Neck Humbucker sounds “muffled”

[Lowspeid]

I bought a 2018 R8 several months back. It is a FANTASTIC guitar I absolutely love it. But over the last several months of playing it I’m finding the creambucker in the neck a bit “muffled”, and maybe a little heavy on the bass notes. I’m not interested in swapping pickups, and just wonder if there’s something I can change fairly easy that will “open up” the pickup (pot or cap value?).

Thanks!

 

[dlew919]

I’d check the pot value. Should be 500 but it may be (particularly if it’s a filtertron style) a 250k pot on the tone control might work better.

 

[kbold]

What are your pot and cap values? We need a point of reference before advice.
In general, a higher pot value and/or a lower cap value should reduce the "muffled" sound.

 

[aging_rocker]

Have you tried adjusting the pickup height? I'd give that a go before doing anything else.

 

[ahiddentableau]

Plenty you can do about it from an electronics side.

Make sure the neck vol and tone pots are 500k. On an R8 they should be, so that's probably not your problem. But measure the pots if you can so you can see how close they are to 500k. It could be they're closer to 400k and that can make a difference (the higher the value the brighter the tone).

You also want to consider the capacitor. I'm not sure what the stock value is in an R8 but it'll probably be either 22nF or 47nF. Smaller is brighter. Don't be afraid to go lower than 22nF. 15nF or even 10nF is a common mod on neck PUs on gibson style guitars for this reason.

You should also consider experimenting with the height of the pole pieces on the pickup and overall pickup height. This is where I would start. If you raise the pole pieces up closer to the strings and move the pickup body down it should add clarity.

The last thing you might want to consider is adding a capacitor in line with the pickup lead. This will create a high pass filter and clean things up, but it's kind of the nuclear option. The cap value tends to be very small. But it works and it's easy. Pretty sure it's been discussed here so if you do a search you shouldn't have much trouble finding it.

 

[Lowspeid]

Awesome responses! Thank you all. I’ve played with pickup height, and adjusted the pole pieces a bit, but likely not enough. The tone pot and cap are stock, but thank you for the reminder to check the actual values.

 

[drmordo]

The simple solution is set the amp eq until the neck PU sounds good, then roll back the tone knob on the bridge PU.

This is how I always dial in my amp - neck PU sounds good, bridge is bright. That way all the sounds on the guitar are useable.

 

[old wrench]

On a Gibson, I like an .015 cap for my neck pickups along with a regular .022 cap for the bridge, and 500k pots all the way around

Using the .015 cap for the neck is a subtle difference, but enough to make a difference to my ears - it gives me a clearer and brighter tone - it's one of the easiest mods you can do

Try setting your neck pickup lower too -

Sometimes you might need to lower both the neck and the bridge to keep a balanced volume, but lowering the pickup will usually result in a clearer and more articulated tone - your bridge pickup will always be bright enough even if it's over-wound

I like my humbuckers with a lower vintage-type wind - too many winds and you lose that sparkle and chime that lower-wind humbuckers have

I've got several Gibsons and this is how I like to set them up to make the most of the neck pickup position which I really love

My old R9 is setup this way and I absolutely love the way its neck pickup sounds

.

 

[trandy9850]

The simple solution is set the amp eq until the neck PU sounds good, then roll back the tone knob on the bridge PU.

This is how I always dial in my amp - neck PU sounds good, bridge is bright. That way all the sounds on the guitar are useable.

Yep….the what the tone controls are for.

 

[ChicknPickn]

The simple solution is set the amp eq until the neck PU sounds good, then roll back the tone knob on the bridge PU.

This is how I always dial in my amp - neck PU sounds good, bridge is bright. That way all the sounds on the guitar are useable.

Good one. Hadn't tried that.

 

[dlew919]

And I said cap when I meant pot. Apologies. I’ve fixed it.

 

[wildschwein]

Mod Squad: Muddy sounding neck pickup? - Seymour Duncan

Muddy sounding neck pickup? Try Seymour’s quick tech fix By Seymour Duncan Tech Guru Scott Miller People often call and ask how to fix a muddy sounding neck pickup. Some years ago, Seymour taught me a cool trick to fix this exact problem. If you connect a .047 capacitor in series (directly...

www.seymourduncan.com

 

[Boreas]

Have you tried adjusting the pickup height? I'd give that a go before doing anything else.

To hitchhike on this - IMO the most reasonable place to start - is adjust the pickups as a set - don't just focus on the troublesome pickup. I would START with that pickup, trying to balance it with the mate. But sometimes it is the mate that makes the other sound different - in a relative way.

Also, don't ignore tweaks you may have made to saddle heights that may have brought bass strings to close or treble springs too distant. Try to maintain a bridge radius that works well with your neck. Then, tweak pickup and pole heights to fine tune.