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Messages - darkbluemurder

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796
The Pickup Place / Re: AT-1 bridge and ....?
« on: January 17, 2017, 03:50:15 AM »
jazz's selection is good.

I can only speak for the Bluesbucker in that context as it is the only of the pickups listed that I have ever paired with the AT-1 but that is a combination I like very much. Very good overall output and tonal balance.

Cheers Stephan

797
Breed bridge with cruiser neck, or one of the Area single coils maybe.

What do you have in it now, and what do you not like about it?

The loudness of these two pickups will be very different. I have a guitar with a Cruiser bridge in the neck and a Chopper T in the bridge. The Cruiser almost kisses the strings whereas I backed off the Chopper T quite a bit and the Cruiser still cannot keep up. I would go for something slightly hotter in the bridge neck, e.g. Chopper or Satch Track.

Cheers Stephan

798
I would consider the Chopper. I have one strat with the Chopper in the bridge, Area 58 in the middle and Area 67 in the neck. The Chopper agrees with these two in that it does not overpower them or makes you feel that you are playing a different guitar when going from any other combination to bridge only.

I would also wire the guitar so that the bridge pickup gets a tone control.

Cheers Stephan

799
Hi everyone, OK...first post here goes
I have a Epiphone les Paul Jr, and I've just purchased a DiMarzio Gravity Storm bridge pickup... I've heard that old Gibson Les Paul Jr's had a 500k volume pot and a 250k tone pot, so I'll be looking in putting a Seymour Duncan YJM 500K volume pot and a 250k tone pot, so....

I would first check the value of the existing pots before changing them. They may already be the values you want.

What's the best cap to put on the tone 0.22 or 0.47 etc?

The standard cap value for humbuckers and P90s is 0.022uf (or 22nf respectively 22000pf, sometimes labelled as "223" where the 3 stands for the zeros). Single coils use 0.047uf as standard value, vintage strats 0.1uf. You probably missed one zero in the values you quoted as these would make the tone very very dark with the pot turned down completely.

For me personally, all these values are too large, and I usually use values between 0.0015 and 0.0047uf, depending on guitar and pickups. Caps are quite cheap, get a few different values, experiment and use what you like best.

Also I would like to have a smooth even decrease in volume from 10-0 but still keep all the bass and treble  characteristics of the guitar tone at lower volumes, and NOT just lose the volume last min or just loose bass or just loose treble...any help would be much appreciated thanks

Unless you use active pickups where this is a non-issue, this is the most difficult thing to achieve as it depends not only on the pickup and guitar electronics but also on the amp and the cable (yes - the cable has a capacitance which is in parallel to pickups and volume/tone controls). First step is to try the pickup with the existing volume pot and see whether you lose too many highs. If yes, you can add a treble bleed circuit (a small capacitor or a small capacitor in parallel with a resistor - I have also seen a cap and resistor in series for this purpose). The cap alone as treble bleed circuit bypasses the highs so they are always on full, which can make the lows to "disappear" at lower settings. To counteract this you can use a resistor in parallel. Keep in mind that the treble bleed circuit alters the taper of the volume control in the way that there is more signal at lower volume settings than without the treble bleed. In the end, you have to experiment to find what you like. Again, caps and resistors are cheap so get a few of them and experiment.

Good luck with your experiments
Stephan

800
I use 67 neck, 58 middle and Virtual Solo (the current one) in one of my strats, and the Virtual Solo is what you are describing. I am a tele player usually.

And yes, definitely use a tone pot on the bridge pickup. When the strat was introduced in the 50s Leo wanted to make the bridge pickup extra bright to cut through for solos so the bridge pickup did not get a tone pot whereas the other two pickups did. I find this inappropriate for my uses - I could live without tone pots for the other two pickups but not for the bridge pickup where it is needed the most. In addition, the stock strat wiring puts both tone controls in the circuit when middle and neck pickups are selected - I don't like that either. The simplest cure for both problems is to move the middle tone control to the bridge pickup.

Cheers Stephan

801
The Pickup Place / Re: Why am I getting this error?
« on: January 09, 2017, 05:17:30 AM »
I received the same message in the exact same situation.

802
The Pickup Place / Re: Pickups for bright guitar
« on: December 23, 2016, 02:55:16 AM »
I'd be vary of the Tone Zone if the problem is weird overtones due to its sizzle in the high frequencies.

An alternative to the AT-1 I mentioned earlier would be the Breed bridge - similar in the lower and mid ranges to the Tone Zone but smoother in the highs. However, I cannot give a direct comparison between those two as I did not try them in the same guitar.

Cheers Stephan

803
The Pickup Place / Re: F spacing?
« on: December 21, 2016, 08:56:52 AM »

804
The Pickup Place / Re: F spacing?
« on: December 21, 2016, 04:17:19 AM »
Mostly the difference is not audible but if you are going to change pickups anyway why not go for an F-spaced one? There are manufacturers that charge the same prices for each (DiMarzio, Bare Knuckle to name a few), and the dimensions are the same - unlike the SD Trembuckers which are a bit larger and may require modification of the pickguard and or the guitar body.

