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Virtual Vintage Heavy Blues 2 (DP 409)

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darkbluemurder:
Surprised that there is no thread on that one - given it was introduced in 2006.

I put it in the neck position of a maple neck/maple board/ash body partscaster strat. Middle pickup is the Injector neck (which was in the neck position before), bridge pickup is a Bareknuckle Holydiver (the closest DiMarzio would probably the AT-1). In #2, the bridge pickup goes to parallel. 500k pots, tone cap is currently a 0.0033uf Orange Drop (subject to change).

Since there is already a detailed thread on the Injector neck I will focus on the difference between that and the HB2.

Output is roughly the same - 170mV vs. 160mV does not matter much really. The balance with the bridge pickup is fine since I like the bridge humbucker to have a bit more output in a HSS set up.
 
The tone charts (B/M/T) are similar: IN 6/6.5/7, HB2 6/7/6.5, and in that case I would agree that the pickups do not sound vastly different from each other. What is noticeable though is that the HB2 has a bit less highs than the IN and significantly more midrange content. I really like this for overdriven solo tones as it makes the guitar sing better and provides for a good tonal balance with the bridge pickup. It does work well for clean tones, too, provided you can accept that it is warmer than a typical low output vintage strat type pickup - these are really bright, and the HB2 won't give you that sound. The Area 67 would be a better choice in that case. 

Now - how does it quack together with the IN in the middle? It does quack well but it's a middier quack, not that super hollow clucky quack of low output singles. Again if you want that, get two Area 67s or an Area 67 for the neck and an Area 58 for the middle.

I have not yet tested the HB2 together with the bridge pickup since the wiring set up in that guitar currently does not provide for that combination. But since I got a spare tone pot that's doing nothing at the moment I may wire it up as a blend control so I can give you an idea of how that works.

Cheers Stephan

darkbluemurder:

--- Quote from: darkbluemurder on September 17, 2014, 11:50:47 AM ---500k pots, tone cap is currently a 0.0033uf Orange Drop (subject to change).
--- End quote ---

Replaced the tone cap with a 0.0069uf Xicon MPP (a 0.0047uf and a 0.0022uf in parallel) and like that better in all positions except for the bridge humbucker. Wired the second tone pot for the bridge pickup with a 0.001uf cap but either I messed up the wiring or it does not have any audible effect. I will probably up that to 0.0015uf or even 0.0022uf.

With the tone pot down the HB2 sounds exceptionally smooth now.

Cheers Stephan

aizenx:
Great pickup!  Sounds amazing in the neck position of a bright guitar! (I call it the Tone Zone for the neck)

darkbluemurder:

--- Quote from: darkbluemurder on October 13, 2014, 01:05:01 PM ---Wired the second tone pot for the bridge pickup with a 0.001uf cap but either I messed up the wiring or it does not have any audible effect. I will probably up that to 0.0015uf or even 0.0022uf.
--- End quote ---

Turns out I did not mess up the wiring but the 0.001uf cap was indeed too small. 0.0015uf gave me the expected result.

Guitar74:
Bump. I REALLY dig this pickup in the neck of my maple/maple/maple guitar. Just SCREAMS with a hot single coil tone. I could not be happier with this pickup for just about anything, great for sweeps alternate picked runs, legato, and does bluesier stuff very well. My first one, and will probably be my go to neck single coil.

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