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Another factor to be considered is treble content. We tend to hear higher frequencies more readily; so it behooves us to use the tone and volume we play with to make our string volume adjustments.
Oh, C77, I like plain Gs. Different strokes....
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10-05-2018 04:28 PM
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Makes sense to me, I raised the top E pole piece on my 175 years ago to balance the volume better, it looks like this.
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You raised it 175 years ago?
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Madness
Originally Posted by citizenk74
Oh, C77, I like plain Gs. Different strokes....
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That’s my wife’s Steinway B. You don’t want to hear me play it. It wouldn’t be pretty. Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
It takes a serious acoustic archtop to hang with a piano that big. I have a couple that can do it, but I mostly have to stay plugged in.
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Business savvy. Most of my playing career was in dance-oriented bands playing multiple genres. Lots of Pop, Rock, Country, Western, Polkas, Blues, you name it. I even did a stint in a Square Dance band (a story in itself). Faux-steel multi-string bends came in mighty handy. So did the dough. Originally Posted by christianm77
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yes mine is a very early pre-production prototype. Originally Posted by christianm77
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You get a Telecaster for that stuff, no? Originally Posted by citizenk74
Business savvy. Most of my playing career was in dance-oriented bands playing multiple genres. Lots of Pop, Rock, Country, Western, Polkas, Blues, you name it. I even did a stint in a Square Dance band (a story in itself). Faux-steel multi-string bends came in mighty handy. So did the dough.
Actually, I will stand by an ES175 with heavy flats as a badass funk guitar.
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I tried it. I like it.
I will see how it is on the gig tomorrow.
Treble compensation a bit too much imo, but bass roll off a very good idea
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I’ve always been a tinkerer and DIYer, but for some reason I’ve always been wary of messing with pickup adjustments for fear of permanently messing something up. This has prompted me to take the plunge.
It’s taken me years to notice that the non-adjustable floater on my Eastman AR810CE has poor string-to-string balance. Now that I’ve put my finger on it, it drives me even more nuts. It’s frustrating to play a note and find the volume level is much lower or higher than you expected due to which string you happened to play it on. An adjustable pole pickup is going on it soon. Another factor on the Eastman is that the pickup itself seems too close to the strings on the treble side, which I think exaggerates the problem. I’ll take care of that at the same time.Last edited by KirkP; 10-06-2018 at 10:00 PM.
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I’ve found it can be really difficult to nail a good amp setting when one string is much louder than the others.
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This is a really interesting discussion; can anyone comment in general about the tonal difference that overall height of the pickup makes on an archtop? Specifically, do mids increase as the pickup gets closer to the strings? If so, is the ideal location of an archtop pickup further away from the strings than what's good for a solidbody axe?
For years, I played jazz on a Les Paul and got a great tone. When I finally got the scratch to pick up an archtop, I found that it didn't quite have the "buttery" sound I expected. So I set about adjusting the pickups on it without having any sort of methodology in mind. I just figured I'd go at it by ear.
The first thing I did was to try to mimic the setup of the pickups on my beloved LP that sounded so good. I raised the pickups to be as close to the strings as possible, and then set the pole pieces to correspond roughly to what the LP had.
The first thing I noticed was that the archtop (a '74 Byrdland) was a lot midrangier than I preferred, and that I began having acoustic feedback issues that were not present before. That leads to my first question about pickup height in general; as pickups get closer to the strings, does the sound get middy-er (muddier)? (One of these days I wanna grab a spectrum analyzer and see graphically what the harmonic content of the output is as the pickup gets closer and further, and compare the Byrdland to the LP. I'm big on empirical data. But haven't gotten to it yet.)
The next thing I learned, quickly I might add, is that thinline archtop electric and solidbody guitars are very different animals. The Byrd seems a lot more responsive to variations in mechanical technique and picking technique. I can change my tone much more drastically with variations in picking technique on the Byrd than on a solidbody axe.
Also noticed right away that the amp makes a big difference in that "adjust till your ears are happy" approach, so I picked one and used it consistently for all the pickup tweaking, leaving it in the same place in the room and on the same settings for weeks as I fiddled. I used a tweed Fender Blues DeVille 4x10 loaded with the blueback speakers (similar to Jackie King's). Likewise, I did not adjust the guitar's settings from their "sweet spot" for that entire time, in order to try to work from a level playing field.
Without knowing anything about Herb's technique, it's pretty much what I did. It just made sense to me that the high E would have least output and that the other strings would have to be balanced with that.
After getting basic volume-balance out of the way, I started playing all over the neck and adjusting further. I then started playing chords and chord melodies with the idea of evening out the combinations of overtones, and this turned out to be a very good idea, as it exposed further slight imbalances that I managed through a combination of tiny adjustments (1/16th turn) of polepieces and adjustment of my playing technique.
All told, I spent two to three weeks adjusting daily before I reached a point where I felt that the sound was pretty even and that further variation was probably just going to be the result of minor variations in my own technique or aesthetic from day to day.
