The Steel Guitar Forum

I have had the exact same experience with the Alumitone pickups that William Joerger had on his GFI. I've used the pickups the past 2 weekends on the job and couldn't be happier with the sound from Alumitones on my GFI. They were a simple install and look great on my "Black" GFI.

aw man I got a black GFI, I better get my order in!

As an addition to my above post, I'd like to thank Bobbe Seymour. In separate emails between us, he was a great help by sharing the benefit of his experience with pickups in general and these Alumitones in particular. Thanks Bobbe.

William, you are more than welcome!

Bobbe

From another post where I'm selling my GFI D-10, I've received a number of emails inquiring about what kind of rubber I used under the ear ends of the Alumitone PU installation. What I did was cut into small strips the rubber from a beer coaster. Rubber beer coasters happen to be only about 1/16 inch thick and very dense. I figured, if they're good enough to protect my furniture from my beer mug, they're certainly good enough to insulate the Alumitone PU from the guitar cabinet and still allow use of the screws that came with the PU. It works out great and the space between the pickup and strings is just a tad over a quarters thickness. Cheers!

I just installed a six-string humbucker-sized Alumitone in one of my Fouke lap steels. So far, so good. It replaced a Kent Armstrong P90 that was dead quiet as well. I'm thinking the all-aluminum body of the Fouke adds sheilding and keeps things quiet, regardless of what pickup is installed. I simply wanted to try out an alumitone to have see what the hype is all about.

It sounds clear, as others have stated. I've set the pickup height really really low (about 1/4" from the strings) and it sounds good that way. I had heard that the Alumitones react to tone controls differently than other pickups but I can't see any significant reason to say such a thing.

I tried out the Alumitone at a rehearsal, last night. Sometimes I loved it and sometimes I wasn't so sure. When using overdrive, it seems kinda processed sounding. There's no "raw" in this pickup. It's very focused, clean and direct. I tried to push it to the edge of feedback without any luck. It actually reminded me of playing through a POD.

Pretty easy to get some springs from Ace Hardware and clip them to needed length. I like to be able to adjust the pickup height to find the sweet spot and foam doesn't allow that. Be careful about getting it too far from the strings or they tend to thin out a bit at least on my Show-Pros.

James Mayer wrote:There's no "raw" in this pickup. It's very focused, clean and direct. I tried to push it to the edge of feedback without any luck. It actually reminded me of playing through a POD.

This fear is exactly what has held me back on getting a pair of 'bucker sized ATs for a Les Paul.
I think I stick with the 'miles of raw', Bareknuckle Mules.

Ron Whitfield wrote:

James Mayer wrote:There's no "raw" in this pickup. It's very focused, clean and direct. I tried to push it to the edge of feedback without any luck. It actually reminded me of playing through a POD.

This fear is exactly what has held me back on getting a pair of 'bucker sized ATs for a Les Paul.
I think I stick with the 'miles of raw', Bareknuckle Mules.

That being said, it does have a lot of strengths. I had another rehearsal last night and realized that pinched harmonics are extremely easy to pull off with the Alumitone. My all-aluminum lap steel always had superior harmonics to my wooden steels, but now it's somehow even easier. The sustain is noticeably better, though I think that it's sort of an illusion. It's almost like it's compressed. The dynamics just aren't there when playing with overdrive. Even with a volume pedal, I'm finding it difficult to place emphasis on certain notes of a phrase. That's a strange feeling.

Perhaps raising the pickup closer to the strings would restore the dynamics?

Rich Peterson wrote:Perhaps raising the pickup closer to the strings would restore the dynamics?

I've been experimenting with the pickup height and it only seems to affect the output volume. I'm going to keep trying because I really want to keep the strengths and remove the weaknesses. I'm playing show tonight and will raise the pickup a bit and see how it goes.