Those sound amazing Jay! Super clear in all the settings and great balance in the in between positions too. Which is always a bit tricky between a humbucker and a single coil.
The problem of giving up screws on humbucker is loosing some of the attack and precision. You can see in demo J has to pick hard to retain separation and there is certain midfreq zing going similar to tele. Also you can adjust only height of the pickup. I've found that adding fatter polepieces into splitting coil (similar to anderson) and overwounding that coil (6,5k) gives balder sound with nice separation. Split works better with 10k trimmer to ground to control the amount of split. Overall 9k humbucker with PAF nature A4 magnet will balance beutifully with singles. Add cover if too harsh. This set is something like 500USD but it's a lot for small mod in 1 bobbin...Resistors to compensate 500k vol are must. You can ask any winder for a special modded pickup for 1/5 of the price. Also position of humbucker is very important. On his guitar it's about 1cm from bridge. Best is to locate bridge pickup about 5mm from bridge to get back some of the attack with theese mods..
I still think HSS with rail pickups is the best set you can buy. You can get clearer sounds than regular humbuckers in the middle and neck positions. Whilst also having the wiring options of a typical strat, use of parallel and out of phase wiring, pickup split options for Steve Vai and Guthrie on the five way normally for HSH.
I'm looking to upgrade my American Performer Strat HSS with a 10-way selector switch and a better humbucker. The only thing I dislike about this strat is the "Double-Tap" humbucker, it's a tincan mess. I had a Tele Deluxe that had two Shawbuckers & they sounded SO much better. I had a Gibson ES-339 with '57s which edged out the Shawbuckers by just a bit. I thought the easiest way to 'upgrade' is to buy a Shawbucker, but if I'm gonna get soldering, I might as well put something killer in it. I'm not a good player but I play easily 3hrs per day. My 'influences' are EVH, Slash, Hendrix, and tons of hair metal. Despite the hair metal, I'm still looking for a passive humbucker. Anyone have a specific passive humbucker suggestion for what I could add to my HSS Strat that might sound great in the realm of Shawbuckers for clarity & the Gibson '57s for growl?
Hi Jay, I own a similar Friedman and I like the original PUs. How would you describe the difference between the J-MOD and the original Friedman? (I know the in between Hum-Sc is not quite perfect, but beyond that...) Thanx for your great videos. Always inspiring! Cheers
Two very different approaches: I feel like Friedman warmed/smoothed up the single coils to blend better with the Bridge Humbucker. The Friedman humbucker is a hotter vintage styled pickup (crunches really great). To match the meaty sound of that bridge, the neck/middle pups are more rounded sounding. You will also notice that when you go to the Bridge/Middle blend position on the Friedman set, the tone is a lot more rounded than clucky. Great set for straight up rockin'! On the other side: for my set, I added more clarity and openness to the humbucker to better match with the single coil pickups. My set has the classic 60s styled Strat sound, with lots of clarity in the Neck and Middle pickup: leading to some great in-between positions. The bridge is very clear and articulate, and balances well with the singles (which is why the in-between position is so great). The idea is, if set your amp to sound the best with your singles coil pickups, your humbucker with be EQ'd just perfectly.
Your guitar one volume and one tone, which is what i'm going to do on my custom HSS strat. The wiring diagram on your patreon has two tones though. What do i need to do differently to go the 2-knob way? Just connect all pickups to the single tone knob? Awesome video and awesome playing as always!
Here is something that may help you. Fender makes a stacked 250K/500K pot that share the same post. If you get two of them, you can wire the bridge to the 500K vol/tone pots and the other singles to the 250K vol/tone pots! Good luck!
Everything about this sounds amazing- the pickups, you're playing, everything. Is this company still in business? I've tried contacting them a couple of times and never got a response. Plus their social media accounts haven't added anything for quite some time. Would love to speak to someone there before dropping this kind of cash!
I just noticed your message and wrote them to look for your message and reach out to you. Thanks for reaching out and I really hope you dig the pickups if you decide to go for them after your hear back!
The Strat pickups are very close to my signature set. The Neck will be a bit more punchy and the middle position is quite clean: leading to fantastic in-between positions. The Bridge is design to match the single coils and has a really sweet sound with great clarity (notice that there are two sets of slugs on it instead of the typical PAF screws/slug orientation. I am also very picky about how I wire it up: here is how I do it and it leads to one of the best Bridge/Middle in-between tones you will ever hear :) drive.google.com/file/d/1j34t2TPwHZjd0YxXx4xAElbYUNiZJhNZ/view
I feel a little more clarity and pop. Cool story: the original humbuckers were dual slugs as well until a sales rep argued that adjustable polepieces would be good selling feature for people used to the adjustability of P90s/
No treble bleed. I run the Bridge through a 500K pots and the singles through a 250K (stacked pot on the volume and tone). When on the in-between Bridge-Middle position, both pickups are going through 500k volume and tone pots.
