Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Building pickups from the ground up

Moderator: jingle_jangle

egosheep
Intermediate Member
Posts: 1258
Joined: Mon Nov 17, 2008 10:29 pm
Contact:

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by egosheep »

Looked like this, JB:
Image
Great Ramp In My Opinion.
JakeK
RRF Consultant
Posts: 5757
Joined: Sun Nov 25, 2007 9:08 pm

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by JakeK »

Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. I think the Hot Rails pickup JB linked to seems the most intriguing, and Eden's idea of wiring the bridge to a tone knob isn't bad either. I'm supposed to take it to International Vintage for a (free) neck adjustment. Steve Staples said when I brought the guitar to him in January for new strings, it was a complete mess: the neck had too much relief, it needed a cleaning, the action was off and the entire pickguard needed to be taken off so the guitar could be rewired (without a reverse-wound middle pickup and 5-way switching). So he told me next month, I can bring it in and he'll give it a free adjustment and whatever else I want done to it. Maybe with a hot-rails AND Eden's suggestion. Steve also thought it would be fun if we refinished it into George Harrison's "Rocky"...

My Strat is an incredibly great guitar and certainly has unique features that cannot be replicated in any other guitar I own, and in any other Strat I've played before or since it. One buddy of mine called it "Then best Strat [he's] ever played, bar none", and he's certainly played a lot of them.
User avatar
jps
RRF Consultant
Posts: 37132
Joined: Wed Feb 12, 2003 6:00 am

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by jps »

JakeK wrote:Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. I think the Hot Rails pickup JB linked to seems the most intriguing...
A friend of mine has these in his Strat, very nice and highly recommended.
User avatar
weemac
Veteran RRF member
Posts: 2735
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 1:28 am

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by weemac »

Any change you do to the treble pickup on a strat will ruin the position "2" neck and middle setting, as the matched DC ohms on the pickups is fairly important. So it depends which sound is more important to you.
I have tried many pickups in my Strat and always come back to the original ones (with the tone control added) after all it only costs about 20c worth of wire and position "2" is unharmed
In changing pickups what you gain in one area you may lose in another. And after all 62 RI strat should have well speced pickups as standard so it is just a matter of a bit of fine tuning.
A decent set of 250K pots and an orange drop capacitor can be money well spent though...

emac.
I confused Faraday's cage, with Schrodinger's cat box....
User avatar
admin
Site Admin
Posts: 15029
Joined: Wed Jul 05, 2000 5:00 am
Contact:

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by admin »

I agree with Eden. Having said that, while we are on the pursuit of finding a less harsh tone, why not put in a push pull pot that will allow for the neck and bridge combination (tele-like) tone. This adds to the palette of tones and is one of my favourite pickup combinations on the Stratocaster.
Life, as with music, often requires one to let go of the melody and listen to the rhythm

Please join the Official RickResource Forum Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/groups/379271585440277
rickboy1689
New member
Posts: 47
Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 1:53 pm

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by rickboy1689 »

rolling off the tone might will dial out the icepick tone but arent you just muffling things then? wouldnt it be better to find a less harsh pickup but one that still retains clarity? dropping a duncan jb jr. in my strat made it such a versatile guitar
User avatar
weemac
Veteran RRF member
Posts: 2735
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 1:28 am

Re: Dial out the "ice-pick" in '60s RI Strat

Post by weemac »

rickboy1689 wrote:rolling off the tone might will dial out the icepick tone but arent you just muffling things then? wouldnt it be better to find a less harsh pickup but one that still retains clarity? dropping a duncan jb jr. in my strat made it such a versatile guitar
It works fine, trust me. It will go a bit like a P-90 without the "Ompth" You don't take all of the tone off though....

emac.
I confused Faraday's cage, with Schrodinger's cat box....
Post Reply

Return to “Winding Up With The Best: by Sergio Silva”