New pickups on my JTV-69S

[amsdenj]

I wasn't that happy with the magnetic pickups on my JTV-69S. They sounded thing and lacked character. The mags on my JTV Standard actually sound quite a bit better. So I installed Amalfitano SVL Daytona pickups on my JTV-69S this week: http://www.amalfitanopickups.com/SVL_Daytona_strat_pickups.php. They sound fantastic and completely change the way the guitar sounds and feels. I struggled choosing new pickups for this guitar, which is my main gigging instrument. There were so may good choices, and no really good way of evaluating them. After much study and listening, I decided to trust in the experience of professionals whose tone and style I really like. Matt Schofield has become one of my favorite guitarists to just listen to. His tone is really fantastic. There's a Rig Rundown that very good, and That Pedal Show has a full interview where he covers his whole rig in detail. His guitar tech, Simon Law, designed these pickups to reproduce the tone of Matt's 61 Strat. The biggest difference was in the bridge pickup. I found myself avoiding the stock JTV-69S bridge pickup because it just didn't sing to me. The Daytonas completely changed that. The bridge pickup has that great Strat spank, a really rich tone without the typical ice pick of a bridge single coil. I'm really happy with these pickups and highly recommend them. Installation was also quite simple, took about an hour.

[psarkissian]

Spec is 6.4k-Ohm bulk resistance,... good. Need to keep bulk resistance within a 6k-8k Ohm range,

so as to not create problems for the processor board. Very good.

[kevin11007]

Hi I thought of changing pickups too on my jtv 69s  because I thought 2nd position on toggle i.e bridge and middle sounded outa phase. I took a peek inside today and noticed pickup wires soldered back to little pcb board, it looked like it should have had black wires on one row terminals and white wires opposite side on board, but mine had bridge reversed, so maybe this is the problem. Hi gearhead when you installed new pickups can you remember what way wires were on board. Did you solder new pickups onto that board, would be tricky I guess. Thanks.

[kevin11007]

Ok got it sorted, bridge pickup was connected wrong way round on pcb board,swapped it around and all ok now, quality control missed that.

[specracer986]

Hey, they gave you custom wiring and didn't even charge extra for it. ;)

[jakeman19]

On 9/25/2017 at 9:59 AM, psarkissian said:

Spec is 6.4k-Ohm bulk resistance,... good. Need to keep bulk resistance within a 6k-8k Ohm range,

so as to not create problems for the processor board. Very good.

 

So I guess putting in a DiMarzio DP110 FS-1 Guitar Pickup that has a DC Resistance: 14.23 Kohm isn't a good idea? What would I have to do so the processor board is happy with a 14.23 k Ohm pickup as I really would like this pickup in my JTV-69s?

 

Jd

[psarkissian]

You'll get a darker tone (EQ) with bulk resistance like that. In a passive electronic guitar,

it would be about finding the right pot and capacitor to wire in. Can't do that here, it's an active

circuit with fixed values.

 

Richie Castellano of Blue Oyster Cult tried this earlier this year, live on Facebook, with a 12k-Ohm DiMarzio.

In real-time I double checked and told him it would too dark of a tone for his liking,... it was too dark of a tone

for his liking. He swapped it out for an 8k-Ohm DiMarzio a day or two later.

 

[jakeman19]

1 hour ago, psarkissian said:

You'll get a darker tone (EQ) with bulk resistance like that. In a passive electronic guitar,

it would be about finding the right pot and capacitor to wire in. Can't do that here, it's an active

circuit with fixed values.

 

Richie Castellano of Blue Oyster Cult tried this earlier this year, live on Facebook, with a 12k-Ohm DiMarzio.

In real-time I double checked and told him it would too dark of a tone for his liking,... it was too dark of a tone

for his liking. He swapped it out for an 8k-Ohm DiMarzio a day or two later.

 

Thanks for the response.

 

But it won't screw up the processor board it will just NOT sound as if it was on a passive guitar setup?

 

Jd

[psarkissian]

Impedance mis-match is not good, but I haven't had a catastrophic fail yet either.

Just won't sound right. I don't anticipate any problems beyond that. Might not sound

the way you like it. 12k-Ohm was too dark for Richie, 14k-Ohm is an even darker tone.

 

Impedance mis-match,... impedance is a function of frequency.

 

[arislaf]

On 9/11/2018 at 8:03 PM, jakeman19 said:

Thanks for the response.

 

But it won't screw up the processor board it will just NOT sound as if it was on a passive guitar setup?

 

Jd

FS1 is my neck pup on my 69S. It is dark, but i like it.

PS on case you are interested, i modeled the tone of the pup.

Get it here. https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=24065.0

[jakeman19]

2 minutes ago, arislaf said:

FS1 is my neck pup on my 69S. It is dark, but i like it.

PS on case you are interested, i modeled the tone of the pup.

Get it here. https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=24065.0

Did you also change out the middle PUP for a Custom Shop Fat 50? And Neck? I only did bridge and middle as the Edge sound, whom I'm trying copy, only uses 2nd position most of the time.  I don't seem to find the FS-1 dark, seems sparkly to me comparing it to my Signature Edge Guitar. 

Might have to play around with the pickup heights to compensate for this. Thanks for the link on the modelled tone. Will be interested to hear the difference with the one I created. I've never posted it cause I was never satisfied with it compared the real thing. 

 

Jd

[arislaf]

8 minutes ago, jakeman19 said:

Did you also change out the middle PUP for a Custom Shop Fat 50? And Neck? I only did bridge and middle as the Edge sound, whom I'm trying copy, only uses 2nd position most of the time.  I don't seem to find the FS-1 dark, seems sparkly to me comparing it to my Signature Edge Guitar. 

Might have to play around with the pickup heights to compensate for this. Thanks for the link on the modelled tone. Will be interested to hear the difference with the one I created. I've never posted it cause I was never satisfied with it compared the real thing. 

 

Jd

I changed the middle to a red velvet, and the bridge to a blue velvet, to have the most close dimarzio tone to the mark knopflers pups.

You are welcome! Just have in mind to save your bundle before you put my sounds.

[jakeman19]

17 minutes ago, arislaf said:

I changed the middle to a red velvet, and the bridge to a blue velvet, to have the most close dimarzio tone to the mark knopflers pups.

You are welcome! Just have in mind to save your bundle before you put my sounds.

Again Thanks for the reminder of the saving of the bundle. Knopfler fan also. This guitar makes it easy to change from one artist sound to another if you tweak things enough. 

 

Jd