The effect of pickups on tone..

[Jon Light]

....I checked the Lace site looking for dimensions of the USAB as well as the actual sensing area, but could not find them. Sad Can you fill us in?

Yeah--I took a chance on this, being unable to find this info anywhere. To my disappointment, the magnetic field is just too short to cover my 12 strings. However it is still totally cool enough that I am using it anyway. I can't get you those measurements until later tomorrow.

[Bob Carlucci]

Very cool Jon.. Let me ask a question.. Once the pickup is installed, is it adjustable as far as its position on the neck??.. In other words, can you move it further from or closer to the original pickup?... bob

[Donny Hinson]

Your earlier post suggested that EQ and amplitude were basically all that mattered with pickups. The factors contributing to EQ are very complex. For starts it depends on the DC resistance, the inductance and the capacitance of the insulation in the coil windings. The type of magnets used along with their gauss rating make a difference as well. The looseness or tightness of the windings can make the pickup more microphonic or less- both sides of that range have their advantages and disadvantages. Add two coils together in a humcancelling arrangement and you get even more variables.

I didn't say it was all that mattered, Steve, I said EQ and amplitude was all there is, and I stand by that. The pickup outputs a certain frequency spectrum at a certain voltage...PERIOD! There is no "magic", no "mojo", and no unknown energy from some flux capacitor. All the things you mentioned: microphonics, inductance, resistance, coil tightness, capacitance, insulation, as well as construction and mounting techniques can change only two things...the frequencies being outputted, or the amplitude of those frequencies. It doesn't matter what change you make - if it sounds different, then there's something different about what's coming out of the two wires that (ultimately) go to the amp. Every single bit of information that comes out of the amp speaker is coming out of two wires.

Some players get a certain guitar to get a certain sound, some get a certain amp, some get a special cord or pedal, and some get all of the above.

Of course, some players think "EQ" is only amp settings. Those players are totally and completely wrong. EQ comes from everything in the sound chain.

[Dave Mudgett]

Donny - I'm sure you know this, but a pickup is a distributed electronic element, in the sense that the different parts of even a single pickup sense different parts of a string's vibration. This may also lead to differences in the way different strings are sensed, depending on the geometry of the pickup's electromagnetic sensing properties. This can be approximated well by a lumped-EQ effect along a single string - unless these electromagnetic sensing properties change over a significant portion of the wavelength of the string vibration - that's the very definition of a lumped-circuit approximation.

Since wavelength is inversely proportional to frequency, this tends to be more of an issue for lower frequencies, and the wavelengths of low to low-mid frequencies are definitely large enough for this to be an issue. I definitely notice distributed-parameter effects with pickups, especially in the low-mid frequencies.

There are several effects from this distribution of sensing parameters. Of course, the first and most obvious is differences in amplitude in sensing different parts of the string. The second, and a very important aspect, is phase dispersion of different frequencies. Even with a single pickup, this can be significant - the difference between a narrow-aperture pickup and a wide-aperture pickup are significant, IMO. With two or more pickups, the phase becomes important - relative pickup placement can have a huge influence on the sound, I think this is pretty obvious. Then, of course, there is the potential effect of different strings being sensed differently. Again, I'm sure you're well aware of all this. Of course, many if not most pedal steel players have one pickup per neck, but there are some well-known exceptions like Dan, and I believe I've seen multiple pickups on at least one of Paul Franklin's guitars (maybe he's reading this and can comment.)

These distributed-parameter issues are especially notable in distinguishing between, let's say, a narrow-aperture Fender Strat/Jaguar-like pickup on an old Fender pedal steel (like Bob C. was talking about) versus, let's say, a modern wide-aperture pedal steel pickup.

I agree that you can lump-EQ some (I argue not all) of these differences out. In fact, Bob C.'s original point was how much the old Fender and the Carter with the tapped-coil TrueTone pickup can be made to like each other. I and almost everybody here heard differences between the two, but I agree with him that an important part of the character of the sound was strongly influenced by the pickups.

