[Zoo Keeper]

Ok, I just bought an Ibanez JS 1000.  Great shape and it's a guitar I have always wanted. I have a '92 RG550 that has a neck that is in need of some professional care beyond a setup. It still plays decently, but I decided to take the plunge on the JS.  The JS is a 22 fret Basswood body Rosewood neck, with a Fred in the bridge and a PAF Pro in the neck - common knowledge around here. My  24 fret RG is Basswood with a Maple neck and a Fred / PAF Joe combo.  If you buy into the theory- acoustically the JS is a warmer sounding guitar, the RG much brighter.  Both with regular 9's on them. Why do I compare on NGD?
Plugged in, the JS is much brighter, thinner sounding. And yeah that is not with the push pulls splitting the pickups. I'm kinda confused. I don't expect them to sound the same. But the qualities I like about the Fred are not here. It's the thin sound I have read a very few people on various forums complain about. The JS pickups have the DiMarzio  raised black logo on them. My direct from Dimarzio Fred of course doesn't. I don't mind the PAF Pro in the neck, but I can't raise it and it's sunk pretty deep. It didn't fall off the screw, either the screw or the hole seems to be stripped. The screw just turns.
Now I think because of the differences in a 22 fret and 24 fret guitar of the same scale, the JS bridge pickup is roughly 4mm closer to the bridge than the RG pickup. Is that causing that much of a difference in the tone?
Bottom line is I really like this JS, it's a keeper but the thin sound is not. Does any of this sound familiar to the Forum ?  Is the Fred really destined to be a 24 fret bridge? If there is something I can check, please let me know. Based on the Dimarzio logo my hunch is this is as it came from Ibanez. Dud pickup? Seems unlikely but who knows.

I wanted this guitar for many reasons, trying to sound like Joe was not one. ( but I do like his tone, and his playing goes without saying). I also love everything I hear from my Fred in the RG. If it needs new pickups I have a few ideas.
Mo Joe - but afraid it's different enough to warm up this axe to were I want it
Tone Zone
Norton
Satchr8
Super Distortion - this is the classic and original replacement pickup and I have never had one.
I want whatever to split well. I also don't want to go super modern. 
If I do swap the bridge out, I'll figure out if I want to see if the PAF Pro can be fixed or get a new neck as well. Bridge first

This is the last time LOL  - time to get this one more guitar sorted and I'm done.  * yea right *

Thanks as always !!!

[darkbluemurder]

There is a substantial difference in a neck pickup in a 22 fret guitar vs a 24 fret guitar but not so much in the output. The tone will be warmer in the 22 fret guitar - all else being equal - due to the fact that the pickup is positioned further away from the bridge and picking up a different spot of the vibrating string. That tonal shift to more warmth can make the bridge pickup brighter in contrast than it would be on the same guitar if it had 24 frets.

Now - FRED and PAF Pro are about the same output. This in itself should not be a problem as in the 50s and 60s there were no calibrated sets or humbucking pickups wound specifically for bridge or neck. Nevertheless, as you said that the neck pickup is as low as it will go you might benefit from a stronger bridge pickup. Before jumping at a pickup change I would check if the wiring is correct and measure the bridge pickup's DC resistance with a multimeter to see whether it is close to the specified resistance.

I have experience with all of the pickups you listed except for the Satchur8. If the FRED is far too thin for you I would discard the Mo' Joe and the Norton as the Mo' Joe is not more powerful and the Norton can be quite bright (depending on the guitar), so can be the Super Distortion. The Tone Zone was standard on many Ibanez guitars so that would be worth considering, or the Air Zone if you don't want/need a high output pickup.

BTW I have the FRED in one HSS strat but I use a 250k volume pot with it, and it does not sound thin at all. Assuming that your volume control is a 500k audio, you could wire a 470k resistor from the switch to which the bridge pickup is connected to ground. Thus the neck pickup sees a 500k load, which is optimal for the neck humbucker, whereas the bridge pickup sees a load of approx. 235k, which will make it warmer. The "both position" will also have the lower load but usually it is fine. That would be the cheapest option to try.

Cheers Stephan

[gregr]

Good thing you have a Breed Neck lying in a drawer.

BNIB + PAF Pro FTW!

[darkbluemurder]

Good thing you have a Breed Neck lying in a drawer.

BNIB + PAF Pro FTW!

I didn't see where he said that but I second that recommendation.

