16

The Pickup Place / Re: Steve Morse neck in the bridge?

« on: January 03, 2013, 10:15:44 PM »

Since I'm generally not a fan of overly bright in the bridge, I'm hoping it isn't an issue.  I wanted a PAF type pickup that I could put in the bridge and not have to use 250ks to tame; specs say it might fit the bill but the proof is in the pudding.  Will report back once it's in.

I put A3 in my VHPAF to tame it and it's still almost as bright as a VSolo in the bridge, but just about there with a 250k load.  With 500 it was just too harsh, even with A3.

ever consider breed neck in the bridge?  should be great with 500K's

17

The Pickup Place / Re: Pickups that have left you less than impressed?

« on: July 30, 2012, 07:20:59 PM »

 Lone phantom is the guy that helped me love the tone zone,he has a cap mod that rolls off the real big low end of the tone zone and it is great if you think the TZ is too bassy in your guitar.

you can take that mod even further if you dont use your tone pot. 

regarding the JB you can also try and move the voicing by increasing it intrinsic coil capacitance, (self capacitance/parasitic capacitance).  I mentioned the process in the D Activator thread, and you can also make it adjustable too, as well as test out many different values with a few alligator clips.  probably will work better for a jb since it has mirror coils to the best of my knowledge, and not dual res.

There are other things you can do as well to passively alter things,  as well as actively,  although most people  don't like to fuss with batteries

How do you change the capacitance? by adding metal in the pu like the Virtual vintage design?

18

The Pickup Place / Re: Pickups that have left you less than impressed?

« on: July 29, 2012, 05:20:00 AM »

Hey this thread is turning out better than i expected! I see there is a lot of JB dislike,which i can understand because it has a rep to be a love or hate model.
I have a love/hate relationship with it, some days it rocks and some days it sounds very Meh!
I did realize that gear and humans are weird,  let me try to explain, sometimes when i plug in i get a tone that makes me want to keep playing all day and night,it sounds that good then sometimes i come back to that SAME rig,settings an everythig that made me smile the very day before and hate the tone???
How can this be?? LOL!  it is like a little gremlin comes in the middle of the night and messes with my settings or something! LOL!
Btw, where is bud and lone phantom? i was hoping they would participate in this thread? I know LP is bloggin for duncan latley which is cool,he has a new mod to try it is where you use a mini switch to change between a 250K pot and a 500K pot just by flickin a dpdt switch, great discovery! http://www.seymourduncan.com/blog/tips-and-tricks/create-a-two-stage-potentiometer/
he is the mad scientist with these things! LOL
 Lone phantom is the guy that helped me love the tone zone,he has a cap mod that rolls off the real big low end of the tone zone and it is great if you think the TZ is too bassy in your guitar.

19

The Pickup Place / Pickups that have left you less than impressed?

« on: July 28, 2012, 05:56:40 PM »

I wanted to hear from others which pu's they tried that left them 
for me it was and keep in mind this is ONLY MY OPINION NOT A CONCRETE FACT
First off is the super d(yeah i know it is known as a classic and it is not a bad pu but i felt it was rather plain sounding,no real magic for me
The X2N wow what i got from it was hot output ,hot output and more hot output but that was it!)very bland EQ
the screamin demon(another pu that i had high hopes for but left me asking thats all it is?)
the steves special(now to be fair this is a specialty pu in that it was developed for guys that need a midrange reduction because their amp is very middy(ala MESA BOOGIE)
the duncan 59(wow i certainly hope that this is not the tone of the pu that some pay thousands of dollors for when they buy a real deal PAF) this one was very boring to me, Plain jane!
duncan PG another pu i bought thinking this is goin to blow me away after reading all the great things about it! NOT! LOL!
Duncan invader(can you say FUGLY LOOKING and MUD BOMB in one sentence!)sold this one so quick i for got i even owned it! LOL!
there are others but those are the main ones,and while i am listing the bad ones for me,ones that surprised me were the double whammy(this should have stayed in production, and the virtual hot PAF's(killer models that i think were better than the 36th that replaced them)
Megadrive( wow this is a steve special without the midrange taken away real nice! great drive and eq!) how about you what models made you say "why did i buy this?"

20

The Pickup Place / Re: De-airing Dimarzio pups??? at-1 vs. axis bridge w/pics and ohm readings

« on: July 12, 2012, 01:29:12 PM »

bump to this thread.