So I’ve had an HSH for a while now and have thought about reselling it, not like the tone. I’m not skilled with soldering and switching pickups, But after seeing this video, I’m wondering if swapping the pups out instead? Electronically, would it be a good idea to switch them to HSS set up? Would it cause any issue since the guitar is originally HSH set?
WOW, those pups do sound really good but...$500.00 for a set? Yikes, you can get two brand new firefly guitars for that, or a couple used squires, or even a Larry Carlton Sire S3 new or an S7 used and these guitars ROCK. IMO, not many people can afford these kind costly of upgrades unless you play Professionally. which I have for many years, I have played in every venue you can imagine for over forty years and in my experience, (and I have run the gamut of costly pickup upgrades and hardware) there really is very little difference in a good set of cheap pups versus a great set costly pups especially if you have the right amp and effects. To my ear there are many cheaper brand pups out there that sound just as good as there costly counterparts, for example, a new set of Fender 59's are around $200.00 half that if you get them used (great rock or blues tone), New Fender 54's at $245.00 (very versatile pups). Both of these pups sound every bit as good as what I hear on this vid. On the lower end of the spectrum are Tex-Mex pups at $99.00 (you can't beat that blues or rock sizzle) or $50.00 used, and last but most certainly not least are a set of Dragon fire area 52 pups at an astonishing $79.00 (which are all around great sounding pups). IMHO, these afore mentioned pups sound just as good to me and have there own strengths. First off, spend your money on a Decent amp and work your tone from there. Just my 2 cents worth. Peace
Good day sir, may i kindly know the spec of your signature p.u and its resistance..an excelent strat tone sir. Thank you very much from Philippines po..
Start with 250k on this set. I've been really digging it there lately! It also does work awesome with a separate 250k volume pot for the singles and 500k volume for the bucker (sharing a 250K tone pot).
"They might just be the best..." -- but, they are not -- because "best pickup sound" is subjective, not objective. And these very expensive pickups are 'made' (read: sold) by a dubious, secretive company. Remember that this video 'includes a paid promotion' and we'll all be fine. There are plenty of pickups from which to choose. Choose wisely.
most underrated UA-cam guitar player IMO
He might just be the best
Love this guy. Always a positive and informative watch.
Word
You are right, Jay, that bridge-middle position is really cool. Great work on this set.
Very nice! I just picked up a Fender HSS for a steal and was considering swapping out P-ups, putting these on the list. Great demo as per usual. ✌
Thanks!
Sounds amazing…now if only I could afford them…
Those sound amazing Jay! Super clear in all the settings and great balance in the in between positions too. Which is always a bit tricky between a humbucker and a single coil.
Yeah! It took awhile, but we really nailed it :)
He definitely is a natural rhythm. Guitarist. I gotta go practice .............
The amount of practice you had to endure in order to be so ABSOLUTELY badass ! Amazing - Bravo!
The problem of giving up screws on humbucker is loosing some of the attack and precision. You can see in demo J has to pick hard to retain separation and there is certain midfreq zing going similar to tele. Also you can adjust only height of the pickup. I've found that adding fatter polepieces into splitting coil (similar to anderson) and overwounding that coil (6,5k) gives balder sound with nice separation. Split works better with 10k trimmer to ground to control the amount of split. Overall 9k humbucker with PAF nature A4 magnet will balance beutifully with singles. Add cover if too harsh. This set is something like 500USD but it's a lot for small mod in 1 bobbin...Resistors to compensate 500k vol are must.
You can ask any winder for a special modded pickup for 1/5 of the price.
Also position of humbucker is very important. On his guitar it's about 1cm from bridge. Best is to locate bridge pickup about 5mm from bridge to get back some of the attack with theese mods..
your playing feels like i'm watching the video at 2x speed
I still think HSS with rail pickups is the best set you can buy. You can get clearer sounds than regular humbuckers in the middle and neck positions. Whilst also having the wiring options of a typical strat, use of parallel and out of phase wiring, pickup split options for Steve Vai and Guthrie on the five way normally for HSH.
I'm looking to upgrade my American Performer Strat HSS with a 10-way selector switch and a better humbucker. The only thing I dislike about this strat is the "Double-Tap" humbucker, it's a tincan mess. I had a Tele Deluxe that had two Shawbuckers & they sounded SO much better. I had a Gibson ES-339 with '57s which edged out the Shawbuckers by just a bit.