Cheers Stephan

[Zoo Keeper]

Thank you all !
I found a YouTube Channel from Japan that does these  great demos of pickups. The poster plays the same sets of riff for every demo, and uses similar guitars, at least for the Dimarzio demos.
A lot of them were with what certainly looks like a 22 fret JS so they were pretty useful to me. As useful as anything on YouTube anyway. 
With that said I am taking a chance on an AT-1 for the Bridge position.  Another discovery about this new guitar was that either the threads or the actual hole in the neck pickup ( low E side) that adjusts the height is stripped. The spring is on the screw, but the pickup on that side is about as deep in the cavity as it could go and I can't get it to raise. The screw turns and I feel it catch then release. I've tried sticking a thin screwdriver in to lever up the pickup while turning the screw to see if I could get it to catch, no go. The pickup is a PAF Pro. If it's the pickups screw hoe that is messed up. I might try the Fred in the neck.  I have looked online and if it is the hole there doesn't seem to be a really good fix for that.
If the AT-1 doesn't win me over, I promise the Breed Neck will go in! 

[HeyNorton!]

Congrats on the JS.

I just got a js2450 a few weeks back. What a guitar! 
It is bright though.  Brighter unplugged and plugged in.  That is by design, as Satch is a strat guy at heart.

Engage the HPF and lower the volume some.  There comes a point where the mo'joe  (Fred too maybe?) gets that driven strat bridge sound with higher gain.


I found the mojoe bright, so I lowered the treble side until I was happy.  This worked nicely as it kept the bright/tightness on the low strings. I might have been a full turn to a turn and a half of the adjusting screw

Funny parallels: I have a mojoe/pafjoe in my rg520qs that sound killer, and much fatter than in the js. This fatness stands in stark contrast to the js, and a testament to the pickups.

Norton is bright
At1 might work.
Breed neck is a good choice.
So is the breed bridge. Its in the paf pro family, but is the fattest and warmest variation.  I like it more than the TZ.

I tweaked the eqs on my modeller to account for the brightness.  It messed with my other guitars sound, so now I have an added block with the JS eq adjustments to all my presets.

The satch track is up there with the paf joe in my eyes/ears

IMO, it is totally worth the eq effort. The JS is capable of alot of tones.

I usually run mine HPF pulled, the volume down to 8/9 (tames the harmonics), and the tone down around 6/7.  To be able to roll up the volume and tone for added craziness is great.

My 2450 is not getting touched. Ever. I like it as is. 

With all the sculpting on the body, the controls, the bridge, the bridge, etc.  Its like a super-superstrat.   Hyperstrat?

Edit: i just tried a dunlop gator 2mm over my usual gravity picks, and that tamed the brightness.

[KH Guitar Freak]

Just to clarify. Is the FRED too bright or too thin for you? If it's too thin but not too bright, you can still try the Mo' Joe or even Norton. The Norton is somewhere between a FRED and a Tone Zone. It's has a beefier tone than the FRED, but still has that upper midrange harmonic you'd expect from the FRED or Mo' Joe

I have a guitar that had a FRED installed in the bridge. I did not quite like how the upper midrange harmonic stood out so much that it gave me the impression that the lower midrange wasn't enough to my taste. Tried out a Mo' Joe and I am happy with the result. A touch more output and low mids, whilst the fundamental qualities of the FRED are still there

However, if you find the FRED too bright sounding instead, then I'd doubt you'd like the FRED or the Norton. Something else, perhaps like an AT-1 or Tone Zone might be more for you

[headcrash]

Hey Zoo Keeper,
The difference in position of the bridge pickup, resp. in the JS being closer to the bridge, will result in a thinner or at least less bassier sound - at least in my experience (assuming you set the pickups to the same distance to strings, using the same string gauge, overall as similar conditions as possible).
I think nowadays we all know that tonewood does not, or better: CAN not make a perceivable difference in sound on a purely electric guitar, and since both of your guitars have at least a very similar vibrato, we can rule that out too. 22 frets vs 24 frets also doesn’t make a difference, since both guitars have the same scale length.
We all know that neck pickups in general sound much fuller and bassier than bridge pickups: because of the position in relation to the bridge.

I have a guitar I absolutely love, and its bridge is around 5-8mm closer (depending on which saddle I measure) to the bridge pickup compared to my EBMM Axis (Super) Sports. The Axis Sports still sound quite a bite fuller and bassier using the same bridge pickup and adjusting everything as close to each other as possible on both guitars.
I ended up using a Tone Zone in that other guitar and I absolutely love it, and it also balances really well to a low output PAF-ish neck pickup there.
So I‘d recommend a Tone Zone or Air Zone. Also a AT-1 might work well there, but I remember it being a little soft in its attack, almost being a bit spongy (had it in my Axis Sports as well).
Keep in mind, that TZ or AZ won’t sound too dark or dull compared to many other guitars, because a position closer to the bridge balances things out quite well. At least, that’s what I experienced.
TBH, I didn’t expect the 5..6..7..8 mm to make such a difference, but well, it did.
I think that most folks don’t take this into account (I didn’t either!), when evaluating the sound of pickups.