However, if the pickup you want to use in that guitar happens to be a SD a regular spaced model may work without any problems. The low E string is rarely a problem anyway due to its mass. Furthermore, any potential difference from misalignment gets reduced the more overdrive is added.

Cheers Stephan

805
The Pickup Place / Re: Need a pickup recommendation for progressive rock
« on: December 20, 2016, 11:39:10 AM »
Another option for the bridge would be AT-1. Not sure about the neck pickup though. I use a Bluesbucker with the AT-1, and that would be a good choice if you want to split the neck pickup and not lose too much output compared to humbucking mode.

Cheers Stephan

806
The Pickup Place / Re: DiMarzio for my Ibanez RG550
« on: December 20, 2016, 11:34:25 AM »
Hi and welcome.

I am afraid I am not much of help here but Gravity Storm/Liquifire and Evolutions are probably the opposite ends of the tonal spectrum. I am not too much into high output pickups. The only two I currently have from the DiMarzio range are the Steve Morse bridge and the Super Distortion. Both have enough highs but are quite fat in the midrange.

Never played the Steve's Special but I own the DLX Plus Bridge which is supposed to be the same pickup in P90 form factor. I wrote a review in the "Everything ..." section. I would not say it is scooped but it is a very warm tone. It is also not that high output - at least it does not feel like it. I liked it but after a while I thought the guitar it was in needed something more aggressive - and I put in a JB which suited the guitar much better. Keep in mind that this was the only guitar I ever liked the JB in. 

Hopefully the guys here with more experience with the high output models will chime in.

Cheers Stephan

807
The Pickup Place / Re: Virtual solo/ Area 58/ Area 67?
« on: December 16, 2016, 04:08:45 AM »
Sure, you're welcome.

Differences between Chopper and Virtual Solo: think of thee Virtual Solo as a strat bridge pickup that (1) does not have the typical ice-pick and (2) is not underpowered compared to the neck and middle pickups. The Chopper is more like a PAF type humbucker in a single coil rail format. It is a bit louder than the Virtual Solo but does not overpower the neck and middle pickups.

In both strats I use 250k pots. The Virtual Solo is set quite close to the strings (almost kissing them) whereas the Chopper is close but not that close. I did not have any problems in getting a good balance between the Chopper and the other two.

So I would say if you want a vintage strat set up without the icepick in the bridge, get the Virtual Solo/58/67. If you want more something like a HSS set up where the bridge pickup still balances well with the other two and still gets a decent quack out of the bridge+middle combo, get the Chopper/58/67.

Luckily for me I have both sets already!

Cheers Stephan

808
The Pickup Place / Re: VPAF Neck or...?
« on: December 15, 2016, 04:59:53 AM »
Difficult question as I have never played a Virtual PAF, only the Virtual HOT PAF, and that one not in combination with the Bluesbucker or even in the same guitar. I used the Bluesbucker in the neck spot in combination with the Chopper T and the AT-1 (in different guitars). Both bridge pickups were a good match to the Bluesbucker in the neck, both volume and tone wise.

Did you ever play a Les Paul with a PAF set (not necessarily original ones from the 50s)? These pickups were either identical for both positions or the bridge pickup was just a bit hotter wound (say 8.2k vs. 7.5k of the same wire). If you did and were not bothered by the bridge pickup being much brighter than the neck pickup, then the combination VPAF bridge/Bluesbucker neck would likely work for you. But if you were thinking, that bridge pickup is just too bright or the neck pickup is too dark (depending on the amp settings), then you would either want a hotter bridge or a brighter neck pickup.

Cheers Stephan

809
The Pickup Place / Re: Virtual solo/ Area 58/ Area 67?
« on: December 15, 2016, 04:50:58 AM »
Hi,

I have the exact same combination in one of my strats, and Area 67 neck/Area 58 middle in another strat  with a Chopper in the bridge. To your questions:

67/58 neck/middle or vice versa: I tried it both ways, and 67 in both positions, and 58 in both positions. 67 neck/58 middle emerged as my clear favorite. Did not like the 58 in the neck as much, and did not like the 67 in the middle as much.

Virtual Solo in the bridge: still sounds like a strat bridge pickup but does not have the ice-pick highs. It will not overpower the other two pickups. Not even the Chopper overpowers them in the other strat, and that pickup is a good deal hotter than the Virtual Solo. The hotter output in the bridge is beneficial because the string movement is more shallow over the bridge pickup than over the neck pickup. 

I second the idea to use separate tone controls for the neck and bridge pickups, especially the bridge pickup will benefit from that since you can warm it up further if so desired.

Cheers Stephan

810
The Pickup Place / Re: DiMarzio PAF Pro vs Seymour Duncan Full Shred
« on: December 06, 2016, 04:09:45 AM »
I still have a FSn at home not installed in anything yet but I have a candidate for it. I will chime in once I get around to putting it in the guitar.

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