Stringmaster/Deluxe 8 replacement pickups and fretboard

[Marc Stone]

Thoughts on the various Stringmaster replacement p/us out there? Lollar, Sentell, Eeymour, whoever else?

Also my guitar has some weird thick lucite fretboard on it that has to go. It's a '56 Deluxe 8 22.5" scale. Recommendations? I see a cpl avail all of which say they need to be filed to fit a vintage Fender. I can do that, but if a drop in replacement is avail, I'd prefer that.

Thx!

[Jonathan Scherer]

Re fretboard replacement,

Have you tried GeorgeBoards?
https://www.georgeboards.com/parts.html

Or Jim Palenscar?
http://www.steelguitars.me/Repairs.html

[Bill Sinclair]

Jimmy Hudson and Gary Rue both have fretboards made for their Stringmaster style guitars and kits. One of them might be willing to sell just the fretboard.

I have the Seymour Duncan pickups in my Deluxe 8 and like them fine. If you have the original working pickups, I wouldn't bother changing them though.

[Marc Stone]

Hi guys,

Thx for the responses. I’m in touch w Jim, he’s got me covered on the fretboard.

As for the pickups, the neck, which I use almost exclusively, is full and sweet but the bridge is terribly anemic and shrill. There’s no point on the blend pot where I’m happy, and have worked a lot w height etc, just not happening.
I could have it rewound, but I happened upon a pickup (for $30!) made by a small maker who seems to cater to the headbanger guitar scene. It’s a 13.5 k stacked humbucker in a Stringmaster format. That may sound like sacrilege, but to me it means a bridge pickup that has enough out put to start having an influence earlier in the blend pot. It also means if I want to drive the amp hard (I use tube amps), I can roll the tone back and peg the bridge pickup.

We will see how it sounds in practice. Anything will be an improvement over the stock bridge pickup.

If someone has experience w SD vs Lollar vs others I’m still curious.

[Bill Sinclair]

Wow! An 8-string stacked humbucker for $30? Please share the winder's contact info when you've had a chance to test it. I have some orphan long scale Stringmaster necks that I don't have enough pickups to populate.

Don't toss your original pickup, someone will want it. What's the ohms reading? You might also consider swapping the windings on the blend pot so that the neck pickup is always on and the bridge pickup gets blended in instead of the other way around.

[Nic Neufeld]

As for the pickups, the neck, which I use almost exclusively, is full and sweet but the bridge is terribly anemic and shrill. There’s no point on the blend pot where I’m happy

Is this a custom wired blend pot, or original factory?

My understanding (subject of course to revision) is that there are two basic approaches to the Stringmaster "blend" wiring. It's not a normal two pickup blend in the modern sense (eg 100/0, 50/50, 0/100). "Mk 1" Stringmasters had it incorporated with the tone knob, but it sounds like you have a blend knob (by the bridge) so it would be the MkII wiring.

With that wiring, pot full on has both pickups on -in series-. Turning the pot down turns off the neck pickup. So with it on, it operates like a typical humbucker, two coils in series, typically humcancelling, warmer, and higher in output. Turn the pot back and you've got the bridge pickup by its lonesome...less output and brighter.

So assuming a lot of things (a. your guitar has original wiring, b. the blend pots on Deluxe 8s are done the same as Stringmasters), you may be making an assumption that there is a bigger difference between your pickups than there is. There's no way to hear just the neck pickup with that wiring (unless you modify the circuit of course and pull the bridge pickup out). The bridge pickup alone is going to naturally sound weaker and brighter than both pickups on in series. All this to say, if what you actually dislike is the weaker, brighter sound of the stock single coil (compared to the in-series dual coil at the other end of the pot) putting in another vintage style pickup isn't necessarily going to fix that.

I always keep mine all the way on, both pickups...the warmer the better with my style of playing.

[George Piburn]

To add another layer to Nic's

To make the dual humbucker idea work, one of the pickups must be wound reverse and magnets opposite polarity.

To get get these as balanced as possible in modern times , I recommend you get a fresh pair made for you if you want to go back to a stock sound, with fully charged magnetic punch.

If you don't care about any if that , and just want 2 pickup sounds, bypass the blend all together and incorporate some sort of selectors.

As it stands with the un matched pickups , if you try to blend them in series, it most likely will be a miserable failure. Then again you might like the results.

[Marc Stone]

interesting. it has the blend pot and the wiring looks original and unmolested. Blend pot full up is indeed both pickups on full and it starts to favor bridge over neck as you roll back. All the way back and the neck is almost totally out.

Bridge p/u still sounds thin/weak (even by normal bridge/neck relationship standards)

so the new pickup (which itself is a stacked humbucker in a strngmaster footprint) with higher output wont just give me some more oomph from the bridge in whatever the blend position is? i may be missing something.

