Questions tagged [pick-ups]
An electromechanical device for amplifying the vibrations from guitar strings. Pickups can consist of ferromagnetic poles wrapped with copper coils for amplifying the vibrations of steel-based strings or piezoelectric crystals which amplify vibrations of the guitar bridge or body. These are both distinguished from microphones.
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What is the purpose of skew pickups? [duplicate]
I sometimes see electric guitars where one of the pickups are not in line with the bridge. What is the purpose of this? Seems to be a thing with strat bridge pickups.
What purpose does this serve?
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Fender Stratocaster center pickup gets in the way of palm muting
I have been playing guitar for probably about 10 years now and my primary guitar at the moment is an American Deluxe Fender Stratocaster with a humbucker for the bridge pickup and 2 single coils. The ...
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Can you put 6 string pickups in a seven string guitar?
I currently own a cheapy Ibanez seven string guitar that I want to upgrade the pickups for. I'm interested in putting active EMG's in but am wondering if I can add six string EMG in a seven string ...
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How can an electric bass/guitar without pick ups work?
I have seen electric guitars and basses that don't have any pick ups. For instance, here is an image of two Line 6 electric basses that have no pick ups:
How do these instruments work if they have no ...
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How to get raw signal from a divided or hexaphonic pickup
I have been looking for a way to get a truly divided signal from each string on an electric guitar.
The problem is I don't want the signal to be in a midi format because midi throws away a lot of ...
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changing pickups of an electric guitar
I have an old Stratocaster shaped electric guitar without any brand. I really love the color of this guitar but it does not sound as I wish. I try to have a good sound for playing blues.
Would it be ...
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Middle humbucker as Bridge humbucker
I have a cheap Strat, and I was just wondering to upgrade the bridge single coil to a bridge humbucker. Unfortunately, I bought a Tenayo Hot Rail Humbucker in Single Coil Form, which is - as it states ...
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Upgrading a guitar from low to high impedance pick ups?
I'm upgrading an Ibanez copy of a Gibson recording (a 2380 from 1973). I believe Ibanez went the low impedance route, but didn't include the transformer/XLR output. The pickups are certainly very ...
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High pitched ringing noise on single coil pickups
My guitar has split coil pickups, and I've started to have more problems with noise on the single coil setting since I changed my recording setup. I used to use a laptop to record into and if I had ...
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Fender Strat - parity between neck and middle pickups
I'm currently in the process of upgrading the pickups in my MIM Stratocaster. Since I've already purchased a neck pup and a humbucker for the bridge, I'd like to buy the middle one in isolation.
I've ...
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Reducing Neck Pickup Dissonance
A common problem with single-coil pickups is severe dissonance in the neck position, known by a few names like Stratitis. I know it can be reduced by properly adjusting the pickup height in relation ...
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Is it normal to have a guitar's single coil neck pickup louder than the bridge humbucker?
Recently I found out that my single coil at the neck has much louder sound than the humbucker at the bridge. The middle single coil is the same as the neck one. Is this normal? Do I need to make the ...
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What's the difference in sound, between an acoustic guitar with a soundhole magnetic pickup and an electric guitar?
What's the difference in sound, between an acoustic guitar with a soundhole magnetic pickup and an electric guitar? I Know that el. guitars usually have more than one, but is that all? Does the hollow ...
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Can someone explain to me how to get my guitar pickup to work on speakers?
I have a decent set of speakers for regular music from my iPod.
Something like this one above
Today I bought a pickup for my classical guitar that you basically tape it next to the bridge and its ...
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Would it be worth buying better pickups for a cheap bass guitar?
I bought a really cheap bass guitar second hand. It works fine, but I'm wondering if it would sound better with more expensive pickups. Since I got it at a market for around £20 I'm guessing that the ...
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What do I need to start playing violin amplified?
I play acoustic violin, but would like to start playing amplified sometimes. But when I start looking into equipment, I get lost in options. Piezos? Microphones? DI boxes? Pre-amps? Speaker systems? ...
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How the body vibration on a semi-hollowbody guitar affect the sound through the pickups?
Are this kind of pickups precisely "magnetic pickups"?
If so, the pickups are supposed to be producing sound from the (metallic) string vibration, then how does the body vibration on a semi-...
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Do I have a grounding issue?
I am asking a question regarding my PRS SE7. It has 2 humbucking pickups and recently, I have noticed a substantial amount of noise in my signal. The noise diminishes when I touch the strings or any ...
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Is there a pickup for Melodica?
I've got a couple of melodicas I want to run through guitar pedals, especially distortion and wah and then run the signal into a guitar amp.
Is there some kind of pickup I can put in or attach to ...
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What are the characteristics of a signal from a typical electric guitar?
A standard electric guitar utilizes passive induction pick-ups, which generate fluctuating voltage as the vibrating string moves in a magnetic field. This is high-school physics. Because it's passive, ...
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New Jackson Rhoads RRXMG control knob confusion
I just bought a New Jackson Rhoads RRXMG with EMG 85 Neck and EMG 81 Bridge pickups. I am having trouble with the control knobs. In theory I should have one master volume, one neck p/u tone and one ...
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Are there guitar/pickup/effect setups for "ganged" distortion?
One of the audio engineering wisdoms of guitar playing is that only comparatively skimpy voicings like power chords go well with heavy distortion because of cross-distortion.
Now one obvious solution ...
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Unwanted distortion from a guitar transducer
I've been using a K&K transducer in my acoustic guitar for ages. Recently I was running my clean signal through a headphone amp when I noticed that there appears to be audible distortion in the ...
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Can the interference of a power drill damage a guitar's pickups?