I thought the easiest way to 'upgrade' is to buy a Shawbucker, but if I'm gonna get soldering, I might as well put something killer in it.
I'm not a good player but I play easily 3hrs per day. My 'influences' are EVH, Slash, Hendrix, and tons of hair metal. Despite the hair metal, I'm still looking for a passive humbucker. Anyone have a specific passive humbucker suggestion for what I could add to my HSS Strat that might sound great in the realm of Shawbuckers for clarity & the Gibson '57s for growl?
might as well sell them *PRE-WIRED* as a set so that we can actually have no troubles of what pots, wires, caps, etc. you specifically use.
That's not a bad idea actually: I should look into that!
Hi Jay, I own a similar Friedman and I like the original PUs. How would you describe the difference between the J-MOD and the original Friedman? (I know the in between Hum-Sc is not quite perfect, but beyond that...) Thanx for your great videos. Always inspiring! Cheers
Two very different approaches:
I feel like Friedman warmed/smoothed up the single coils to blend better with the Bridge Humbucker. The Friedman humbucker is a hotter vintage styled pickup (crunches really great). To match the meaty sound of that bridge, the neck/middle pups are more rounded sounding. You will also notice that when you go to the Bridge/Middle blend position on the Friedman set, the tone is a lot more rounded than clucky. Great set for straight up rockin'!
On the other side: for my set, I added more clarity and openness to the humbucker to better match with the single coil pickups. My set has the classic 60s styled Strat sound, with lots of clarity in the Neck and Middle pickup: leading to some great in-between positions. The bridge is very clear and articulate, and balances well with the singles (which is why the in-between position is so great). The idea is, if set your amp to sound the best with your singles coil pickups, your humbucker with be EQ'd just perfectly.
@@JayLeonardJ you're filipino right ?
These sound amazing!
And the price is ridiculously high!
I recommend Marko Foley`s and Radioshop`s PUs for those in UK&Europe. :)
Is this the guitar fetish pre wired pickup guard
Is this the one J28 Humbucker Equipped HSS Guard- Slick White on White single ply Assembly.
Grabeh!!!! Sarap. Best HSS wiring mod.
Really glad you dig it :)
I always love your playing bro very awesome
Really appreciate it!
Guitar is sounding awesome... with your awesome musicianship.
Thanks :)
Sounds great! Do they sell this set in a loaded pickguard?
I don't think so unfortunately. I'm sure they can rig one up for you if you reach out!
Your guitar one volume and one tone, which is what i'm going to do on my custom HSS strat. The wiring diagram on your patreon has two tones though. What do i need to do differently to go the 2-knob way? Just connect all pickups to the single tone knob?
Awesome video and awesome playing as always!
Here is something that may help you. Fender makes a stacked 250K/500K pot that share the same post. If you get two of them, you can wire the bridge to the 500K vol/tone pots and the other singles to the 250K vol/tone pots! Good luck!
Thanks for the video. Can you make a list of all songs you played in the video? Thanks.
That little guitar intro made me think of Bill and Ted.
hahaha! Definitely
Everything about this sounds amazing- the pickups, you're playing, everything. Is this company still in business? I've tried contacting them a couple of times and never got a response. Plus their social media accounts haven't added anything for quite some time. Would love to speak to someone there before dropping this kind of cash!
I just noticed your message and wrote them to look for your message and reach out to you. Thanks for reaching out and I really hope you dig the pickups if you decide to go for them after your hear back!
@@JayLeonardJ Thanks so much, they just got back to me yesterday. Really looking forward to trying these out!
What would you say the biggest difference is between these pickups and the deluxe set?
The Strat pickups are very close to my signature set. The Neck will be a bit more punchy and the middle position is quite clean: leading to fantastic in-between positions. The Bridge is design to match the single coils and has a really sweet sound with great clarity (notice that there are two sets of slugs on it instead of the typical PAF screws/slug orientation. I am also very picky about how I wire it up: here is how I do it and it leads to one of the best Bridge/Middle in-between tones you will ever hear :) drive.google.com/file/d/1j34t2TPwHZjd0YxXx4xAElbYUNiZJhNZ/view
Panalo!
I wish I saw this first before I bought the Seymour Duncans.
New subscriber here, great playing bro.🎸🎵🍻
I really appreciate it! Thanks :)
What's the difference between a pickup with screws and one without? 1:52
I feel a little more clarity and pop. Cool story: the original humbuckers were dual slugs as well until a sales rep argued that adjustable polepieces would be good selling feature for people used to the adjustability of P90s/
These sound incredible - do you only sell in North America?