Of course, I completely agree with you that a good player can overcome a lot of tonal issues with technique. But it has been my experience that major changes in pickup design can lead to very different sound qualities, when other variables are kept the same. Of course, I agree you don't need to keep all other variables the same, but I don't think Bob C. is off-base to argue major differences in sound due to pickups.

[Dan Tyack]

What Dave said.....

[Jon Light]

Steve A---the pickup is 1 1/2" wide x 4 1/16" long x 5/16" deep (plus another 1 or 2/16" mounting adhesive pads.) The hot zone is just around 3 1/4"....I'll have to check later..it may be an eighth smaller.

Bob--re:

...can you move it further from or closer to the original pickup?

----totally. That is an important part of this rig. I'll describe how I've done this when I've got some pics and I'm ready to formally announce the product. I abandoned my efforts to create a rail system because i don't have the engineering chops to make something safe, solid and acceptably....proper. But I found something very cool that works really well.

[Donny Hinson]

...it has been my experience that major changes in pickup design can lead to very different sound qualities, when other variables are kept the same...

I agree Dave, and my major point and emphasis is that "when other variables are kept the same" phrase. Many players are so locked in to a particular amp setting that they automatically assume that a change in one area (let's say the pickup) cannot be counterbalanced with a change in another area (like the amp).

So, let's say you want more treble - you can change guitars, change pickups, change your volume pedal, change your cords, change your amp, change your amp settings, change your speaker, or...you can even change where you pick the string. However, I think most people would agree that you can get the most emphatic and dynamic change by changing the amp settings. With everything else kept the same, you can go from thick-full bassy sounds to literally screaming, piercing treble just by adjusting the amp controls.

While every one of the other things may move you slightly from one extreme to the other, none of them will do what the EQ in a good amp will. Now, I'll admit that the EQ in the amp won't do everything, and it may not give you what you want, but I believe it's a largely unexplored area for a lot of players.

Guys, the bottom line here is that nothing that I say is meant to help or change the mind of a really skilled player. If you've been doing this stuff a few decades, you've likely heard just about everything there is to hear. However, I do think it's a good thing for someone (maybe just me?) to tell the newbies and less experienced players who are having trouble with their sound that there are many other things to be explored and tried before you run out and buy a pickup, a speaker, a $40 cord, a $75 bar, or a $400 pedal.

Thus is one of the quotes from Buddy Emmons that always gave me pause to think about the importance of the "gear" we use:

" But the difference in the “magic” guitar compared to similar models is not likely to heard or felt by everybody. Over the years I’ve had hundreds of players sit down at The Blade and play through my amp with my tone settings and they ended up sounding like they did on their own guitars "

Peace.

[Bob Carlucci]

Here's my take on this.. Yes you can consider the signal from the pickup as a "trigger".. Just an electrical signal waiting to be processed.
You can bend it and shape it into any form you want I suppose..
Electronic drums do it.. Take a signal from each individual "drum" and "cymbal" and process it into a drum/cymbal like sound.. It works but is lifeless.

You can take any steel signal and shape the EQ at various places in the signal chain.. Pre amp, power amp, pre pre amp,...
You can fatten up thin and thin out fat.
You can take a pedal steel signal and process it into dobro like sounds, fiddle sounds, organ sounds etc....
I don't think thats what we are discussing here.. I say if you get 5 very different design pickups in various configurations and output levels, you will have different sounds and characters. Certain frequencies will be cut or enhanced, as will signal strength, and yes, some of these things can be added to or subtracted from later in the chain, but you change the character of the sound in doing so.

If we took this to the level of just being ludicrous, we could say every single pedal steel guitar pickup ever made sounds exactly the same, only the body and mechanism sound different.. It just doesn't make any sense to me.
Too many great players with great ears have pickups that are sitting in junk drawers because they lacked a certain character, that could NOT be EQ'd in or out, and have found something that sounded better to them .. If it were a simple matter of EQ, I would think there would be a lot less used pickups for sale....bob

[Brad Sarno]

I am a firm believer that tone is in the hands.. To a point.
I feel that the pickup contributes greatly to the tone, timbre and response of a pedal steel, including sustain..