Thx!

[George Piburn]

From what I can gather , you don't care to make it back into a string master.
If you want it to be an original sound, you need to do what everyone else has done -
get a correct pickup set from a professional winder and install them exactly like they are supposed to be.

To make it work like a normal guitar which is completely OK and viable, you need a 3 way switch and 2 volumes just like a typical 2 pickup guitar.

Then you bring up what ever volume and so on like any normal guitar.

[Nic Neufeld]

Here's the thing, I'm with you...bridge by itself sounds thin compared to the two pickups in series...that's why I'm always playing it full on with both coils active. But that's Stringmaster tone, by design. Some folks (maybe as you get more into country??) might like a brighter, thinner tone with more twang in it, and that's the benefit to rolling off to just the bridge pickup. Because they are wired in series vs parallel, you're always going to lose output and "oomph" when you roll off to just one pickup...think of it a bit like a coil split on a humbucker...you're gonna lose power but you gain more top end.

[Marc Stone]

hi George - no i'm not stuck on making it a proper strinmaster, but there are things I like about the blend circuit and sound.

hi Nic, yes I understand and I understand the compromises inherent in a blend circuit. Not looking for more twang, but more oomph. I could envision doing something like putting the blender on a switch so I could have it in or out of the circuit, and then a three way toggle for pickup selector when blender is out. I have an extra control plate and the guitar has been refinned/meesed with so originality is not an issue.
Except w the pots. I think the wiring and pots have a "thing", incl the way the tone shuts the volume nearly off at the bottom of it's range and the great wah effects you can get from that.
But I can also imagine those pickups sounding much bolder and full range when not draining each other in a blender circuit...

[Francisco Castillo]

i had the same problem, and changed the blend pot for a mini 3 way switch.
Got two new pickups and wired them traditional way.

1 vol
1 tone
3 way switch, on/off - on/on - off/on

you get neck, both, bridge, and super easy acces. I cant put the bridge cover back in place, but i found this wiring offers a lot of possibilities so it doesnt matters me.

stewmac, mini toggle 3 way switch

[Nick Fryer]

Marc -

I can make you a set of Stringmaster pickups. I've made quite a few of these for people in the Steel community and they really love them. PM me for details. Here are some links to some demos of my pickups. These pickups also work great on Fender 400 PSG. My pickups come with a lifetime warranty and a full refund if you are not happy with the product.

Youtube Links:

Stringmaster: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aN4kYwP4bh4

Fender 400: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1peps-tt48

[Marc Stone]

Thx Nick Fryer. Just might have to hit you up because...

Some mofo went through the trouble of pulling the Priority mail bag w the new pickup from my mailbox, opening the bag, stealing the pickup (must be the other 8 string lap player on the block, smh) and putting the empty bag back in my mailbox.

Now, where were we?

Oh yeah, how do we feel about having a switch between the blend pot and a tele style three way selector? That allows the the cool sonic aspects of the blend circuit and the (I presume) fuller, bolder sound of the pickups when they are not creating drag on one another in a blend circuit.

@BILL - the company is Hargreaves pickups

[Nic Neufeld]

the (I presume) fuller, bolder sound of the pickups when they are not creating drag on one another in a blend circuit.

Just reiterating...it isn't a conventional blend circuit. It's two coils in series with a pot that progressively sends the second (neck) coil to ground. Almost exactly like a single conventional humbucker pickup with a coil split switch, but the coils are in separate routs so it feels different to us (as well as a pot vs a switch).

So bear in mind, the two pickups in series will be fuller/warmer/louder than either pickup by itself...just the same as when you split a standard PAF humbucker pickup you never see a jump in output. If you're handy with a soldering iron you can for sure try removing either pickup. unwiring the neck pickup should work fine as the pot would send the bridge pickup ground straight to ground (at one end of the pot travel). Or, let me think...if you just removed the bridge pickup lead from the center lug on the blend pot and soldered it to the ground on top of the pot, you'd accomplish the same thing (bypass the pot, bypass the second coil). Tone is subjective of course but just in theory, with two similar single coils, wiring in series will give you more output. YMMV

https://www.lollarguitars.com/pickup-wi ... iagram.pdf

[Nick Fryer]

Marc -

In my opinion the dual pickup with the blend pot is the best thing Fender ever did. When blended at 100% it sounds great. They work together in tandem beautifully, no drag or tone loss. Some people flip the way it's wired and put the neck pickup as the single pickup when the blend knob is rolled off vs. the bridge pickup being the single pickup. This gives you a darker sound if you want to opt for a single pickup but not have a super bright bridge pickup sound. The key to have the two pickup set up work best is having an equally matched set of pickups. I have found after experimenting a lot with them, that two pickups in the 9k range really hits the sweet spot for these guitars.

Here is a picture of one of my SM pickups