Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Talk about modding or building your own guitar from scratch.
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daz
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Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by daz » Wed Apr 07, 2021 1:20 pm

Then do i have the fix for you ! If you recall from my other thread, i have a squier paranormal tele that has those pickups that are more P90 than JM due to screw poles and bar mag. But they are in jazzmaster shells. I posted about trying to make the pickups work and talked about having first tried a set of fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters in it and hated them. I have heard the same from a fair number of people since this, my first foray into anything close to jazzmaster territory. So i started modding the remaining stock pickup after one died and found a way to make them sound better. Not great but better, and i ordered a pair since they are cheap chinese pickups u can get for $25 on ebay and are the same as it came with.

Anyways, cut to the chase....i thought about trying to somehow mount other pickups in it but tele pickup polepieces don't match the jazzmaster cover oles. Today i check my strat pickups and they fit. So i thought about how i could go about mounting them and it hit me....simple, just leave the foam i have in the cavity (i removed the rubber foam off the stock pickups and put spongy foam in the cavity to allow lower settings) ans put the strat pickup in the cover and hold it in while i put it in the cavity with the springs and screws in place. That was all there was to it ! No fabricating anything and they just drop in !

The results were fantastic. SOOOOOO much better then the fender 65's or the modded stock ones. I tried any old strat i had loose in the parts drawer and just did the bridge. But now i think i may take my best set and use 2 of those and not even bother with the stock units i ordered from china. Now i wish i hadn't ! But for anyone who can't seem to make their JM type pickups work for them because they just find them too scooped and bright, heres a great and simple answer if you have any strat pickups laying around. I'm going to put the bridge and neck pickups from my fender fat 50s set in it later on tonite. This allowed me to truly hear whether i like this guitar or not because it was hard to tell thru the sound of those fake JMs or the 65s both of which are not to my taste. The stock once might have been if they sounded like P90s which is what they are closest to, but they don't.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Vendetagainst » Wed Apr 07, 2021 7:01 pm

This is actually a super cool idea! Thanks for sharing, I know someone who may be really interested in this.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by daz » Wed Apr 07, 2021 7:27 pm

The let me give you a bit of advice to pass to him to make it easier. What i did is to cut 2 pieces of foam like the kind they use in pickup packaging. Cut each one so it's about a 1/2" thick and maybe 3/4" wide, and for length it should fit the width of the cavity so that each piece sits up against the cutouts for the cover screws. Or i suppose you could use a piece the entire size of the cavity but the thickness may have to be less or it may be too compressed to lower the pickup as much as he may want. In any case what i'm getting at that will make install much easier it that the cutouts should have foam up against them so you can put the springs in the cutouts and the foam will hold them in place as you lower the pickup in. Otherwise they will fall over and make installing the cover with the pickup a PITA. So once the foam is in and springs sitting in the cutouts, have the screws in the cover then push the pickup in so the poles line up and push them thru the holes hold it in place with one hand and use the other to feed the wires thru. Once u pull the wires thru, while holding the pickup in the cover, lower the pickup in and guide the screws into the springs and push and hold the whole thing down and with the other hand screw it down.Anyways, probably way more then he needs and can figure it out himself, but the main point is using the foam not only to push against the pickup keeping it in place, but to hold the springs in place while you lower the whole shebang in place

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by ohm-men » Thu Apr 08, 2021 2:21 am

Cool, I did a simelar thing with my first parts Jazzmaster some 15 years ago. I didn't have pick ups, so I put a Strat Middle and Bridge pick up in this guitar and put some Jazzmaster covers over the strat pu's. I later did a simelar thing with a pair of Gretch mini himbuckers where I removed the covers from, put them in a DIY thinline Jazzmaster with std. Jm pu covers.
like you wrote, if the pole pieces match the holes of the Jm covers, you can put about everything under these covers and put some foam underneath the pick ups to level them out.

I think a formite here still owns the thinline Jm with the Gretch mini's...

A while back I was planning on doing a pair of Alnico 2 strat pick ups in a Frankenmaster, but then I found a used set of Creamery '58 style alnoco 2 pickups and got these.

But, yeah... a pair of good strat pick ups in a Jazzmaster sound pretty good. Plenty of choiche as well....
You might even want to consider putting a middle strat pu in between.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Lost In Autumn » Thu Apr 08, 2021 5:18 am

Japanese Jazzmasters have traditionally had Strat pickups beneath Jazzmaster covers.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Sweetfinger » Sat Apr 10, 2021 3:53 am

Lost In Autumn wrote:
Thu Apr 08, 2021 5:18 am
Japanese Jazzmasters have traditionally had Strat pickups beneath Jazzmaster covers.
No. They're Jazzmaster pickups, they just have a slightly different wind and bobbin height which makes them sound a bit more like Strat pickups.
Here's what MIJ JM pickups look like:
Image

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by solfege » Sat Apr 10, 2021 1:20 pm

One of these days, I might actually build something around the pickups out of my '94 MIJ JM. The only thing that's really wrong with them is that they're not traditional JM pickups. They have a thing of their own that's probably exploitable.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Lost In Autumn » Sun Apr 11, 2021 3:26 am

Sweetfinger wrote:
Sat Apr 10, 2021 3:53 am
Lost In Autumn wrote:
Thu Apr 08, 2021 5:18 am
Japanese Jazzmasters have traditionally had Strat pickups beneath Jazzmaster covers.
No. They're Jazzmaster pickups, they just have a slightly different wind and bobbin height which makes them sound a bit more like Strat pickups.
Here's what MIJ JM pickups look like:
Image
their taller bobbin effectively makes them strat pickups, that the bobbin looks like a Jazzmaster from the top is irrelevant.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by jvin248 » Sun Apr 11, 2021 6:29 am

.