It's possible to get the sound of a power drill to come through an electric guitar's pickups. Paul Gilbert does it at the start of this video. Does this adversely affect the pickups when done for long ...
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Help for electro-acoustic pickup? (Element Active System)
A couple of years back I bought a classical guitar (Admira Avila), and had an acoustic pickup called the Element Active System put in.
I was wondering what amps people would recommend for this ...
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Guitar pickup selection
Most electric guitars and some basses allow players to select different combinations of pickups. For example, modern Stratocasters have a five-way switch between the neck, middle, and bridge pickups. ...
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Under-saddle pickup not picking up the low E string
Recently, my under-saddle B-Band pickup has gone silent, but only on the low E.
Acoustically, everything sounds just fine. The saddle hasn't been removed recently and everything appears sound.
Any ...
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Get series and parallel pickup wirings from a Strat?
I'm looking for a way to get some thicker pickups-in-series tones out of my Strat without losing the existing Strat sounds, or some extra ones I've added.
My current wiring uses one of the tone ...
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Middle pickup not working
The middle pickup on my Epiphone S600 does not come on when the 5 position selector is in the middle position. I cannot tell if it ever comes on. Also, the volume control closest to the tone control ...
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H-S-H vs H-H what can do one and can't another?
I'm seeking a guitar to elicit the rich fat heavy sound. So as I understand a guitar with the H humbucker (double coil) pickup is what I need for that. But there is a wide range of layouts for the ...
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What's the difference between alnico and ceramic pickups?
What's the difference? Is the gain on ceramic bigger or not?
PS: I don't know what to say, but I only ask for those pickups difference in general.
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How are the passive pickups of an electric guitar powered when they are connected to an effects processor?
Having the output as headphones how are the passive pickups powered in an effects processor ?
Do they take up the power source of the processor itself ?
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Is it practical (or even beneficial) to put pickup phase switch on Telecaster?
I play three Telecasters, they all have standard single-coil pickups. The oldest of these has a really individual sound when using the middle pick up setting. It is really thin and nasal; great for ...
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How are guitar pickups tailored to a certain frequency response?
I'm fairly familiar with how pickups work (difference between single coil and humbucker, coil splits, coil taps, active vs. passive, the fact that they are made from magnets with wire wrapped around ...
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Active Pickup Height
There are a lot of guides about the pickup height for singlecoil and humbucker pickups but there is very little guideline on active pickups. I have had my pickups in the default position since I ...
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Bass pickup height adjustment
I've recently set up my bass with the help of this youtube video:
I'm really happy with it but one question remains. Fender recommends 2mm space between the ...
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is there a way to fix Seymour Duncan Woody HC Hum-Canceling Soundhole Pickup cable?
A friend that visited the States got it for me, but after half hour of using it I believe the cable got broken. Now it sounds with a buzz everytime I use it.
Is there a way to replace the cable? ...
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Are there any practical differences between Humbuckers and Mini Humbuckers?
Other than form factor, is there any practical difference in sound or performance between a mini/single-coil-sized humbucker and a regular sized humbucker?
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Passive and active pickups for bass guitar
What is the difference in sound quality of active and passive pickups? At first it comes to me that active is best, always, but is that really true?
Also, can anyone point me if THIS specific bass ...
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seymour duncan phase
I am about to upgrade the pickups in my Ibanez 1527 7string guitar, so I was looking into this model for the bridge: Seymour Duncan JB Modell 7 Bridge black 4-phase, 7-string. Could someone explain ...
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Humbucker pickup wrapping wire role (The one that wraps the four wires together)
I was wondering if this wrapping can be removed as it is very hard to stack all the wires so that the pickguard will be easily placed inside the guitar. Does it shield noises for the four wires coming ...
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Effect of nickel cover on Telecaster bridge pickup?
Traditionally telecaster guitars have the neck pick-up covered in a nickel/chrome cover, and the bridge pickup left with exposed pole pieces.
What is the origin/logic of the nickel cover?
What ...
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Andy Timmons Dimarzio AT1 pickup sound
Well, the story goes like this : I have a custom made Tom Anderson guitar which has a fender style body (alder wood). The guitar comes with VAx pickups which sound great but the pickup near the bridge ...
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Validating pickup wiring
I want to replace the pickups on my guitar with another set.
Is there a way of knowing if I wired the pickups correctly before putting on the strings ?
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Annoying hot humbucker pick harmonics
I have a weird "problem" I recently bought an ESP ltd les paul style guitar with a Duncan JB pickup on bridge. Yesterday while i was practising with my headphones and with full hi gain distortion i ...
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F-Spaced pickups
I want to buy a Dimarzio DP224 pickup which comes in two types : F-Spaced and regular.
I heard that the difference is in the distance between the poles in the pickup.
I have an Ibanez GRG140 guitar ...
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Is there a way to test pickups or to determine which pickup to buy
I don't like the sound of the stock active pickups on my Ibanez (ART-320 - Les Paul like body), so I'd like to change them.
I really love the sound of the passive pickups I have on my other guitar (...
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How can I evaluate violin pickups?
I wanted to buy some pickups for my accoustic violin and I was looking on thomann.de and see these two models that seems interesting with the same price:
Fishman V-200
David Gage Violin Minijack
I ...
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What is the recommended way to amplify a jarana?
I've seen some inexpensive guitar pickups to amplify any kind of acoustic guitar, but I don't know if there's something like that for a jarana, and how good the sound quality is.
Is there something ...
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Replacing a humbucker with a P-90
I have an Epiphone Special Les Paul Junior, and I've been thinking about replacing the one humbucker that came on it with a P-90. Any reasons why this is a bad idea? Any recommendations about what I ...
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