Floating pickup fight

[MartyGrass]

Three archtop guitars with three different floaters through the same amp A/B/C.

 

 

 

Golden Eagle with D'Addario Chrome 12s and Kent Armstrong rebuilt Heritage #3 Floating humbucker. 3" deep non-cutaway.

 

 

 

Heritage Johnny Smith with GHS Flatwounds 11's and a Heritage Floating #3 pickup. Same dimensions as the Golden Eagle but is tap tuned and has a cutaway.

 

 

 

 

Unity 100th Anniversary with GHS Flawounds 13's and a Shadow Zoller humbucker. Same dimensions as the others except the body depth a 3 1/2".

 

 

 

The results.

 

I hope you weren't expecting much here. The strings and guitars were somewhat dissimilar. Nonetheless it is obvious that the Kent Armstrong is hotter. The mids are stonger and the volume is louder at the same pot and amp settings. This cannot be ascribed to the strings or the size of the box because I played all three guitars acoustically as well.

 

Surprisingly the Zoller and Heritage pickups sound very similar. The reviews of the Zollers are generally glowing. It seems that as many people like the Heritage Floating #3 as hate it.

 

I believe I can compensate with an equalizer for about 90% of the differences among the pickups. Any of the pickups will do just fine. If I had the only have one, it would be the Kent Armstrong.

 

The more experience I get, the more I tend to agree with the old timers, at least the ones around Kalamazoo. They would tell you that you need to have a pickup on your guitar. Which one you choose isn't that important.

 

But knowing this won't change much. I'll still check out other pickups and strings from time to time looking for a big surprise.

[Gitfiddler]

For what it's worth, your hot Kent Armstrong p'up might have been a special request, since he custom winds many of his high end pafs.

 

The KA floater on my Golden Eagle seems hot only because of its close proximity to the strings. I lowered it as much as possible by subtle adjustment to the pickguard and it sounds much sweeter.

 

Since you've started a kind of comparison, can you comment on how they handle feedback issues when amplifed?

[Keith7940236]

I have the KA rebuilt floater on my GE. I also have a mahogany Eagle with the stock Heritage #3. The rebuilt KA, in my opinion is much sweeter sounding.

 

Strangely enough however, my favorite is another KA that I have on my 575. It is the floater with the 6 adjustable pole pieces, really a unique, fat, sweet sound. It's not the single coil with the six adjustable on the Archtop.com site, it's a humbucker that I purchased from my guitar instructor that originally came on his handmade archtop.

[MartyGrass]

For what it's worth, your hot Kent Armstrong p'up might have been a special request, since he custom winds many of his high end pafs.

 

The KA floater on my Golden Eagle seems hot only because of its close proximity to the strings. I lowered it as much as possible by subtle adjustment to the pickguard and it sounds much sweeter.

 

Since you've started a kind of comparison, can you comment on how they handle feedback issues when amplifed?

 

 

All of the pickups are as distant as possible from the strings and are about the same distance.

 

I didn't check for feedback.

[Steiner]

All of the pickups are as distant as possible from the strings and are about the same distance.

 

I didn't check for feedback.

Are you trying to say you don't play through a cranked, full stack, Marshall Plexi?

[DetroitBlues]

I'd love to sit down and try out a tapped tuned and a non tapped tuned to see which sounds better.

[Keith7940236]

Mark,

I forgot to ask, what cap values are you using in those? I"m assuming 500K pots?

[MartyGrass]

One of the guitars came with a 25K pot. That was horrible. At least two of them have 500K pots and 0.022 caps. Probably all three do.

 

With regards to tap tuning, it is an art. Sometimes it's done very poorly. One of the guys at Heritage told me that sometimes an archtop sounds tap tuned by luck with no special effort.

 

Here's a video on tuning a back. It happens to be a mandolin. Some of the masters are adamant that tuning the back of a guitar does more harm than good. The carving of it is far more important, and it must be hand, not machine, carved.

 

 

Here's a video on tuning the top.

 

[H]

A 25K pot? When you played it, did whales compliment you on your music?

[MartyGrass]

A 25K pot? When you played it, did whales compliment you on your music?

 

I posted this saga about a year ago.

 

This archtop sang nicely acoustically, but I thought the pickup was almost dead. I had a Heritage Floating #3 put in. It still sounded very quiet and bassy. The luthier didn't notice a problem. After a month and trying various strings and amps, I pulled the electronics out and noticed the 25K pot.

 

Apparently the guy who put the original electronics in got a pot intended for a bass by mistake.