What were the results of the 2 screws coils of the tone zone?

according to member zerocool
"Zerocool says:
March 7, 2011 at 5:20 pm
Hey Lone Phantom,
Nice article! Just wanted to let you know about something. Currently I have 2 TZ screw coils together and sounds even better than when I had it half air modded!
Well, I’ve notcied that just putting the magnet against the screw coil does what its supposed to, but is still lacking “something”. And I also did this to my air norton and it also was lacking “something”.
So, I decided to put the metal spacer back in the air norton, BUT! I did it so the thinner side of the metal spacer was facing the magnet. The slug coil still had the spacers on it and the magnet fit perfectly. Sounds great now!
If I had thought of this before, I might have not done the TZ screw coil mod. Could you try this on a TZ? Also, You might have to use some sort of spacer[toothpick?] between the magnet and slug coil. I’m guessing this might be the missing piece of the half air mod. I think this all has to do with “inductance”, which i’m not really too sure what that means. But at least the half air norton sounds good !!
Good Luck! "

 MY REPLY,
ed hunter says:
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
July 13, 2012 at 3:28 am
According to steve at dimarzio as he puts it “the TZ is the closest we offer to the axis it is half way to a axis bridge pu” Hmmm??? wonder what he meant by that??? Hmmm? LOL!
anyway the axis bridge pu’s i own are all balanced coils each coil reads at 8.8K and my tone zones are screw coil 8.8K slug col 9.2K
Dimarzio will NOT confirm it but IMHO the AT-1 is a aired/VV’ed axis each coil on mine reads at 8.6K so i unaired it BUT i dont know how to get out those VV slugs? they are set into the coil with no way to grab at em? anyway the un-aired AT-1 is outstanding! EVEN IF it is not 100% a axis it sounds more than close enough in the same guitar to fool the sharpest of ears(except if you are eric johnson! )LOL!



KEEP in mnd this was BEFORE the AT-1 was available for retail sale, the TZ WAS the closest till now

21

Everything you wanted to know about .... / Re: The Breed

« on: June 24, 2012, 05:43:07 PM »

I got a breed set and put alncio 8 mags in them as a goof to shut up a bud of mine who swears by these A8's in his pu's.
Stock the breed is everything it is said to be but with the A8 magnet swap the breed is still a breed but tighter, more bite,more scream.
a breed plus if you will?

22

The Trading Post / Re: Awesome Traders!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

« on: June 19, 2012, 08:00:26 PM »

slugworth,notesfield and jerry g are all great guy to deal with!

23

Everything you wanted to know about .... / Re: The Breed

« on: June 17, 2012, 06:48:26 PM »

This is my fav Dimarzio a the moment, the midrange is so crunchy its insane.
Mark Morton from Lamb of God uses Breeds in his live guitars so I figured I'd try them out.

I put the breed bridge in my mahogany superstrat 6 months ago and it added so much crunch to my tone.  The pickup is warm enough that i don't really need to switch to the neck pickup for cleans.
With pickups like the D Activator and Super D i find that no matter how clean or distorted they are they maintain their tonality, not the case with the Breed it almost feels like a different pickup depending on how much gain I use. It sounds just as awesome for classic rock as it does for death metal, which isn't the case for any other pickup I've tried. With medium gain its warm and crunchy, high gain makes the lows tighter and pinch harmonics are easy to get and sustain.

This is the only pickup Ive ever heard convincing AC/DC tones out of in a superstrat. Its also great for LOG style metal tones (not scooped), I don't scoop my mids since I like to be heard over the drums, the breed adds even more depth to the midrange and especially accents alternate picking.

If you play rock and metal and like midrangey tones more than scooped ones I recommend trying the breed.

Reading this makes me even more stoked abot the BREED i have on the way! I have been wanted to try it for a really long time and finally ordered one. from youre review i doubt i will be disappointed!

24

Everything you wanted to know about .... / Re: The Tone Zone

« on: May 06, 2012, 01:35:54 PM »

For me the TONE ZONE  is right in between a duncan JB and distortion model. just like a norton is between a fred and tone zone. the tone zone has a huge bag fat tone with definition and harmonics.
I like the way it makes a super strat take on the attitude and tone of a les paul. high single notes  just F**Kin BURN with authority adn they sing like  a JB does. IF you want the biggest tone without getting all mush and mud the TZ is the answer.
To those that find the TZ too be too low mid and bass heavy try LONE PHANTOMS cap mod,thisis so much better than setting the TZ 6-7mm's away from the strings or swapping mags and it is safer.
here is his link to TZ mods,   http://www.lonephantom.com/2010/11/taming-the-tone-zone/

25

Everything you wanted to know about .... / Re: The PAF Pro

« on: March 24, 2012, 08:29:08 PM »

I did a pu shootout this weekend and out of the many pu's that were used for it (JB,DD,custom,59,PG,AZ,TZ,norton, Fred,breed, At-1 and several different PAF clones,) the PAF pro handled it's own quite well! of these others the Pro had the better string to string to string clarity and definition. out of all the pups the paf pro worked best for covering different styles and has the easiest to get pinch harmonics too. the only slight downside is that the pro does not have a big bass end but did work best with single coil in the HSS charvel strat test guitar(alder,all maple neck,floyd) amp was a YJM plexi and a 5153 half stack.
I came out of this little experiment with a lot more respect and love for the PAF pro!

