Thoughts on Fender Fat 50's Strat pickups

[basile865]

Hey everybody. I've been giving these pickups a strong looking at lately. They seem like they might be the pickups I go with after all.

I spent some time with my buddies strat that has 69 custom shops in them. Compared to my american standard the 69's sounded thin. Im not sure I'm into the whole low output way of doing it.

The fat 50's have , starting with the bridge, an output of 6.2, 6.3, and 6.0 at the neck.

So theyre still not super high output, just enough to be a little fatter than some other vintage spec styles. The 69's have 5.8 output at each pickup.

Anybody have experience with fat 50's? What was your take on them?

Thanks

[Flames1950]

I've got a set in a Strat. Haven't played it in a while.

They're nice enough pickups. I certainly liked them better than Fender's Texas Specials. I don't think they have quite as much chime and high harmonics as the Tokai pickups I love dearly, but then neither does anything else I've found either. I guess my best thought is that I have no reason to want to remove them from that Strat, and I swap pickups like socks.

[basile865]

Yeah well that sounds like a pretty good set then!

The reason I'm sort've after these pickups is theres a 56 custom shop strat in the local GC that sounds great through a 76 super lead and also a 70's silver face twin. Its really in the ballpark of tone I'm shooting for. Thick and bluesy and all you need is to work the volume knob here and there to get the dynamics. I spend 99 percent of the time on the neck. Every once and a while I'll cut with the bridge but thats about all.

Now I'm assuming the fat 50's are the pickups in that strat because it says custom 50's pickups on the specs for the custom shop 56 strat on fenders website.

The only problem is that some strats say Fat 50's and others say custom 50's. The 1960 custom shop strat says custom 60's pickups, which you cant buy separately. Even still, I think based off the output I'd probably like them a good bit. Only problem with my current pickups is that they sound muffled sometimes in comparison to some higher end pickups.

Whats the benefit of changing the tone cap? Does that only effect the sound when you use the tone knob? cuz thats always on 10 for me

[yngwie308]

The Fender '69 pickups are an aproximation of the grey bobbin late sixties early seventies pickups wound by Abagail Ybarra for Fender as a Custom Shop pickup, these are good ones, Lindy Fralin's Woodstocks would be an even more inspired choice imho
yngwie308

[basile865]

Yeah my friend has the classic player 60's strat which has 69 custom shop pickups in them. In comparison to my american standard they sound weak. I'm not so sure the low output style pickup is for me. It might've worked best for 3 cranked stacks but considering I only play through 1 halfstack, or a high powered combo (85-130 watts) I still feel a single coil with a tad more power would sound better IMHO.

[basile865]

Just looking at fralin's website: the vintage hots and real 54's have the same neck output as the fender fat 50's. To be honest I'm going for fat single note soloing tone. Almost like an old humbucker but with strat character. Ya know sometimes how clapton gets his strat to have that humbucker sound sometimes? Thats sort've more what I'm after. Not ridiculously hot making it distort but rather something that will help overdrive so tiny that it just sounds large warm and bluesy.

[yngwie308]

Clapton uses a TBX mid-boost circuit to fatten up his sound, for 'fat note' single coil sounds I prefer to use a P-90, as that is the fattest single coil sound there is, it has hair growing on it.. .
For me, I like weak single coil Strat pickups, they lose their character imho if the output is jacked up, that's why there are pedals and high gain amps for boosting the signal.
You can get P-90's that fit in a Strat size slot if I'm not mistaken.
yngwie308

[basile865]

Yeah. I've never had a chance to really spend time with P-90's. I agree that the hotter you get, the more character you give up. If there were a spectrum from 1-5, 5 being the hottest, 1 being the 69's, I'd like to be somewhere around 2 or 2.5 Basically take a 69 style pickup and add a bit more output. Probably around .2-.4 ohms. Just to maintain strat quality but have a thicker single note sound.

To be honest, I want to transform my american standard strat into a 1 trick pony. It does not need to be versatile much. I spend 99 percent of my time on the neck pickup. I want it to sound beautiful through a single channel tube amp. Thick blues lead tones.

If anybody has suggestions or input please chime in!

[yngwie308]

I know what you are saying basile865 and I have often wished for this as well, have you ever tried the active EMG SA pickups, with the double 9 volt battery mod the output can be quite considerably boosted, without losing clarity.On the subject on neck pickup, the DiMarzio YJM vintage stagger single coil Strat pickup on my 2004 YJM Strat, has an incredible sound, very deep and with great definition and note separation. You may try some of DiMarzio's pickups as his are more versatile on average than the Seymour Duncans. You could use a humbucker in a stacked single coil approach on one of your pickups and mix and match the set of three for example.
yngwie308

[basile865]

im sort've scared to stray from something thats mostly vintage styled.

Heres a vid of me jamming with my friend using his strat that has 69 pickups.

I'd like something just a little fatter than that sound.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSGgWDHP7OI" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[yngwie308]

Rob, looking at the DiMarzio pickups, the hum cancelling single coils, the Virtual Vintage Blues DP402 looks right up your alley for the neck, check it out
http://www.dimarzio.com/site/pickups/#/pickups/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
What do you need in order to play blues with a Strat®? The Virtual Vintage® Blues has more power and warmth than a typical single-coil. You can really hear these qualities when you’re playing the Virtual Vintage® 2.1. It withstands hard picking and opens up when you’re playing with an overdriven amp. Instead of shrinking away, the sound jumps out of the speakers. These qualities are really useful for getting a fat neck position sound, but they’re outstanding for the bridge position—particularly if you have a thin-sounding guitar or use light-gauge strings. It’s a tough-sounding bridge pickup with warmer guitars, and makes a good neck and middle choice to match with a full-size bridge humbucker. As the rest of the Virtual Vintage® family, it’s dead quiet; there’s practically no hum at all.
Recommended For: All positions.
Tech Talk: The Blues model is a more muscular pickup than the standard DP401. Unlike thinner-sounding single-coils, it stands up to hard picking - the sound seems to expand through an overdriven amp instead of shrinking away. This quality is really useful for the neck position, particularly if you have a thin-sounding guitar or use light-gauge strings. With warmer-sounding guitars, it's a strong, tough-sounding bridge pickup. We recommend using 500K controls for extended frequency response, although there's no problem using 250K controls if you like the warmer tone they provide.

http://www.dimarzio.com/site/pickups/#/pickuppicker/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Good luck and nice playing on your clip..
yngwie308

[basile865]

man dimarzio has a great website. Endless possibilities makes my head spin! Thanks for taking the time to look into and respond man.

[NY Chief]

Duncan has a pretty good tone chart as well.

[Guitar-Sam]

I have a DiMarzio Blue Velvet single coil in the neck of my Ash bodied strat and I like it allot. Has a 6.08K output.Great for blues leads.On this same guitar I have a DiMarzio FS-1 in the bridge nice quacky scream outta the bridge with that one 13+K output
I just bought a set of 69' Custom Shop's for my new 75' strat I'm building.Waiting for my F tuners to get here,befor I can play it though.
EDIT: I dunno man...........after listening to that video you sound pretty good on those 69's.

[basile865]

Thanks man. That video was through his little vox 15 watt practice amp. It had settings for different voicings and it was on the ac-15 setting. It got pretty good tone for what it was. He and I made some recordings this weekend that I'm going to post up soon. Comparing the music man with 6ca7's and my plexi with el34s. Im going to do a poll under the hendrix forum to see which one people feel sounds more Band of Gypsys ish.