removing windings to make pickup quieter and brighter?

[imaradiostar]

I bought a PRS SE soapbar II and I like the bridge pickup tone quite a bit- nice thick p90 sound and it seems to respond really well to different amps, distortions and volume and tone settings. I've wanted a p90 guitar for a while and this seems to be exactly what I wanted. The neck pickup is not as usable...

I've already tried lowering the neck pickup and it's still too bassy and has too much output. The inbetween position is dominated by the tone of the neck pickup.

I measured the DCR and they're both around 8.6k- seems like the neck should be a hundred or even a thousand ohms hotter for them to be a decent match, given similar magnets.

I was thinking- would it be possible to remove windings till the neck pickup is around 8k, hopefully making it a better match for the bridge pickup?

jamie

[bbsailor]

Originally Posted by imaradiostar

I bought a PRS SE soapbar II and I like the bridge pickup tone quite a bit- nice thick p90 sound and it seems to respond really well to different amps, distortions and volume and tone settings. I've wanted a p90 guitar for a while and this seems to be exactly what I wanted. The neck pickup is not as usable...

I've already tried lowering the neck pickup and it's still too bassy and has too much output. The inbetween position is dominated by the tone of the neck pickup.

I measured the DCR and they're both around 8.6k- seems like the neck should be a hundred or even a thousand ohms hotter for them to be a decent match, given similar magnets.

I was thinking- would it be possible to remove windings till the neck pickup is around 8k, hopefully making it a better match for the bridge pickup?

jamie

Jamie

The quick thing to try is to put a 10K ohms resistor in series with the hot wire of the neck pickup and the volume pot. If it still sounds too loud, increase it (up to about 25K) until the levels are balanced. The neck pickup is usually louder because the string motion is more near the neck.

One more thing to try is to disconnect the neck pickup from the volume pot and directly connect it to the amp (with alligator clips) and listen for any tonal changes. This will eliminate any wiring problems in the control cavity.

Joseph Rogowski

[David Schwab]

Originally Posted by imaradiostar

I measured the DCR and they're both around 8.6k- seems like the neck should be a hundred or even a thousand ohms hotter for them to be a decent match, given similar magnets.

I was thinking- would it be possible to remove windings till the neck pickup is around 8k, hopefully making it a better match for the bridge pickup?

They really should have wound the two pickups differently. I had a set of 70's Gibson P-90's, and back then they wound them pretty hot, around 9K. I had an ES-330TD with chrome cover soapbars, and they sounded better, especially at the neck, and they were 8K.

So I unwound one of the P-90's to 8 K for the neck, and it sounded much better for a neck pickup. You can even go below 8 K if you want a cleaner brighter tone.

The resistor trick will balance them, but it wont make the neck pickup brighter. But one trick for an overly dark pickup is to run it through a cap to roll off some low end. That often fixes a muddy neck pickup without having to rewind or replace it. Something like a .02µ should work. Larger values give more low end.

[Mark Hammer]

Something like the Reverend Guitars bass contour control might be a useful add-on for your instrument.

As near as I can tell, the control is essentially a cap in parallel with a variable resistance, placed before the input lug of the volume control. The mids and highs pass through the cap with ease, but not the bass, which is obliged to pass through the variable resistance. When the resistance is high enough, the result is a tone comprised of less bass, and mostly mids and highs. When the resistance is lower, the resulting tone provdes equal opportunity for all parts of the spectrum.

I'm going to suggest .0022uf (2200pf) as a first guess for a suitable cap value, and a 50k-100k pot (wired as rheostat - 2 adjacent lugs only) in parallel.

See if that is able to provide the tonal balance you want.

[Chuck H]

Well, David and Mark really do have this covered. Their solutions are the best route and the one I would use today. But I want to add that in my youth I had a similar problem and solved it in exactly the manner you proposed. But I was working with a neck humbucker and I only removed winds from one side to make the coils assymetrical. This did improve the brightness and reduce overall output a little, with a proportional increase in hum.

I still have that pickup (in a different guitar now) and I do love it for it's unique sound. But I have to warn that removing coils and winds can be dangerous once a pickup is potted. Removing the bobbin. unsoldering the hair thin copper, strip it from the coil and resolder everything can be difficult. I did ruin another pickup trying to duplicate my first success.

Chuck

[imaradiostar]

thanks for all the tips and advice!

I guess I'll take a closer look at the pickup and try to determine if I'll be able to remove windings without destroying it. If so then I will.

If not then I've got plenty of other suggestions to try and I can always get some other P90's- seems like there are plenty of people making them!

jamie

[imaradiostar]

Well...I've removed about 900 turns of wire. I now have (desoldered from the guitar) 8.9k in the bridge position and 8.0k in the neck position.

Of course I haven't put the neck pickup back together yet.

Any tips from people that make pickups all the time?

jamie

[imaradiostar]

I did my best to assemble the pickup the way it was when it came apart. It seemed to go back together pretty easily.

The in between sound is 100% better. I'm still not totally thrilled with the neck pickup sound- I wish it was a little bit brighter. I'm thinking I'll try some different strings.

I feel like the tone control is very responsive on this guitar so hopefully a string change will brighten the whole instrument and I can back off the tone when needed to compensate.

jamie

[Mark Hammer]

One needs to be realistic in one's expectations of treble in a P90 style pickup. They certainly have more "bite" than a PAF-style, but will not have the upper treble glassiness that a Strat-style single coil will, no matter how many turns you pull off.

[imaradiostar]

Thanks Mark. I don't expect it to sound like a strat- if it did that would defeat the whole point of having p90's!

I've wanted to get an SG with p90's but couldn't afford it on my current budget. This is a great alternative for now.

jamie

[Mark Hammer]

hey, if it sounds right to you, that's all that matters.

[axpro]

I find P-90's tend to sound fat and chunky 99% of the time. I had a nice set of Lollars in my PRS soapy and they were a little underwound, and give it a little more chime.

Ended up getting SD custome shop 3+3 split coil pickups in a firebird housing. Bright enough for a little jangle, but still hum canceling.

It is my go to "Neil young" guitar.

[imaradiostar]

Just thought I'd update. After a change of strings the minor change I made to the neck pickup has worked out really well- lots of treble but still clearly not a strat or tele. The bridge is nice and thick and thins out a bit as you roll off the volume. I'm totally happy with how it turned out!

jamie

[David Schwab]

Originally Posted by imaradiostar

lots of treble but still clearly not a strat or tele.

It's also not a 25.5" scale length. The longer the scale, the more twang you get.

[imaradiostar]

Originally Posted by David Schwab

It's also not a 25.5" scale length. The longer the scale, the more twang you get.

Of course, that's logical.

More than anything I was trying to get closer to the "live at leeds" sound and I feel like it's there now and wasn't before.

jamie