26

The Pickup Place / Re: De-airing Dimarzio pups??? at-1 vs. axis bridge w/pics and ohm readings

« on: March 15, 2012, 12:01:29 PM »

So basically, a Norton/ToneZone setup without the Dual Resonance(which I hate anyway). LOL

So, since the Air Norton is half Fred & half TZ, wouldn't this make the neck pup close to an aired Fred?

No not at all the neck axis pup is at 15K and has even coils the fred is at 10K with dual resonance coils

27

The Pickup Place / Re: De-airing Dimarzio pups??? at-1 vs. axis bridge w/pics and ohm readings

« on: March 12, 2012, 05:27:42 PM »

Hey Ed, thanks for chiming in on my thread. I've read some of your posts in some other threads, and you seem pretty knowledgeable on this subject. I have no reason to doubt what you said about the tone zone and the air norton. It seems to be the consensus that the axis bridge is 2 screw coils on the tone zone.

I find the readings you got on your at-1 and axis bridge interesting. It seems the resistance readings aren't really consistent. I am using an f-spaced at-1 for this project. This pickup will be going in the bridge of one of my project guitars.

I still don't think I want to give up on removing the VV slugs, even though it seems like it's gonna be a pain in the ass. I'm the kinda person who just likes taking things apart and seeing how they work.

If you do get those Virtual vintage slugs out the pup will have a lot more bite and presence. dimarzio is not lying when they said the AT-1 is the closest to the axis bridge but it seem to get the same pup you have to use two screw TZ coils according to the guy at dimarzio. I think most will find the modded AT-1 more than close enough to where they wont want to make a double screw TZ like me and you! LOL

28

The Pickup Place / Re: De-airing Dimarzio pups??? at-1 vs. axis bridge w/pics and ohm readings

« on: March 12, 2012, 12:54:09 PM »

So basically, a Norton/ToneZone setup without the Dual Resonance(which I hate anyway). LOL

Yes thats correct and since this guy actually works for them i tend to believe him and it just makes logical sense to me as well. so i am going to try and make a screw/screw coil tone zone and see,if it works out i will go to the screw/screw air norton
The ONLY problem is that both coils will have screws and no slug poles? that does effect the magnetism and probably tone but how much i am not sure, it can be enough to really be a drastic effect,or the two coils on any standard bucker would be very different and that not the case only with dimarzio's DR design  but what i think i will do is set the screws all equal height.

For those that did not know the TONE ZONE was one of the LAST 2 pu's left for eddie to choose from,this was said by steve blucher in a Iheartguitar interview here,

http://iheartguitar.blogspot.com/2009/03/interview-dimarzios-steve-blucher.html

IHG: With regard to when you said pickups don't exist in a vacuum, I imagine you seek feedback from various players from different genres when designing a new pickup? For example, Paul Gilbert was featured in an ad for the Tone Zone - did he have any feedback into its development?

Blucher: We sometimes seek opinions from players in different genres, but not when a pickup is being designed for a specific player or style of music. Paul Gilbert didn't provide any input towards the development of the Tone Zone. The only player who did was Eddie Van Halen, in the course of doing the pickups for the MusicMan EVH guitar. My understanding is that the final choice for the bridge pickup was between the TZ and the pickup he actually chose, and it almost literally came down to a coin toss.

29

The Pickup Place / Re: De-airing Dimarzio pups??? at-1 vs. axis bridge w/pics and ohm readings

« on: March 12, 2012, 07:26:58 AM »

Just to stick my two cents in i have a axis bridge pu that read at 16.8K and a AT-1 at 17.1K
are you using a F-spaced AT-1 to compare? if not the resistance will be lower on the regular spaced AT-1. I dont recomend tryin to take out the V V slugs? I didnt even try since they are not screws or hex heads but flat poles? taking these out will increase the highs and i found it not necessary to get close to the axis tone.

Take this with a grain of salt but i recently heard from a guy at who works at dimarzio that the axis NECK pup is just two norton 7K coils and the axis bridge is just two tone zone 8.5K coils(screw side)
I think i can believe this

30

The Trading Post / Re: Awesome Traders!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

« on: January 22, 2012, 07:39:52 AM »

SLUGWORTH is a great guy to deal with! we traded pu's and the DSD came EXACTLY as he described!