Question/ problem: SD Cool Rail pickups in Jaguar

sprisoners · Post by **sprisoners** » Wed Jul 29, 2009 7:37 pm

Hello all,

New member of this forum, but I've been reading it for a while.

I recently bought a mid 2000's Jaguar that was crafted in Japan. It had the non-wax potted pickups, which were subject to a lot of feedback. I also own a strat that has three Seymour Duncan Cool Rails (singe space humbuckers)- they sound great, cancel hum, and are versatile pickups. They luckily also fit in the Jaguar.

I put two of them into the guitar pretty easily, but once I started playing I encountered a problem.

The pickups now overdrive my amp way more easily than I'd like, and in general its hard to get a clean tone out of them when playing loud. This was never a problem with my strat. I don't think I have the pickups too high- they are about a 1/4 from the strings when the strings are depressed.

Anyone know what I can do to fix this? Any help would be greatly appreciated. thanks much!

Fran · Post by **Fran** » Wed Jul 29, 2009 8:16 pm

Welcome to the forum.

You could try obvious stuff like lowering the pups more or rolling the volume knob back a little and adjusting your amp. Consider EQ and Volume.
Im quite surprised this is happening, they should be more powerful on a Strat technically speaking.

purplehaze19x · Post by **purplehaze19x** » Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:47 pm

Does pot. values make that much of a difference? The strat probably has 250K and the Jag. has 1m.

Fran · Post by **Fran** » Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:55 pm

It should only effect treble but it did cross my mind..

Lol i just saw your sig

purplehaze19x · Post by **purplehaze19x** » Wed Jul 29, 2009 10:05 pm

Fran wrote:It should only effect treble but it did cross my mind..

Lol i just saw your sig

Its the TRUTH! i read way more than i post, signed up 3 years ago and only have 420 post? Noob for LIFE.

sprisoners · Post by **sprisoners** » Wed Jul 29, 2009 10:23 pm

Yeah, i've considered lowering the pickups even more, but I think doing so might negatively affect the tone.

I've also tried lowering the volume of the guitar and just raising the volume of the amp, but it still happens to a certain extent.

Could it be the the difference in pot. between the strat and jag?

Mityushikha · Post by **Mityushikha** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 1:45 am

It quite possibly could be, I put 500k pots in my JM and still dial volume and tone down to 8 on the guitar to get a nice clean tone on the amp. what amp are you using btw?

Will · Post by **Will** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 2:13 am

Best suggestion is just lowering guitar volume; I wouldn't lower the PUPs unless you have too much midrange. What amp are you using?

mezzio13 · Post by **mezzio13** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 2:34 am

From our Wiki....

If you have a Japanese model Fender Jaguar the pickups are not wax potted (which makes them prone to microphonic feedback in high gain situations), fairly low output and have a 'spiky' treble sound to them (although this is part of the Jaguars personality).

Cool rails are for players looking for loud, basically.

Cool Rails

Cool Rails are for players who need a louder, punchier, and fatter single-coil sound

That Jag is set up for weak pups, I'd certainly lower the rails to compensate.

sprisoners · Post by **sprisoners** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 4:50 am

thanks to everyone for all the help so far.

some clarification:

I'm using an old Epiphone tube amp from the 60's. It's basically a Gibson GA-20 RVT. Ten inch speaker, I think like 12 watts. Not really super loud, but I never had problems with it using my strat when the volume was on 4 or 5. Now, I have my guitar on anywhere from 5-10 on the volume knob and my amp at the same level, and a chord rings out dirty.

However, the amp is somewhat of a moot point because I tried the Jag through a Fender Deluxe Reverb, a Pro Reverb, and a Twin, and had similar problems. Not quite as bad, but I still could not get a loud clean tone.

How low should the pickups be if I did lower them more? What is recommended?

thanks again!

Fran · Post by **Fran** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 9:32 am

You got break up on all them amps?
To be honest 1/4 of an inch is already plenty, and if you cannot clean things up with volume settings maybe you should look at another pickup replacement like SD Jag upgrades. Another alternative would be to lower the pot value but I can't see it making much difference.
You may be able to tame things down with a pedal, maybe a compressor or gate but it's always going to be at the cost of your tone.

Will · Post by **Will** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 9:39 am

You couldn't get a clean sound with a Twin?!?!?!?!

I've got an old Cool Rails that gets stuck in a guitar every now and then - it does tend to drive an amp more than you'd expect. If you're after really clean cleans, you probably want a lower output PUP. Dimarzio Virtual Vintage are probably the best hum-cancellers for mimicking the SC sound and they have some low-output models.

Mityushikha · Post by **Mityushikha** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 10:01 am

If it's not the amp then other than a pickup replacement all I can suggest is lowering the pickups some more and turn down the volume on the guitar.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 10:57 am

Getting any dirt out of a Twin without the use of a pedal or your eyes bleeding is some feat.

Fran · Post by **Fran** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 1:14 pm

Haha, I was thinking the same.... Might get me some cool rails in the future.

Post by **dots** » Thu Jul 30, 2009 9:39 pm

is maybe the amp having problems? tried it with a different guitar to rule that out first? twins should be REALLY hard to break up w/o a pedal.