted to use as a bit of a Blues/Rock guitar. I wanted to nudge it very definitely in the direction of a Les Paul tone and the the tones I was after were Gary Moore, Slash and Santana, especially when they push the gain a bit for more compression and saturation. A hot PAF that was thick, smooth and rich seemed the order of the day. It seemed to be between an Abraxas and Crawler set with Tim eventually plumping for the Crawlers. I am now happily in a position to order the pickups so I fired BKP a quick line to make a final verification before placing the order and back came the reply 'Black Dogs'. Now I'm sure I want one of those three but now I'm unsure which one or which mixture. My first question is what would be the differences between these three in my guitar? Other than that, here's some quick points of what I'm after:

1) Smooth, thick and rich that nudges me towards that Les Paul tone.
2) Good note separation and articulation. Well defined.
3) Different enough to the PRS I have with a Holydiver/Emerald set to have it's own distinct Blues/Rock character but with enough crossover that it can act as an effective backup.
4) Has a Gary Moore/Slash/Santana feel about it.
5) Neck pickup is smooth and creamy and reasonably thick. Probably AIV I would think.
6) Needs to work without changing my amp/effects settings from the other guitar. Amp has gain set to about 50% and the overdrive is about 30% gain. If I change anything it will probably be with the volume pot on the guitar.
7) A bit thicker and darker than the Holydiver without being swamped with bass.
8) Good for lead and rhythm, though I'm primarily a lead player.
9) The middle position will be wired out of phase for the Peter Green tone and it will have a coils split on a push/pull too so it will need to work well with this setup.

Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated as I want to get these ordered  :D

[darrenw5094]

Bd is very thick sounding, mids are just bearable and not too much. For single note riffs like led Zeppelin,  they do the job. But for normal rhythm, they are very middy.

When I saw your post, Abraxas came to mind. Maybe the Crawler if your guitar is bright, but BD is quite middy, huge mids really.

['Ash' J. Williams]

Abraxas is a bit brighter than the HD, very rich and sweet though.
Crawler seems more rich and fat than the HD. Both have AIV in the neck and are sweet.
Definitely Abraxas set or Crawler set.
BDs are great with barking mids but may not be sweet enough based on what you described.

[Slartibartfarst42]

Well, I've had a careful listen to and researched everything from the Vintage Hot and Contemporary  now. Nothing from the Contemporary range is really what I'm after except the Crawler because it would all give me a result that is too close to what I already have with the Holydiver. In that respect, the Crawler is a bit of an odd one out and I'd never really considered that before. I can now understand why people sometimes say it should be in the Vintage Hot section. The VJII is too bright and the same is true of the Emerald, which I've tried before in a CU24. Now as a Holydiver user, I'm clearly a man who appreciates mids but I think that perhaps the Black Dog is a bit too similar to the Holydiver to give me a distinctly different flavour in the same model guitar. That brings me back to my original two and this is where it's tough.

I have two of these guitars and both of them sound the same. They're not particularly bright guitars, certainly not when compared to a Strat but they're not as dark sounding as a Les Paul either. It's somewhere between the two. When I had my Jackson (maple neck-thru) I found that to be quite middy but the PRS guitars aren't as mid focused as that; they're warmer and richer with broader sound. Not sure if that helps you guys.

'Rich' and 'sweet' seems to describe both the Abraxas and Crawler very well so in that respect, both are ideal. The Abraxas sounds great and I really like the sounds I hear but if it's brighter than the Holydiver, it won't really nudge my guitar in the direction of a Les Paul. Being a darker and fatter pickup, the Crawler will do that but whenever anyone mentions the Crawlers, it always seems to be with the proviso 'if your guitar is bright' and that worries me slightly as historically, I've found that pickups with too much bass don't allow the guitar to cut through and some of the notes can be less distinct.

[BigB]

the Crawler is a bit of an odd one out and I'd never really considered that before. I can now understand why people sometimes say it should be in the Vintage Hot section.

Actually it used to be in the Vintage Hot section.

'Rich' and 'sweet' seems to describe both the Abraxas and Crawler very well so in that respect, both are ideal. The Abraxas sounds great and I really like the sounds I hear but if it's brighter than the Holydiver, it won't really nudge my guitar in the direction of a Les Paul. Being a darker and fatter pickup, the Crawler will do that but whenever anyone mentions the Crawlers, it always seems to be with the proviso 'if your guitar is bright' and that worries me slightly as historically, I've found that pickups with too much bass don't allow the guitar to cut through and some of the notes can be less distinct.