... Is the sound really just in the body and mechanism with the pickup unable to change any of the basic tonal characteristics?... Or is the pickup a seminal part of the sound feel, and response?

This whole thing points me to the microphone/singer metaphor. We can pick a microphone that best captures a particular singer's voice, but it'll always sound like that singer. I see guitars that way. They have their character. A telecaster with humbuckers still sounds like a telecaster. An Emmons push/pull with a single or a humbucker still has that distinctive push/pull voice. Some pickups will enhance that and some may not so much. But guitars have characteristics, and I do believe that's still a more dominant factor in the end. I disagree that pickups have any significant effect on "sustain". Sustain is basically how long a string will vibrate before it decays into inaudibility. A pickup won't change that, although some pickups may help capture a bit more low level detail as the string decays, but in the end, it's the guitar that effects this.

I think a lot of people have a hard time doing accurate and scientific comparisons of this stuff. It's hard because if you un-string a steel, change pickups and then pull those strings back up to tension, they'll be a bit duller sounding. If you replace the strings with fresh ones, then you'll have brightness and sustain for days simply because of the fresh strings, and then you have to wait days before you can truly compare.

I got to mess with a GFI the other night, and again, that guitar stands out to me as having a distinctly midrange-heavy and a dark-ish decay character that does not support a long sustain of certain upper harmonics. Regardless of pickups, a guitar will either absorb or reinforce certain parts of the harmonic spectrum of a vibrating string. That's a function of the guitar and is where a guitar gets its unique "voice". It's what makes one guitar sound different from another. The pickup merely captures what the string is doing, and some pickups will bring out more or less of certain harmonic aspects. But the tonal character of the harmonic content of the vibrating string over time, after it's been picked, is where a lot of "tone" lives.

Up in "Hugheyland", a push-pull will just sing and cry and hold that sweet treble content for quite a long time, even when certain mids and low-mids have subdued, the crying treble lives on and allows for certain musical expressions. The GFI, for example, absorbs this energy far more rapidly than the push-pull, and it's quite hard to get that same result. It's easier with fresh strings because they just sustain for longer, but in general, the GFI guitar itself doesn't support that kind of sound as much. And this isn't a dis on the GFI, I only use it as an example because it's so far at the other end of the spectrum from a push/pull and helps to illustrate how guitars themselves have their own sound, regardless of pickup.

B

[Bob Carlucci]

the "telecaster sounds like a telecaster" argument doesn't hold water Brad, with all due respect.
There are very big differences in tone and response.
Thats why all the guys that want a particular snap and twang use a tele.. The guys looking for that edge in the sound wouldn't be caught playing a humbucker tele with a gun pressed to their heads..

Most tele players would agree, you simply cannot EQ the single coil sound of a good tele into a humbucker equipped tele. Putting a les paul pickup into a tele will not make it sound like a les paul, I grant you that, no arguments.. However it will remove that distinctive tele snap and twang in a second, and no EQ will bring it back 100%... bob

[Brad Sarno]

Now I'm not saying that pickups don't matter. I'm saying that the instrument still has a huge part of the character, the harmonic content, the general "voice". Sure, a humbucker in a Tele will change that knife edge sharpness, that particular snap that can be attributed to the pickup. But a humbucker loaded Telecaster will not sound like a Les Paul. It's still got plenty of that strong Fender character, feel, pop, resonance, etc. And likewise, putting Fender pickups on a Les Paul may add some of that single coil aspect to it, but it will not suddenly make a Les Paul pop and do all that distinctly Fendery stuff. Just like a microphone won't make a singer sound like another voice. The source harmonic content is in the instrument. The mic (or pickup) merely helps to bring out and subdue certain frequencies already present in the strings harmonic content. And it's the time-based content that really reveals the instrument itself. After a note is picked, the spectrum changes as certain frequencies are reinforced and others are absorbed by the instrument itself. The pickup can't change that time-envelope factor.

