I have my TS in my American Special on factory height.

They sound really nice and clear, bright but not too bright, I like the sound except 1 thing : compared to my standard mex. strat or classic players 50s they have less lows/bass

Even when I look at reviews online it's like there is more lows/bass in the sound

I've read a lot about changing the height of the texas specials (mostly lowering them) but all the time the reason would be to be less ice-picky or harsh or better cleans ... never I read about lows.

My question :

Would changing the height (lower/higher) of the pickups also give me more lows/bass ... or is it only going to affect the ouput volume (soft/hard)

I'm kinda expecting that the reason for the bright sound and little lows is the maple neck... because except for the lows the sound is very nice.

I'd look to the tone caps as a possible cause of attenuated or diminished bass response.

Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

You mean they could be defective ? Wouldn't that be a little strange ?
It's a factory American special strat, no changes were made whatsoever in the past.

There is bass response but just not that much... just brighter then my other guitars...

I play with .010 - .046 ...

Raising the bass side and lowering the treble side of each pickup should take care of your problem. You also might try adjusting the tone controls on your amp. Each pickup responds differently so settings may vary.

The American Special Strat uses the Greasebucket tone circuit on the neck and bridge pickup (middle pickup has no tone control). The American Special does not get as muddy sounding with the Greasebucket as the tone controls are rolled back like a regular tone circuit does with just a capacitor. That might be misinterpreted as a "lack of bass".

Different guitar and pickups but same Greasebucket tone circuit:

http://support.fender.com/service_diagr ... 1_SISD.pdf

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Bill

Try you tone knob

Got the bass on all the way up on my amp (fender blues jr) ... I use same settings on my amp to compare with my other guitars.

I don't want less highs but I do want more lows ... should I then just only raise the bass side of the pups ?

And ... There is a tone knob ???!!??

(that rolls of the highs but doesn't give me more bass I assume..)

You want a balanced output. Raise one side, lower one side, raise/lower both sides. Whatever it takes to get the tone you want.

Adjust the various controls. Thats why they are there. Max bass on a BJr can't sound that great and is not a good way to compare things. I would suggest setting the amp tone controls in the middle and making comparisons and adjustments from there.

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Bill

Tried the neck pickup, lower/higher....

it goes to fatter when I higher them, but not deeper/lower
it goes cleaner when I lower them, but not deeper/lower

They just seem brighter in general then the stock pups from my mim standard strat.
Better for sure, specially with my pedal (blues pro) in fron, but brighter

You don't seem to understand. The low E on a guitar is about 82 Hz. It will never go "deeper" or "lower" than that. Adjusting the pickups in relation to the strings will change their volume level and sustain: closer to the strings equals louder with potentially less sustain due to more magnetic pull on the strings; further from the strings equal quieter and possibly more sustain due to less pull on the strings. You adjust the tilt and overall height of the pickup until you get the tone you like.

You also need to adjust the tone controls on either or both of your guitar and amp as each pickup will sound different. You need to face the fact that these pickups may never sound like your other pickups. If that is what you are trying to do, then you may have made the wrong choice in a guitar/pickups.

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Bill

A couple of things to try.

The TS pickups have (to my ears) a bit of a hump in the Mids, maybe this is giving the impression of less Bass, try dialing the Mids back down on your amp, go down to 3 or less, leave the Bass control set high and use the Treble to add a bit top end zing to your taste and see if that helps. The BJ doesn't have a lot of inherent Bass anyway but is voiced heavily in Mids, which I think the TS pickups will further accentuate.

Also try running the Master Vol full up to fatten and open up the amp to let it breathe, use a pedal to get your overdrive and run the amp wide open on the Master.

Snowy

yes with deeper/lower ... I mean darker/fuller/hotter.
But with raising them the sound just gets... how do I put this ... smeared out ?
Not the kinda sound you would like.
I went a little lower and then they went back to clean and then when lower then before yes they were dropped in volume... so I put them back were they were

For sure these pickups are just brighter then my others.
Ah, the strings are new also, which also gives a brighter sound to my ears

So what I understand is that I just shouldn't be comparing both strats/pickups with the same settings on the amp

Thanks for the response by the way

Based on your adjustment results, you have found the pickup "sweet spot".

Yes, comparisons should always be made under identical conditions. But those conditions should be neutral to avoid imparting any effect of their own. I do not consider having the amp set with bass at max as "neutral". You will notice that most amp reviews are conducted with the tone controls set in the middle range of their span. Once the comparison is made then adjustments can be made to compensate for any differences observed.

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Bill

Thanks

Yesterday i was comparing on my Blackstar HT1-R with my headphones (sennheiser HD380) on, it was late, mercy with the neighbours...

Anyway : with overdrive pedal active they sound sweet
Had my volume all the way up there ... completely different amp ofcourse but I liked it.

Settings for the blues junior I will try this evening,
normally I always play with volume at 8/9 and master volume really low : 2/3 (again for the neighbours) so I have the edge of distortion at low volume already before kicking in the pedal.

What about an EQ pedal? Boss's is good and cheap. If you want grinding low range you're not going to get it from a single-coil Strat through a BJr, surely? That's my set-up and I can't see any way you're going to get big bass without some form of outboard device...

yep with pedal in front i get big bass...
But I was more comparing the bass from my other single coil strats to the american special then searching for bass in general