The Crawler is indeed warm and fat with rather full but still clear and defined lows - and there's no over-emphasis on the low-end neither.  From experience, the bridge cuts thru a dense mix with no problem and note separation is pretty much what you'd expect from a BKP. Note that it's bit more compressed than most BKPs though (but still has much more dynamic than say a JB or like).

wrt/ the "if your guitar is bright" thing, well, I would not put it in my (rather dark) SG nor on a dark V or Explorer, but that's about it - if your guitar is brigther than a standard LP it should work just fine. You may want to read the couple reviews here (LP Standard) https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=29328 and here (all mahogany Smartwood LP) https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=22331.

Hope that helps...

['Ash' J. Williams]

Have you seen this ?
http://youtu.be/PSghgh-nEtY

Also you're not wrong about the BDs, I myself see them a lot like lower output and less compressed HDs.
Anyway i'm still really confident that both the Crawler and Abraxas sets will work wonder in a PRS for what you want.

[ericsabbath]

didn't play the crawler, but it seems quite different from a diver
the dog, on the hand, is definitely an older brother to the diver
it has a little less top and less aggressive upper mids, but the midrange density is very similar
they also share almost the same specs, except the wire gauges (42.5 awg poly for the black dog, 44 awg poly for the diver)
I've never heard a crawler clip that sounds anything like a diver
more like the nailbomb's fat geek distant cousin
more open and a lot less aggressive in the mids and top end
I wish Tim made something like that in the vintage 42 awg range as well
like an overwound fat version of the riff raff without going asymmetric (which would make a vhII)

[Kiichi]

Basecally what it comes down to is more or less this: Shut up and get the Crawler.

As mentioned the HD and BD are somewhat related. The Crawler on the other hand is more in the family of the Mule and Abraxas. It really does that rich and saturated sound you want.

Give it a shot, I am fairly certain it will do what you need. If that happens not to be the case youŽll have to give it back, but at least youŽll know, otherwise you will just keep wondering.
In the axe I have it in it very much delivers the basic defining qualities of a LP as much as a PU can in my book.

[Slartibartfarst42]

To a degree, having a pickup that sounds nothing like the Holydiver may be OK because at least then I get two distinct sounds from two guitars that are exactly the same model. For the bridge, taking the Holydiver as a starting point, I'd like a pickup that is a bit thicker, a bit richer and just a touch darker, with a bit of a bite to it. The neck needs to be softer, smoother and creamier. So far, it does sound like the Crawler has that bit of an edge over the Abraxas to get that kind of tone.

[Kiichi]

To a degree, having a pickup that sounds nothing like the Holydiver may be OK because at least then I get two distinct sounds from two guitars that are exactly the same model. For the bridge, taking the Holydiver as a starting point, I'd like a pickup that is a bit thicker, a bit richer and just a touch darker, with a bit of a bite to it. The neck needs to be softer, smoother and creamier. So far, it does sound like the Crawler has that bit of an edge over the Abraxas to get that kind of tone.

I do not have direct comparison with the HD (that is still on my "to get" list), but from my experience the Crawler is very nicely thick (still defined), the richest PU I have played, on the darker side too and yeah it has enough bite too imho, especially with the pole pieces turned up the way I tend to do.

The center and low mids are just so full of goodness. When the new Vai signature PU was first introduced I felt that the basic idea desciption for that PU fit the Crawler very well. I donŽt quite recall the exact wording, but it was along the lines of: thundercloud of chocolat icecream.
The high mids and highs are there to keep a balance and retain cut, but the star is the lower midrange.
Growl galore.


The neck is also what you describe. The basic idea is a much hotter mule. So take the mule, make it more compressed and hot and smooth it out. Such a wonderful big cleansound and driven it always has a smooth feeling while being muscular in the sense of gravitas.

Generally this set has a lot of character and gravitas I feel.

[Slartibartfarst42]

Life is so much easier when someone say 'You described this pickup to perfection so you just have to buy that one'

[Telerocker]

Crawler cuts well, don't be afraid. It growls like a bear when pushed, but it cleans up very good for thick semiclean solo's. This BKP is more versatile then you might think.

[Slartibartfarst42]

OK, I'll give the Crawler a go; I'm convinced  :D

I was going to swap the electrics over between the two guitars so my 550k pots etc. went into the new guitar but if I remember correctly, when they were fitted to the old guitar, I had to slightly enlarge the holes for the new pots so I assume that transferring over the PRS pots from the new guitar won't work. I guess I'll need new pots too in that case but as I want to keep a push/pull option it will need to be only 500k. Is it OK having a 550k volume pot and 500k push/pull tone pot or am I just as well getting two 500k pots?

[BigB]

Is it OK having a 550k volume pot and 500k push/pull tone pot

No problem. Remember that these are the nominal values and there's always a tolerance - usually +/-10% for pots so a 500K pot is really anywhere between 450 to 550K.

Also and if that may help I just posted a couple (sloppy) clips of the Crawlers in my Vox Custom 24 here https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=30260.

[Slartibartfarst42]

Pickups, pots and capacitor ordered  :D