Can a bridge P-90 be wound to get a less nasal/honky sound?

[thrashmetl]

So I am really confused right now. I've loved P-90's since the first time I played them so eventually I had my dream P-90 guitar built for me. While this guitar is amazing, for some reason I'm noticing that any P-90 I put in the bridge position is unbearably nasally and honky and it's killing me. The neck sounds fine, but the bridge I just can't deal with.

I've put Lollar's in it and 2 different Zhangbucker sets so I'm starting to explore the fact that it may not be the pickups.

My first thought is that maybe I've never noticed just how nasally and honky P-90's are until now. This doesn't seem right though because I've owned many P-90 guitars before this and never noticed it on any of the other ones. Sooooo.......

I think it may be the wood. The bodies of all of my previous P-90 guitars have been Mahogany or Korina (similar to Mahogany tonally) or Basswood (sounded amazing with P-90's), but this particular guitar has an Ash body.

Has anyone out there ever owned an Ash bodied P-90 guitar and noticed a problem with too much honk in the bridge?

Would it be possible to wind a P-90 that compensated for an overly nasal/honky tone wood?

 

[Fuzz_Mountain]

hard to say dude, i mean, you've already tried a bunch of different ones, so it may just be a characteristic of the guitar that you can't change.

 

[Quarter]

Could very well be the guitar. Of the 90's you've tried, have any been a low wind?

 

[thrashmetl]

That's what I'm afraid of. I haven't tried any low winds in this guitar just because I want that classic beefy Pete Townsend/Angus Young pure rock n roll in the bridge and the low winds are too thin and lacking in bass, especially in Ash. I've had Lollar 50's winds in another guitar and didn't like the bridge.

 

[NashSG]

It sounds like the mids difference between Ash and Mahogany.

I'd check with someone that really knows guitar electronics and maybe try some different capacitors, as that can make more change than you might think and with the right one, it might allow you to use the tone to filter some of that out. Pickups also sound quite a bit different with 500k pots to say a 250k pot.

 

[rhinocaster]

I had a Hamer Eclipse that sounded the same way. It was mahogany, but even unplugged you could immediately hear the nasal quality of the guitar. Plugged in it almost sounded like a cocked wah. It was COOL, but it was limiting.

My bet is that it's the guitar, not the electronics.

 

[Mike9]

I had Jon Moore wind me a set of dogear P-90's that are low wind and low output. I approached Jon to wind a set to be more like single coils with a bell like tone. You can try Jon - he can be contacted here: http://tonefordays.com

 

[Brett Faust]

What bridge do you have on the guitar?

 

[thrashmetl]

I have a Hipshot hardtail bridge on it.

 

[stevieboy]

Saying you want a bridge P90 to be less nasaly and honky is like saying you want a hooker to be more ladylike!

But if you must, have you tried to talking to Jason Lollar about how his pickup worked out in your guitar? I think he might be of help.

 

[2HBStrat]

Sounds like some kind of weird quirk on this particular guitar.

Have you tried moving the neck pickup, which you already know sounds fine, to the bridge position?

 

[Hulakatt]

I have a lollar standard wind in a LP Jr [mahogany, duh] and it is not honky at all, kinda glassy really, but in my tele custom [basswood] the bridge p-90 is quite honky regardless of what pup is in it.

 

[Loobster]

Nature of the beast, IMO. I have dual P90s (Bare Knuckle Mississippi Queens) in my alder Tele Deluxe and whereas while the neck one sounds great, the bridge suffers from the same problems that you've mentioned.

I'm gonna probably tear them out and put in a set of Dimarzio PAF 36th Anniversary humbuckers in it.

 

[thrashmetl]

Any chance it would benefit from some experimentation with different caps? If so, what would you recommend?

Now that I think about it, I know that Scott Lentz does make offer an Ash version of the DL-90, any idea what his electronics look like?

 

[Loobster]

Caps only make a difference when the volume or tone pots are used, both wide open you won't really hear any difference. Going for a higher pot value may increase some high end but it won't take the mids away, that's just the way P90s sound.

 

[CJDM]

I have lollars in my Collings 290 - they do have a slight taste of that midrange p90 character (honk), but it is minor and goes away largely when you reduce volume setting from 10 to perhaps 6-7. Overall, very transparent / natural sounding pickups.

Most people that don't like lollar p90's complain that they don't have the honk and growl of vintage gibson p90s. I suspect it is the combination of any vintage style p90 and your specific guitar that are causing the issue.

 

[zztomato]

Any chance the pickup route was put too far from the bridge?
Also, ash will give it more midrange. Ash is great with single coil tele and strat pups but may produce too much mid honk for a p-90.

 

[Quarter]

Perhaps one of those Alnico rod magnet 90's would tame it for you, they generally are a bit less snarly and a bit clearer.

 

[Crikey]

My mahogany Collings 290 also has a way nasal and honky Lollar bridge P90. It's almost like a Tube Screamer without the grit. I wondered about the pickup, and the wood -- never thought about caps.

It's grown on me, and I wouldn't change it now. That's a cool guitar for what it does. It gets a lot of play.

 

[pete692]

I had the Gibson Pete Townshend sig SG, and I could never get on with it just because of this. It never really "opened up." Just pure freakin' honk, almost like it had a tubescreamer built into it. Sounded nice through a Fender Twin, but was way too focused and nasally through Marshalls, tweeds, or any overdriven lower powered amp. Very cool, but very limited range of uses for this sound. I tried all the p90's out there at the time as well.