I helped a few guys set up their electric guitars for their Grateful Dead band projects. They were going for a later-year Garcia tone based on the single coil half of a Dimarzio Super II in the middle position (of 3 humbuckers). One guy installed the pickup in a Gibson SG. He could never get the upper spectrum to sustain. The mahogany just soaked it up rapidly. But in a maple based guitar with ebony fretboard, the highs rang for days. Same exact pickup, totally different guitar. Night and day. The attack tone was similar, but over time as the notes rang out and the guitar absorbed and reinforced certain harmonic components, the tone changes and reveals the instruments inherent character. Not a subtle thing.

Why would the alumitone sound unbearably edgy and unpleasant in my ZB while it's nice and balanced in the push/pull? The pickup is the same, the guitars are very different.

B

[Johnny Thomasson]

Just want to say, this is an outstanding thread.

[Dan Tyack]

I agree, Johnny. I don't have the engineering/physics backgroud to respond intelligently to some of the comments, but I have learned a lot.

[Bob Carlucci]

Now I'm not saying that pickups don't matter. I'm saying that the instrument still has a huge part of the character, the harmonic content, the general "voice". Sure, a humbucker in a Tele will change that knife edge sharpness, that particular snap that can be attributed to the pickup. But a humbucker loaded Telecaster will not sound like a Les Paul. It's still got plenty of that strong Fender character, feel, pop, resonance, etc. And likewise, putting Fender pickups on a Les Paul may add some of that single coil aspect to it, but it will not suddenly make a Les Paul pop and do all that distinctly Fendery stuff. Just like a microphone won't make a singer sound like another voice. The source harmonic content is in the instrument. The mic (or pickup) merely helps to bring out and subdue certain frequencies already present in the strings harmonic content. And it's the time-based content that really reveals the instrument itself. After a note is picked, the spectrum changes as certain frequencies are reinforced and others are absorbed by the instrument itself. The pickup can't change that time-envelope factor.

I helped a few guys set up their electric guitars for their Grateful Dead band projects. They were going for a later-year Garcia tone based on the single coil half of a Dimarzio Super II in the middle position (of 3 humbuckers). One guy installed the pickup in a Gibson SG. He could never get the upper spectrum to sustain. The mahogany just soaked it up rapidly. But in a maple based guitar with ebony fretboard, the highs rang for days. Same exact pickup, totally different guitar. Night and day. The attack tone was similar, but over time as the notes rang out and the guitar absorbed and reinforced certain harmonic components, the tone changes and reveals the instruments inherent character. Not a subtle thing.

Why would the alumitone sound unbearably edgy and unpleasant in my ZB while it's nice and balanced in the push/pull? The pickup is the same, the guitars are very different.

B

Brad we are actually on the same page.. Yes a Gibson with Fender pickups will not sound like a Fender.. I don't dispute that.. It can't. Not with a set neck mahogany body, stop tailpiece etc... Just a totally different approach to guitar construction...

However, its character will change, and its NOT just an EQ issue. If it were, all you would have to do is turn a few knobs, and get all the original characteristics back,, It won't happen.
The only point I am trying to make is this... The pickup on an instrument is critical to the tonal characteristic and response.. It is far more than a trigger.You will usually change the sound and response by changing pickups.
I don't have the electronic recording background, nor the electronic design experience of some of the guys here, but I know what my ears tell me.
Pickups do have an impact on tone... A lot of the sound is integral to the instrument itself, NO argument.. Pickups can and do alter that however, sometimes pretty radically, often very subtley.
bob

[Brad Sarno]

I think I'm with you too Bob. The only sticking point for me is the notion that "sustain" can change with pickup changes. Now I guess I can sort-of agree that some pickups will enhance the frequencies in a guitar string that linger for longer. But I attribute sustain mostly to the guitar itself since it has do do with how long a string will continue to vibrate.

