Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

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offsetgamematch
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Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by offsetgamematch » Mon Feb 25, 2019 7:16 am

Hiya,

So when I bought my JMJM I did so knowing I was going to install a staytrem and replace the pickups. 2 years later and the staytrem’s been going strong but I haven’t got round to those pickups yet...

Here’s the deal, I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of WRHBs in a JM but I’m not a humbucker guy. My other JM is a classic player where I swapped the pickups out for some Jess Loureiro vintage styled and put a 4-way switch in. (It was a long time ago, I had no problems with Jess though I know others have since). I really like the sounds I can get out of that and it covers off the classic JM sounds well.

On the JMJM, I wanted to put something in there a little fatter and hotter I was thinking a classic neck JM pickup with an overwound bridge. FWIW, I don’t hate the stock pickuos which are JM/p90 hybrid but I want an upgrade..

All the WRHB clones I’ve seen out there are crazy money and tbh I’m not after vintage correct, cunife etc but then I saw the rose Picasso’s which look a great price and product. I found a theead from a fellow forumite saying he asked rose to wind them with lower output and they were still pretty sparkly when clean. I’m uk based so was also considering asking one of the winders over here, probably mojo, to do me a just a plain old vintage hot set. Budget is around £100.

I want something with plenty of sparkle and clarity when clean and not too honky but that can also drive a fuzz hard too. Music-wise, I play jangly stuff and fuzzy alt-rock stuff with a bit of shoegaze. Nothing super heavy so not after crushing high-output by any means. The amps either clean or running through an IC muff maxed out.

Grateful for any thoughts. Sidepoint, the lack of good quality YouTube clips of JMs with WRHBs is staggering. Particularly the clean sounds. Couldn’t even really find many of the Lee Ranaldo signature. I’ve found a couple of clips on here which I’ll check when out of work of the Picasso’s.

I don’t want to sacrifice lovely JM clean sounds for higher output.

Tl;dr - can jazzblasters sound pretty clean? Can you point me in the direction of clips? Do I bite the bullet and go for JM sized WRHBs or stay safe with overwound vintage style pickups.

Thanks!

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by 601210 » Tue Feb 26, 2019 8:11 am

offsetgamematch wrote:
Mon Feb 25, 2019 7:16 am
On the JMJM, I wanted to put something in there a little fatter and hotter I was thinking a classic neck JM pickup with an overwound bridge. FWIW, I don’t hate the stock pickuos which are JM/p90 hybrid but I want an upgrade..
The JMJM pickups are already fatter and hotter than regular JM pickups. If someone with standard JM pickups wanted fatter and hotter they'd probably be pointed in the direction of JMJM pickups ;) .

From what I can tell the Rose Picassos don't seem to be straight repros of WRHBs but more of "inspired by". Looks cool though, if I saw these before I ordered the Bootstrap Lakesurfers for my Starmaster I'd have probably ordered a set.

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by offsetgamematch » Tue Feb 26, 2019 10:24 am

Ah apologies if I wasn’t clear. Something a little a fatter and hotter than a vintage JM pickup rather than the JMJM pickups.

As you say, they’re plenty fat and hot enough! Just Not completely sold on them.

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by jvin248 » Tue Feb 26, 2019 11:56 am

.

The modern WRHB pickups are regular humbuckers with a fancy offset screw pole pattern case.
The original WRHB and remake ones as you found are crazy pricey due to the material availability and the special machining of magnetic screws.

Just get a set of hot humbuckers or mix a hot humbucker with a JM depending on which you use for what.

You can find the usual suspects of SD and Dimarzio/etc but you can also search ebay for low cost humbucker sets (I have bought quite a few of the '$15/set' models from chrome cased, black-black, black-creme, and black-red. Look for one or both pickups that output 15-16kohms. I find these are cleaner (less muddy) than the normal SD/D offerings. Possibly due to hand-winding (and for $15/set) revealed by lower internal capacitance measurements.

Difficult part will be getting a new pickguard and maybe need to do some wood cutting to get depth allowance.

.