This is the camera angle you need for the MIJ JM pickup comparison...
Still not quite a Strat pickup.

Image

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Tweedsuitcase » Wed Apr 14, 2021 12:51 pm

daz wrote:
Wed Apr 07, 2021 1:20 pm
Then do i have the fix for you ! If you recall from my other thread, i have a squier paranormal tele that has those pickups that are more P90 than JM due to screw poles and bar mag. But they are in jazzmaster shells. I posted about trying to make the pickups work and talked about having first tried a set of fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters in it and hated them. I have heard the same from a fair number of people since this, my first foray into anything close to jazzmaster territory. So i started modding the remaining stock pickup after one died and found a way to make them sound better. Not great but better, and i ordered a pair since they are cheap chinese pickups u can get for $25 on ebay and are the same as it came with.

Anyways, cut to the chase....i thought about trying to somehow mount other pickups in it but tele pickup polepieces don't match the jazzmaster cover oles. Today i check my strat pickups and they fit. So i thought about how i could go about mounting them and it hit me....simple, just leave the foam i have in the cavity (i removed the rubber foam off the stock pickups and put spongy foam in the cavity to allow lower settings) ans put the strat pickup in the cover and hold it in while i put it in the cavity with the springs and screws in place. That was all there was to it ! No fabricating anything and they just drop in !

The results were fantastic. SOOOOOO much better then the fender 65's or the modded stock ones. I tried any old strat i had loose in the parts drawer and just did the bridge. But now i think i may take my best set and use 2 of those and not even bother with the stock units i ordered from china. Now i wish i hadn't ! But for anyone who can't seem to make their JM type pickups work for them because they just find them too scooped and bright, heres a great and simple answer if you have any strat pickups laying around. I'm going to put the bridge and neck pickups from my fender fat 50s set in it later on tonite. This allowed me to truly hear whether i like this guitar or not because it was hard to tell thru the sound of those fake JMs or the 65s both of which are not to my taste. The stock once might have been if they sounded like P90s which is what they are closest to, but they don't.
Surprised to see that the fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters are not well thought of. Was under the impression those were the recommended non-boutique option.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by andy_tchp » Wed Apr 14, 2021 6:03 pm

Tweedsuitcase wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 12:51 pm
Surprised to see that the fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters are not well thought of. Was under the impression those were the recommended non-boutique option.
They are well thought of and widely recommended.

I’m surprised that that’s what you took from a single person noting that they didn’t like them.
"I don't know why we asked him to join the band 'cause the rest of us don't like country music all that much; we just like Graham Lee."
David McComb, 1987.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Deed_Poll » Thu Apr 15, 2021 3:24 am

andy_tchp wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 6:03 pm
Tweedsuitcase wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 12:51 pm
Surprised to see that the fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters are not well thought of. Was under the impression those were the recommended non-boutique option.
They are well thought of and widely recommended.

I’m surprised that that’s what you took from a single person noting that they didn’t like them.
+1, I've always appreciated the AVRI '65 pickups, and I own two vintage '65 Jazzmasters. Which isn't to say they're for everyone of course, but they do a great job of sounding like a vintage pickup, and that's the basis upon which they're marketed and sold. There's not much more they can do than that in my opinion!

But different strokes for different folks, of course!
Owner Operator of GuitarForm - Custom Offset Guitar Bodies
www.guitarform.com ◈ @guitar_form

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Lost In Autumn » Thu Apr 15, 2021 4:31 am

andy_tchp wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 6:03 pm
Tweedsuitcase wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 12:51 pm
Surprised to see that the fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters are not well thought of. Was under the impression those were the recommended non-boutique option.
They are well thought of and widely recommended.

I’m surprised that that’s what you took from a single person noting that they didn’t like them.
I suspect that the OP may not Jazzmaster Pickups. In all fairness, I didn't like them either, until I properly eq'd my amp for them. In my experience, P90's & strats benefit from different settings than Jazzmasters and Jaguars- my vintage-styled offsets do better with attenuated treble settings, while my other guitars seem to want a treble boost.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by daz » Thu Apr 15, 2021 6:33 am

People, it's not that the pickups are lousy, they just don't work in my guitar. A jazzmaster is a very different guitar than my tele which is a squier paranormal cabronita thats a hollow poplar body with a strat style hardtail bridge and maple neck. Nite and day different. The JM pickup have an obvious quality tone, but they are scooped and in this guiatr that gets highly exaggerated leaving mostly high end and a little bass with not mids to speak of. I now have strat pickups in it and they sound much better but it's still very bright because the guitar is annually bright due to the woods and hardware. I suspect i wouldn't like jazzmasters anyways because while the pickups would likely sound a lot better in them, chances are they are still more scooped than i like. But the pickups are fine, just not my thing and likeyl WAY more not my thing due to the guitar they were in.

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Re: Don't care for you jazzmaster pickups? I may have your fix

Post by Tweedsuitcase » Fri Apr 16, 2021 12:45 pm

andy_tchp wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 6:03 pm
Tweedsuitcase wrote:
Wed Apr 14, 2021 12:51 pm
Surprised to see that the fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters are not well thought of. Was under the impression those were the recommended non-boutique option.
They are well thought of and widely recommended.

I’m surprised that that’s what you took from a single person noting that they didn’t like them.
If it had just been the OPs opinion, I would have figured “different strokes”, but he said “... tried a set of fender pure vintage 65 jazzmasters in it and hated them. I have heard the same from a fair number of people”
which caught my attention

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