But I do agree, pickups are very real contributors to the tone. I wouldn't have gone thru the dozens of strat, tele, gibson, and pedal steel pickups all these years chasing the sound I wanted if it wasn't true.

Fun thread for sure...

B

[Brint Hannay]

However, its character will change, and its NOT just an EQ issue. If it were, all you would have to do is turn a few knobs, and get all the original characteristics back,, It won't happen.

Maybe part of the problem in these discussions is different uses of the term "EQ".

Since it stands for "equalization," it originally refers to an electronic device for manipulation of the frequency content of sound. Such devices come, of course in various degrees of sophistication--the set of knobs on a Peavey steel amp are a very blunt instrument compared to a 32-band graphic equalizer, but that, too, is not without limitation.

But I believe a lot of people, myself included, by a sort of "back construction" use the term "EQ" as a shorthand for "frequency content profile," not limited to the coarse-grained level that an "equalizer" is capable of manipulating.

In that sense, it's not "just EQ." Nothing "just" about it!

[Dave Hepworth]

Hi,
For what it is worth I have started playing Gibson guitars after being a Fender addict for most of my playing life-50plus years.I aquired a LP Studio and hated the Humbucker sound.However I could HEAR ACOUSTICALLY what the guitar sounded like which was harmonically rich and quite jangly .I took the buckers out and put Gibson P94s single coils in.The guitar now sounds TOTALLY different in a very pleasing way. I now hear more of what I heard acoustically.So in my estimation pickups DO alter the sound of a stringed instrument -they only alter what is there already and cant pickup something that is not there or you wish was there.

[Gary Meixner]

Brad,

I like your microphone/singer metaphor, it is a very accurate way to think about the relationship between a pickup and strings. Simply put, a pickup can not hear what isn't there; however, with a solid body guitar it is kind of hard to say what is the true, natural sound of the instrument.

My sense is that the pickup design does have an effect on the sound we finally hear but I don't believe it is a magical as we like to think. The electric signal is affected by thousands of feet of wire, multiple electro-magnetic devices and other components each having their way with signal before it reaches our ears.

Twenty years ago I was in the hardwood lumber business and took calls nearly every week from somebody looking for Swamp Ash. I had standing orders for container loads of super light weight Ash to be shipped to Asia. The spec was no more than 2.4 lbs/board foot. That was supposedly the mojo that made a Tele a Tele and a Strat a Strat.

I have made many non-pedal steel guitars for myself and used many different woods and styles of pickups - even cheap ones. Most of these guitars really sounded good. I probably could have been happy forever with anyone of them. Like many of us, familiarity breeds contempt and I had to make a change and build something else. Actually messing with this stuff is just too much fun so I think I look for deficiencies in my sound to necessitate another project. I have discovered though if I am unhappy with my sound the first thing to do is change my strings – maybe try a brand I haven’t used before.

Gary Meixner

[Dan Beller-McKenna]

Hate to wade into such roiling waters, but ....

I recently picked up a Fender Artist S-10, the model made by Sho Bud for fender in the mid '70s. As others have observed, this model has a characteristic sound that is slightly reminiscent of the old fender cable guitars. I would described it as a very hollowed out sound, especially in the middle strings. I have never played the D-10 version of this model, but I have seen people make the same observation about its tone here on the forum.

On mine, as it happens, the top plate of the non-adjustable pickup had warped a little, and the strings would hit it if I picked with any force (as I often do). I had a reputable pickup maker build me a new one that is 1/16" shorter. Pickup fits perfectly and sounds nice, but has absolutely none of the characteristic sound this model is known for. Absolutely different sounding guitar now (not better or worse, just different), no matter how I eq the amp.

Dan

[Dean Schilling]

This has been a long and very informative thread.
As an old Electrical Engineer, I can appreciate very much the pointers given in all this.

However, I just want a good sound, and the p/u is the very first transducer to hear the strings.