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by øøøøøøø » Tue Feb 26, 2019 2:28 pm

Don't think "humbucker" when you think WRHB.

They're a different animal than a Gibson-style humbucker. I bet you'd like them. I love the Lollar version... not cheap, but not outlandish price wise.

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by 601210 » Tue Feb 26, 2019 6:52 pm

jvin248 wrote:
Tue Feb 26, 2019 11:56 am
.

The modern WRHB pickups are regular humbuckers with a fancy offset screw pole pattern case.
The original WRHB and remake ones as you found are crazy pricey due to the material availability and the special machining of magnetic screws.

Just get a set of hot humbuckers or mix a hot humbucker with a JM depending on which you use for what.

You can find the usual suspects of SD and Dimarzio/etc but you can also search ebay for low cost humbucker sets (I have bought quite a few of the '$15/set' models from chrome cased, black-black, black-creme, and black-red. Look for one or both pickups that output 15-16kohms. I find these are cleaner (less muddy) than the normal SD/D offerings. Possibly due to hand-winding (and for $15/set) revealed by lower internal capacitance measurements.

Difficult part will be getting a new pickguard and maybe need to do some wood cutting to get depth allowance.

.
I think what he's looking at are the WRHB for Jazzmaster types of pickups. They're actually surprisingly not as rare as you'd think because there's a lot of interest in Jazzblasters.

I doubt "just get a set of humbuckers" would be close at all to what he's looking for.

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by offsetgamematch » Sun Mar 17, 2019 12:42 pm

Cheers guys - I’ve ordered a set of the Picassos. I’ll keep you posted with how I get on!

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by TeenageShutdown! » Sun Mar 17, 2019 3:09 pm

offsetgamematch wrote:
Sun Mar 17, 2019 12:42 pm
Cheers guys - I’ve ordered a set of the Picassos. I’ll keep you posted with how I get on!
Please do! I have a Rose JM in the neck & a Rose Picasso in the bridge. I think the Picasso in mine is an Alnico 3. Great pickup for the price.

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by offsetgamematch » Mon Apr 22, 2019 2:11 am

Update.

Installed these over the weekend and I’m really really loving them. I’ve not done a direct comparison with a standard JM pickup yet, but to my ear they sound very similar. Definitely a little more bass and mids but still plenty of top end and clarity. If I didn’t know better, I reckon you could convince me they were a noiseless set of JM pickups. Would definitely recommend for anyone interested in taking the plunge. I’m seriously considering getting a second set for a build I’m about to start...

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by MC3 » Sun Jul 07, 2019 9:27 pm

Sorry to bump an old thread but it seems better than creating a new one for my question

I ordered a Rose Picasso for my JMJM bridge, and Ken was super quick and helpful when responding to emails and questions. I ordered them June 5th, and I received a confirmation of order that day that said I would be notified when they ship. It's been about a month now, and I haven't heard anything, I emailed Ken just making sure all was well with the order (I felt kinda bad doing so, but was worried the order never went thru etc.) and got no response.

This is my first time having pickups made for me, so does this timeframe make sense? I figured it would take a while, but I don't exactly know how long a while is. Does anyone have experience with Rose that can help?

I'm probably just overthinking this

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Re: Jazzblaster/WRHB questions and musings

Post by JVG » Sun Jul 07, 2019 11:10 pm

One month is nothing out of the ordinary. If you reach two months without any comms, I would start asking questions. I don’t know Ken Rose, but bear in mind the following:

1. Many ‘guitar guys’ (i.e. people who make guitar stuff) are not the greatest communicators. Yes, there are exceptions, but this is the rule, unfortunately.

2. They tend to receive many emails each day from various customers or prospective customers, and may grow tired of answering the ‘when is my order ready’ question (or simply don’t have time to answer everyone’s questions).

So I wouldn’t be too worried at this point. I’ve been in exactly the same situation many times, and the builder has eventually delivered a great product each occasion (despite non-existant comms in many cases).

Let us know how you like the pickup when it arrives.

Cheers!
J.

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