I also adjusted the tail pickup in similar fashion. After I got both pickups adjusted individually, I did some further adjustment based on having both turned on. But I pretty much play the neck pickup exclusively on this axe. I don't know how to play a single Ted Nugent song ;-)
Here's what I wound up with on the Byrdland, which is strung with LaBella nylon tape flats 14-67 (same strings Jackie used). It's a bit different than the Herb polepiece settings; as we've noted, a number of factors can affect what sounds good. No, the high E polepiece does not touch the string, even though it kinda looks like that!
I would be curious to see pics of others pickup setups if you're willing to post them!
A couple other notes: the neck pickup slants towards the nut; that is, the tail side of the pickup is higher than the nut side. I haven't made any attempt to change this, as IDK whether it matters a whole lot. I did all my pickup adjustments years ago and may revisit them after getting the DeVille serviced. I plan to get some pots replaced and add a bias pot, both of which I expect may help clean up some of the mud. I also use an Ernie volume pedal and have noticed that it rolls off some treble and volume, even when wide open, which actually suits me fine. But that too needs a new volume pot, which is a giant PITA. If I die and find myself replacing the pots in EB volume pedals for eternity, I'll know that I definitely did something wrong!
Cheers!
SJLast edited by starjasmine; 10-06-2018 at 08:13 PM.
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I generally agree with the points in this article regarding pickup height.
Pickup Height Adjustments: An Easy Way to Tweak Your | Reverb News
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Thanks TRM - helpful article, although the following quote has me thoroughly confused: Originally Posted by ThatRhythmMan
For a brighter bridge-pickup tone, lower the pickup slightly but raise the individually-adjustable pole pieces a few turns each, bringing the poles of the coil nearest the bridge (where brighter frequencies occur) closer to the strings while leaving the "warmer" coil position a little further away. Reverse this—pickup raised, adjustable poles set to their lowest—for a warmer, thicker bridge tone. This technique is reversed again for the neck pickup, since the coil with the adjustable pole pieces is further from the bridge than the fixed-slug coil, and therefore delivers more warmth into the double-coil sonic blend.
Is this saying that for a warmer neck PUP tone, you lower the PUP and raise the pole pieces, since they are closer to the "warm" middle of the string as opposed to the "bright" end towards the bridge?
SJ
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I would file that quote into the archive of myths. The gap between the strings and the coils have far greater impact than the relative position of the 1st and 2nd humbucker coil in relation to the bridge/string node. Originally Posted by starjasmine
Facts:
1. Lowering the pickups and raising the poles the same amount will yield a weaker signal and a thinner, brighter tone. This holds true for both bridge and neck PU and is applicable to P-90 single coils as well as humbuckers regardless of orientation.
2. Keeping pickup height but raising the poles will yield a stronger signal, albeit a brighter clean sound. (On the other hand the amp input would get saturated earlier which could possibly be perceived as fatter especially if the coils were set low from start.)
3. You'll fatten the E and B strings and thinning the low E and A by canting the pickup slightly, setting the treble side higher than the bass side, lower the poles a tad on the treble side and raise them a fraction on the bass side (as required to compensate for balanced output). You'll get the same effect on both bridge and neck PU regardless of PU-orientation.
4. When a humbucker is tilted forward relative to the string plane from bridge to nut (very common on new guitars that only had a factory set up) the two coils in a humbucker will not have the same distance to the strings. This will make a thinner sound, somewhat closer to a single coil. Correcting that tilt will make a fatter sound for better or worse.
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Famous last words (cue mushroom cloud) Originally Posted by joe2758
John
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I just wanted to share my experience in trying this pickup adjustment on my cheap Ibanez AF75 going thru a Fishman Loudbox Mini. I'm not much of a tinkerer, but I decided to take a crack at this.
I adjusted the pickup to the approximate Herb Ellis settings. The bass strings sounded good, but the high E was overpowering. I lowered the pole piece a bit and it was fine. I'm still tweaking the pole heights to find the ideal setting.
The bottom line is that there was a dramatic effect on the bass strings from lowering the pickup height on the bass side. It eliminated all the boominess. So here's how I'd approach this if I had to do it again.
1. Set amp EQ's to 12 o'clock and the guitar's volume and tone all the way up.
2. Lower bass side of pickup.
3. Lower or raise treble side of pickup as needed.
4. Now start dicking around with pole heights.
5. Fine tune amp EQ's.
6. Fine tune guitar's volume and tone controls if necessary.
I'm so glad I stumbled upon this thread before going out and spending money on a new pickup. I'm sure a high quality pickup would be a great improvement, but this adjustment has satisfied me for the time being. I was having a hard time justifying putting a high quality pickup on a cheap guitar.
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Different strings require different settings. If you change gauges, and especially if you change metal type (steel, nickel, monel, whatever) you may need to change the polepiece heights, depending on the alloy and your ears. Different speakers can also cause some frequencies to sound louder or softer, as the frequency response of the speakers differ, and the cabinet also can influence this. I don't think it's possible to get a perfect balance, I just set things the best I can using my old ears.
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