I would cite
Mitch Adelman's response, that by replacing the pickup with a Telonics unit at least on my pedal steel,

it has the creamiest sweetest sound out there, and I don't care what the rest are using.

Dean Schilling
New Braunfels, TX

[Jim Pitman]

There is some science to engineering a pickup.
The inductance L, and the Resistance R combine to create a resonance point in the spectrum. I found we PSG folks tend to like a peak resonance around 1.8khz.
The capacitance C to a small degree affects the response too. Also the input Z the pickup sees is in the equation as well. This input Z is not necessarily a flat line with frequency too.
Pickups are there own little tone cube with different response curves.
A pickup can be modeled as a an R in series with an L then some C distributed in parallel, however the C is almost insignificant.
The magnetic strength of the core (poll pieces) affect the amplitude and dynamics.
The total mass of the core changes the inductance significantly.
One can change the resonance a number of ways.
Making the wire thinner increases the R. So if you want to move the resonance up in frequency go to a higher gauge, thinner wire. If you want to move the resonance down increase the total mass of the core, ie, make the pole pieces bigger. This is a simplification as once must take the input Z into consideration.
The number of turns of wire and the mass of the core affect the L. They make quite a contribution to the overall output level of the pickup. The number of turns also affects the R.
Though people will often characterize a pickup quoting its resistance it's really its inductance that makes the biggest contribution to its sound.
The guitar itself has its' own resonance point as well. That's why I agree that the pickup can compliment the guitar and visa-versa.
I think sustain has more to do with the guitar. I generally conclude that an acoustically loud guitar is going to have the most sustain and sound good with most pickups. I will always try to get a feel for the way a particular guitar will sound plugged in by playing it unplugged.
It's easy to make a bad sounding pickup.
Most commercial pickups don't sound bad though.

[Stephen Cowell]

I generally conclude that an acoustically loud guitar is going to have the most sustain (snip)

This doesn't seem right... the more energy that goes into the air, the less energy there is to stay in the string-support system. The quietest guitar is a large steel/concrete/whatever block with a string strung across it... and it has the most sustain. Am I wrong?

Now, when you add an amp to the equation, the loudest guitar *acoustically* will have the most coupling to the amp... so we're talking about *induced* sustain... perhaps that's what you were referring to. This changes with stage volume, of course.

[Jim Pitman]

Stephen perhaps my statement is too generalized. There comes a point when too much acoustic volume can generate feedback via the sound from the amp. Sure, then the feed back is constructive or destructive - quite unpredictable. But most if not all solid body instruments rarely reach that threshold at normal amp/guitar distances.
I've had two very solid/heavey PSG guitars with thick tops that you would think would have a lot of sustain - in fact they didn't and the overtones on those guitars was relatively subdued as well. - sounded too pure and uninteresting. I tried many pickups in each to no avail.
The sustain theory I put forth is the longevity of vibration for a string can be increased by sound waves from the body adding to its' amplitude. - acoustic resonance to a degree, but merely increasing the vibrating surface area ore letting the surface vibrate, ie thinner top contributes.
The pickup merely needs to sensitive enough to pick it up.
This part of my post is a "theory" really. However it is based on the experiences with the PSGs I've owned. I imagine one has to get the vibrations from the surface of the guitar to be in phase with the string movement, otherwise it will kill the sustain. Phase relation will change with frequency so this is frequency dependent.
From my pickup making experience generally we like it when the upper mid-range is reinforced.

[Sid Hudson]

You know,,, I am a simple minded guy. I believe in simplicity.

I would like to mention something that happened to me withing the last 3 months.

As a 6 string guitar player for 48 years I tried something 3 months ago that I have never tried. At least I don't remember trying.

The gauges on my 6 string Fender Tele were this:
9-11-17-26-36-46

I ask the wife to put me a set of strings together with the following gauges: 13-16-20-30-40-52

An understatement would be the following:
I was shocked at the improvement in tone of my guitar. The difference was night and day.

It sounds like I am playing through an entirely different rig now. Something to ponder.