Angled pickup with XR-16 - Was Leo Fender right?

Dave Mudgett · From: Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee

I just picked up a Lawrence XR-16 pickup from Bob Carlucci for my Emmons SKH Legrande E9 neck. It came without the usual mounting tabs, so I had to mount it with Silicone RTV directly to the mounting plate, which turned out to be fortuitous.

Before I mounted it, I decided to try some different pickup mounting strategies to see what they sounded like - various linear positions unangled, and then angled various ways so the polepieces lined up under the strings reasonably well. I tried every conceivable position with 3-4 amps for the last couple of days, and found - for my tastes - that Leo Fender knew what he was doing with the Strat and Tele lead pickups by angling the treble strings slightly toward the bridge/changer and the bass strings slightly toward the neck, and that's what I wound up with.

Of course, I looked around for posts on the subject - I only found a couple on the old forum:

http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=28658
http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=63203

It seems that most people who think about this suggest the opposite. I guess it's a personal preference, but I felt that I got more of a push-pull style brilliance in the high-register this way, and I really liked the bass strings in the more mellow jazz-position region towards the neck. Overall, I got a wider range of tonal colors from the bottom to the top strings. Not a huge difference from the straight-across mounting, but I liked it.

Anybody else try this, or have any comments or criticisms?

On the XR-16 - I love it. It is quiet as a mouse, and I can push the treble EQ up a bit for high-register work without noise and without it getting real harsh-sounding. I think I like this as much as the much-vaunted 705 on other guitars I've had.

Bill Hatcher · From: Atlanta Ga. USA

Dave.

I am having Jim Flynn make me a 6 string pedal steel. I made the body for him and he is doing the rest. I always wanted a dedicated 6 pedal guitar. The pickup setup on it will be such that there will be two pickups on the guitar and each will be moveable. The range of movement will be modest on the back pickup and the front will have a bit more. You can really get some interesting sounds moving pickups around.

I will have to experiment with the angle set up also.

Dave Mudgett · From: Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee

Bill - I do think it would be good to have adjustable position/angle mounting plates as a standard feature on pedal steels. I don't see how it would cost much of anything on steels with a metal pickup mounting plate like this Emmons has. You know - I got the idea to mess with this by just looking at the whole mounting hardware - the three screws that mount the plate to the neck and the whole thing look so much like a Tele bridge pickup mounting that I said - "Hey, why don't I consider angling the pickup like a Tele bridge pickup?" Smile

Whether or not anybody does that as original equipment, it should be straightforward to make up a mounting plate that would give some backward/forward and angled mounting options for this Emmons - if I ever decide to put on a pickup with standard wide-mounting hardware, I'll look into that.

As a guitar player - I certainly like the idea of two adjustable pickups. So far, I haven't had the guts to tear up any steels - yet. I can just hear the cringes at the thought. Wink

The other thing that I really noticed about this pickup change was that with the high-resistance (but I assume reduced-inductance) Lawrence design - I had to rethink the EQ settings a bit. But the pickup is so quiet, I can do whatever I want and not worry about noise, so I felt I was able to dial in what I needed and it sounded very natural to me. No doubt about it - Bill Lawrence is a real innovator.

Earnest Bovine · From: Los Angeles CA USA

I had a steel like that once. Actually, there were two 6-string pickups, and the pickup on the treble side was closer to the bridge. I didn't like it that way.

c c johnson · From: killeen,tx usa * R.I.P.

I always like to test Keoki Lakes memory from time to time. All of Bud Tutmarcs steels had the slanted pup. One day in Winchester a bunch of us were in the parking lot including you and me with Bud expounding on the attributes of the slanted pups. He went back inside and returned with a Tutmarc electric bass that had a slanted pup. If my memory is correct he stated that his dad came up with the bass idea in the early 30s. I have a pic of his dad playing the electric bass w/ a slanted pup behind Sol Hoopii playing steel.I think that Bud said his dad put the slanted pup on Buds steel in order to get more out of the last 3-4 strgs as most other steels of that era lacked good responce on these strgs. Thats the extent of my memory, how about yours? cc

David Doggett · Posted 13 Mar 2007 9:53 am

Dave, I'm one of the ones suggesting an opposite slant from the regular guitar pickups. I got the idea from two observations. When adjusting the EQ of my amp, I discovered I like the way the lower strings of my uni sound with more treble in the EQ. It gives them more definition and string separation. I think this is the same reason bass guitar speakers often use horn tweeters or 10" speakers. But this EQ adjustment makes my high strings sound too shrill. If I adjust for more bass EQ, the high strings sound better, but the low strings sound muddy and are lost in the mix. Ideally, I would like a split pickup, so I could run the two pickup sections into separate channels of a two channel amp (or separate EQ device) and EQ them differently.

I also notice the same effect based on where I pick the strings. The high strings sound better picked about an octave above the bar, where the harmonics are rich and mellow. But the low strings get better definition and cut through the mix better if picked nearer the changer. That's not exactly the same as slanting the pickup, but it is a similar effect.

However, my little experiments above don't give me the ability to play the high and low strings the way I like them AT THE SAME TIME, in harmony or chords. Your experiment with slanting the pickup does allow you to get the effect on the high and low strings at the same time. Maybe what I perceive as better EQ and definition when playing the high and low strings separately doesn't hold up well when they are played together. Maybe that explains why you liked the traditional slant (high strings closer to the changer) better than my reverse slant suggestion. But your observation that it sounds brighter makes me suspicious we are just after different sounds. I'm not so much after overall brightness as I am after less shrillness on the high strings and more bite and definition on the low strings. I'd sure like to try this myself sometime to hear the difference.

Bob Kagy · From: Lafayette, CO USA

David D,

I have exactly the same experience with EQ'ing the bass and treble strings; and with picking position.

I'd like to try either of the following:

(1) one pickup with separate coils and outputs for the bass strings and the treble string to offer the possibility of EQ'ing each output differently, then mixing them.

(2) one angled pickup, with the bass end angled towards the bridge, the treble end toward the nut.

(3) two pickups with a blend control like the stringmasters.

Of the three options, maybe a hybrid between #1 and #2, i.e., separate bass and treble pickups positioned with the bass p/u neard the bridge, treble further away.

Or how about this, one wide pickup with one pole piece per string that could be dropped in pre-fab'ed holes closer or further away from the bridge according to the user and tuning? Would be compatible with most existing guitars.

But the current compromise of less string separation on the bass end vs shrillness at the treble side never fails to have me tweaking the EQ every day.

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