-2 right now, and more snow than oyu guys(close to the mountains.) I think we should let this thread get back on track though, sorry for the hijack.

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

Wow!. You ever read something new and it just resonates with other tidbits of knowledge you've gleaned thu the years?

The thing about lower having less draw down on the string's sustain time - yet less output - and that I can just let the amp do more of the work because of that.

It just goes along with what I've beleived for a long time (yet I never really knew why- lol)

EVH, back in the early days, when he was experimenting with pickups, used lower output pickups, and in his words he would "let the amp do the work".

When I use lower output pickups I get better tone, and I can control the sound via eq and what-not.

It all makes sense

OK,…I spent several hours playing with different heights on one of my strats last night…as discussed in this thred of lower setting making for better tone. It seemed to my ear that I lost a lot in doing so at least in volume. As tone goes it seemed to me to get more dull and flatter sounding the lower the pickup was lowered. That is for the neck and middle that is. The bridge did seem to sound better to me..with the pickups high it seem the feedback and other noises get real prominent and some time hard to control with any gain dialed in…I noticed increasing my neck pick up very high the tone is very much like my other guitar with active pick up in tone and out put…….I ultimately set the neck up almost all the way, the middle pickup around half way and the bridge even with the pickguard…the bridge sounds great but being that low the out put compared to the other pickups is so low its hard to hear….when switching there for solos I am going to have to kick in some type of external boost to increase the output to even be heard, ie my EQ pedal or something of the sort….I like the pickups high for my tastes at least on the strats with single coils…..tried it on the les Paul and the RG550 with hum buckers and you go into too much uncontrollable noise and feed back….all my hum buckers are set very low now but I seem to really lick em high on the srtats…for my tastes and style anyway…

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(80’s Hair Metal) = A snapshot in time before Grunge ruined Rock & Roll forever!!!!

Al right I stand corrected about the pick up sounding great dialed way up there on my strat…My original research was done in my practice room with my Fender Combo amp. When I hit the stage last night and plugged into my Marshal stack it was a whole different story. Like Chet said “Mud”…I had no tone at all. It sounded like a Black Label Society show and not a Blues Gig.. it was utter noise that was undistinguishable. I had to swap to my other strat and fix it on a break.. for leads it sounded great but all rhythms and chords were just pure noise with the Marshall.. I still don’t have the pickup all the way down maybe just a bit lower that half way. I still don’t like how little out put there is all the way down but I for sure don’t like it all the way up either….I am now set up with neck and middle halfway and the bridge all the way down.. Just my experience playing with pickup height……Bill

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(80’s Hair Metal) = A snapshot in time before Grunge ruined Rock & Roll forever!!!!

Hi all,
First post here! I just wanted to chime in - I tried lowering the pups yesterday based on suggestions in this thread and it worked miracles. I was close to buying a whole new set for my new MIA Strat and now I think the stock pups sound just fine. Amazing what a difference lowering them made!

What you want to try to accomplish is find the sweet spot in your pup height. That means either raising or lowering them. Too high=loud, less sustain and muddy, too low and a weak sounding pup. It's all about getting the right tone and the perfect sustain. A perfect balance! It may take a few minutes but it's well worth the effort. That's why we are always amazed by people that buy a new AM guitar (or MIM) and immediately want to change out the stock pups . Work with nearly all stock pups and you can get good tone/volume/sustain out of them. At least try before spending a lot of money on new pups for you newly acquired axe! One more little tip. You can control volume with your volume knob on your guitar and amp!

Welcome to the forum! It worked out fine for you huh? Also it saved you some coin! Glad to hear that!

That's a good post. Nice one, Mr Hopkins.

And welcome to the Forum, backtoblue!

Cheers - C

Thanks Ceri. Another thing I like to do when adjusting the pups is to insure that all the pups have the same amount of volume and sustain. When using your switch you don't want any drop off of volume between one pup or the other one. The last thing is I'm sure you've all seen slanted pups(one side a little higher or lower than the other on the same pup) The reason that this is done is to insure the same amount of volume is present on the high E and the low E. That's about all I have to say about that!

Then there is the subject of individual pole height on a single pup, but that's a subject for later on...!?

I'll bite -- why are the D and G pole pieces so much higher than the others on most of the Strats I've seen? Including the used AmStd I'm picking up Wednesday?

Thanks for the Tip Chet


I tried it on my Ash deluxe, it definitely sounded more straty/quacky .. but given that I've got the SCN's they sounded a bit thin but with little tweaking of tone knobs and EQ's (especially with the reverb on) I got a Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeet clean sound with lots of sustain..

I don't like heavy distortion either, I actually hardly ever use it, so this is one good tip for more clean soundscapes ... thanks
HS

Heres a bit of advice in the opposite direction if you have lace sensor pickups push them all the way up for the best tone.I agree with regular single coils I keep them low, in fact even on my lace sensor ultra and my two other strats I sink the middle all the way like Blackmore but that has to do more with my pick always hitting it besides im always on the neck or bridge anyway

The poles are set to match the combination of the strings following the curvature of the fretboard and how some strings ring louder than others because of their tension. Notice the B string pole is way lower than the others.

On a side note i've just taken my rhythm guitar/ vocalists strat in for a service. Its a 96 mim very untouched with original ceramic pickups. Now he's a salty old seadog with decades upon decades of gigging under his belt. The strats pickups are set way low. This he has done of his own accord some years ago. It sounds like the harps of heaven, its insanely good despite its much maligned ceramic magnet pickups. Upon playing it i had to re-evaluate why i bought american.

One things for sure he's gonna love it when he gets it back. It was in dire need of a tweaking.

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