How accurate are the EJ pickups?

[ken]

I'm curious.

I was talking to a friend of mine who wants to buy a EJ strat.

Does anyone know exactly how "accurate" the pickups are in the EJ strat?

I think I heard that they are supposed to be exact copies of the pickups in his 1954? Strat, but I haven't ever seen them.

Thanks,
ken

[Possum]

...

I would take everything Fender says in its advertising with a grain of salt, much of their stuff is very inaccurate. Just look a the necks on the strats, their 50's reissue strats have thin necks on them, nothing like the fat necks I played on as a kid and could barely handle. I have a '57 reissue and there's not much authentic about it at all except its a strat. The pickups that came on it were so horrible they redesigned them and they were still horrible. Duncan says average for '54 is 5.7K, ones I've seen on ebay were 6.2K, they range all over the place really. All they are is standard pre-CBs heavy formvar strat pickups with vintage stagger and the fatter magnets. Anyone here could make a set, though there are some tricks if you want to get close to the real tones of a vintage set. My advice....go to a store, try one out and see if he likes it before he buys it. Mostly you pay for the hype, it'd be more productive to just go find some used strats or new and find one that sounds great acoustically, (put your ear to the wood and play it), then take it home and rewire it with new pots and caps the way you like your switching set up, then get some pickups from one of us guys wound to taste, and you got it made. One of the best playing strats I've seen in the last few years was a $99 Jay Turser that had a neck to die for on it :-)

[David Schwab]

Does anyone know exactly how "accurate" the pickups are in the EJ strat?

I think I heard that they are supposed to be exact copies of the pickups in his 1954? Strat, but I haven't ever seen them.

This is what GuitarPlayer said about the guitar:

Another significant aspect of the EJ is its pickup configuration, which consists of a ’54 Strat with oversize alnico 3 magnets in the neck position, a ’63-style middle pickup with alnico 3 magnets and a reverse winding (to provide hum cancellation in the second and fourth positions), and an alnico-5 bridge pickup that’s overwound just enough to provide a hotter output while maintaining excellent top-end response. The controls operate in standard fashion except that the rear Tone pot is wired to the bridge pickup instead of the middle unit.

So they are not copies of his '54 Strat. But they are supposed to be built to his specs. Also keep in mind that Eric hasn't been using the stock pickups for a while either. He used to use DiMarzio HS-2 stacked pickups with the bottom coil turned off, and he would keep his tone control on zero.

He also has the DiMarzio DP211 Eric Johnson Signature humbuckers.

Plus there are at least two Eric Johnson Strats. The maple neck and the signature model with the rosewood neck which has a hotter treble pickup.

So I suppose the production models are the same as his.

Possum has a good point though, Fender likes to call their pickups lots of things that imply they are reproductions of earlier models, when often that's just a name they give them, and the pickups will be nothing like the originals. For instance, some of their "vintage" P bass pickups have plastic bobbins, and the new Jazzmaster pickups sound more like a Strat.

[greenfingers]

How weird, I played one for the first time yesterday. +1 with everything David said. I'll add that the pickup spec con-fig is based on the guitar he used on the "Live from Austin TX" dvd. he no longer owns it. He got that DiMarzio sounding good didn't he

The pickups were nicely balanced and sounded great for clean stuff, and just as good over driven. Probably the best strat Fender is putting out at this time. Sticky finish on the neck though, "nitro"

As to how accurate are the pickups ? Probably not exact, but the guitar is not meant to be a dead-on reincarnation, it's a hot rodded strat with a vintage vibe.

a good 8/10 guitar for me.

[ken]

My friend bought this guitar. It's the 'signature model' with the rosewood neck.

He was nice enough to let me borrow the pickguard assembly for 'inspection', and possibly having me make him a new set of pickups for it. I was expecting a 1954 type complete set of pickups, and I had no idea that he 'mixed and matched' his pickups like he did.

Ken

[jack briggs]

I just refretted an EJ Strat. The pickups are anything but '54 replicas. The neck may be, but the bridge has considerably more output than a '54 would. Actually a pretty nice balance, though IHMO.


Cheers,

[Alabam]

I would take everything Fender says in its advertising with a grain of salt, much of their stuff is very inaccurate. Just look a the necks on the strats, their 50's reissue strats have thin necks on them, nothing like the fat necks I played on as a kid and could barely handle. One of the best playing strats I've seen in the last few years was a $99 Jay Turser that had a neck to die for on it :-)

These thin necks are a pain, maybe ok for kids with small hands, and also their light structure must affect the tone.
You are right about the Turser necks, i have one of their Teles and the neck is perfect.
I`m on the lookout for a couple of them to replace the duds on my two copy Strats.

[Possum]

........

I sometimes wonder if Fender makes them thin to get more necks out of a batch of wood....