They sell direct at www.tonespecific.com :)
What’s the writing diagram for this guitar ? Volume and tone values and what capacitor? Also does it have a treble bleed mod?
No treble bleed. I run the Bridge through a 500K pots and the singles through a 250K (stacked pot on the volume and tone). When on the in-between Bridge-Middle position, both pickups are going through 500k volume and tone pots.
@@JayLeonardJ ok
Kool thanks
So I’ve had an HSH for a while now and have thought about reselling it, not like the tone. I’m not skilled with soldering and switching pickups, But after seeing this video, I’m wondering if swapping the pups out instead? Electronically, would it be a good idea to switch them to HSS set up? Would it cause any issue since the guitar is originally HSH set?
That should work just fine! that neck Humbucker route will easily fit a single coil in there easily. Good luck :)
please i want the wiring scheme, i have 1 pot 1 volume on my guitar too, but i visit your patreon its 2 tone 1 volume scheme. i want your tone master.
Try one of those Dual 250k/500k pots that share the same shaft. Fender makes one!
Sounds amazing but the pups cost nearly as much as my MIM strat. Lol
Do they make loaded HSS pickguards
Sold.
If you need any tips on it, feel free to reach out anytime :)
Nice...
WOW, those pups do sound really good but...$500.00 for a set? Yikes, you can get two brand new firefly guitars for that, or a couple used squires, or even a Larry Carlton Sire S3 new or an S7 used and these guitars ROCK.
IMO, not many people can afford these kind costly of upgrades unless you play Professionally. which I have for many years, I have played in every venue you can imagine for over forty years and in my experience, (and I have run the gamut of costly pickup upgrades and hardware) there really is very little difference in a good set of cheap pups versus a great set costly pups especially if you have the right amp and effects. To my ear there are many cheaper brand pups out there that sound just as good as there costly counterparts, for example, a new set of Fender 59's are around $200.00 half that if you get them used (great rock or blues tone), New Fender 54's at $245.00 (very versatile pups). Both of these pups sound every bit as good as what I hear on this vid. On the lower end of the spectrum are Tex-Mex pups at $99.00 (you can't beat that blues or rock sizzle) or $50.00 used, and last but most certainly not least are a set of Dragon fire area 52 pups at an astonishing $79.00 (which are all around great sounding pups).
IMHO, these afore mentioned pups sound just as good to me and have there own strengths. First off, spend your money on a Decent amp and work your tone from there. Just my 2 cents worth. Peace
How do you think they would do on a maple board?
They are awesome! I actually tend to prefer maple neck Strats in general. However, that Friedman is something special :)
he is the Best youtube guitarist
I'll take that complement any day of the week, haha. I really appreciate it and thanks for writing :)
@@JayLeonardJ you're filipino right ?
Good day sir, may i kindly know the spec of your signature p.u and its resistance..an excelent strat tone sir. Thank you very much from Philippines po..
Love your demo's but please slow down your playing Can hear the tones a bit better Specs and output ? Good set man
I should definitely slow down, but I guess I was having too much fun, haha
Are you using 250k pots or 500k?
Start with 250k on this set. I've been really digging it there lately! It also does work awesome with a separate 250k volume pot for the singles and 500k volume for the bucker (sharing a 250K tone pot).
Thats sick
I trust you if you say they are the best. I do prefer not the best definitely. Lucky for my money 😂
Does he have a band??? Can i listen on spotify
🤯 🎸
"They might just be the best..." -- but, they are not -- because "best pickup sound" is subjective, not objective. And these very expensive pickups are 'made' (read: sold) by a dubious, secretive company. Remember that this video 'includes a paid promotion' and we'll all be fine. There are plenty of pickups from which to choose. Choose wisely.
They are the best HSS to me :) However, they were voiced specifically for my needs and tastes, so that would have to be a given, haha.
They sound little dull to me🤷🏻♂️
$500 for pickups? Yikes 🤦♂️
Is this satire ?
skip it ... with all his facial emoting and loud overdriven playing...
These kids today with their smiling and loud music...
unholy crap, how much incredible stuff can one use "on an everyday basis"
I know 😂 Definitely lucky in the gear department, haha
@@JayLeonardJ You deserve it, sir - by far the most innovative player on youtube. Please keep it up!
Strait awful....Lemme help you, bareknuckles
They make lovely stuff as well :) That being said, my ears definitely prefer my set (obviously, haha)