SG bridge pickup position

[AMonteiro]

I bought recently a Gibson SG 2019 HP-II (Burstbucker Pro Lead+ in the bridge position; replaced by a Gibson P-498T).
I generally like it by all the reasons I bought it after some research time.
But the bridge pickup keeps sounding to me too bright and with the lack of some fatness, as compared to an HSS strat or an Ibañez RG I also have.
I noticed the pickup is very close to the bridge and this post is about this. Looking at photos of SGs in Google, you can see all sorts of distances.
Mine is a 24 fret so, I believe that they had to move the neck pickup a bit closer to the bridge and they moved the bridge one too, probably a bit less.
Has anyone noticed this and have any opinion on how these guitars are made in this specific aspect?

 

[58pit]

The SG each year is made to ROCK! Your interpretation of that is up to you. You have a wonderful guitar, and it is up to you to let it eat, or change it. Many variations have been made over that clearance that concerns you. I doubt that the clearance you mentioned, really has anything to do with the sound you are perceiving. A subtle movement of the bridge (or neck for that matter) pick up , In my opinion, should not make a "hill of beans" difference in an electric guitar. You have a world class guitar, finest made IMO. Rock it, let it be itself. RGs and Strats are FINE guitars. Let the SG be the SG!

 

[AMonteiro]

58pit: thanks for your opinion.
Let me focus on the part I'm interested in. I think that regarding pickup positions, the bridge is much more sensitive, once the difference in the harmonic contents of the string vibration changes much more with say 1cm change close to an end than away from it, like in the place of the neck pickup. How do I know this? Using HB and SC switching in several guitars, including this one, the single coil closer to the bridge produces a much weaker and treblier sound than the other coil. The difference is very clear and they are about 1.5cm apart.
You get that I'm a technical guy, but above all I love to play rock. So, I agree with the rest of your comments, but I think there is something with this guitar. Maybe it's just me, not used to it...

 

[Col Mustard]

Welcome to ETSG!

You will find many opinions on this forum. Others will also join this thread.

IMHO the solution to the problem that you have is to turn your tone control.
It sounds like you have not tried this. Turn the tone control on your amp as well.
There is no reason why you should play your SG with the pickup sounding too bright.
On my electric guitars, I have plenty of control over the tone from the pickups. I believe
that you do too.

One simple solution is to set your switch to the middle position, and turn your bridge pickup
full on, and add enough of the neck pickup to bring more fatness to the tone. Using the knobs
in this way gives you complete control. I like to run the tone control on my bridge pickup at
about 3, and the tone control on my neck pickup at about 8. This works for Gibson '57 Classic
and Classic plus, and it also works for Gibson mini hum buckers. So I believe it will work for
you.

The Gibson 498T pickup is used on SG Standards, and Les Paul Standards and other Gibson
guitars, and has been used on these models for decades. Thousands of them are in use
worldwide. On this forum we see many posts by players complaining about their pickups
for one reason or another. I have seen 498s described by players
as shrill, and also as muddy. This is all nonsense. The pickups themselves are accurate.
It's up to the player to control the tone. Any Gibson guitar will have a more treble tone
from the bridge pickup, not because of the pickup but because of the position near
the bridge. You mentioned this yourself.

But maybe the 498T is the wrong pickup for this guitar. The designers selected the
Burstbucker pro Lead+ for the HP design. Why did anybody change it, on a brand new
guitar? It might sound better than the 498T, being new. ...or supposedly new.

My own feeling is that either one would work fine, once you figure out a tone
setting that gives you what you want. You should not expect to use the same tone
settings on your amp that you use for other guitars. Each guitar requires its own
setting. Some guitars will sound better through a different amplifier.

In addition, if you try to compare the sound of one electric guitar to another, you will
see that an SG will never sound like a Strat, nor will it ever sound like an Ibanez guitar of
any kind. Lucky us that we have so many different instruments to choose, and so
many tones, and so many neck shapes.

One other simple suggestion I have, is that you use an EQ pedal in your f/x loop.
That way, you may be able to use the same settings on your amp, and play your
other guitars through it. When you play the Gibson, step on the pedal, which
you have previously set to increase the lower midrange and pad the highs a bit.

An EQ pedal is such a useful addition to your pedal board, once you try it this way
other uses will become obvious. It works very well as a clean boost, and can be
adapted to any problem relating to highs, mids and lows.

Good luck in your quest...

THE QUEST FOR TONE HAS NO FINISH LINE
SO IT'S TECHNICALLY A DEATH MARCH

 

[Dale]

The placement of bridge and neck pickups makes a difference. As does scale length and they pickup construction. You can't set up an amp to sound like you want with a LP and then play a strat. You have to set up the amp for the guitar.

 

[AMonteiro]

Thanks a lot for your great comments. I totally agree with all the comments although...
My point was specifically: doesn't it seem odd to you that a well known model like the SG (with two humbuckers) has different parameters of construction that should be kept within small limits to guarantee the characteristics we expect?
Obs: this is just a discussion item regarding the position of the bridge pickup! I know exactly how to use tone, mix with neck pickup, adjust settings in the amp, and also the way of picking.

 

[Derald]

I think things like pickup position are happenstance, and over the last 50 years have been tweaked to where they are today. Welcome to the Tone Chase. Cheers!

 

[DrBGood]

One thing that hasn't been addressed here is that pickup height. Adjusting it is the most dramatic (and free) tweak you can do on ANY guitar.

That pup is too bright, borderline shrilling ? It's probably too close to the strings. Can we see it's height ? Sideways picture ?

 

[Col Mustard]

+1 on that... that's what those little screws are
for... so you can adjust the sound of your pickups
without replacing them.

By the way, I did NOT mean to sound patronizing.
So please forgive me if I did. I lurked here for months
when I was new to electric guitars, and got a lot of
benefit from posts that provided information I could
use. That's why I joined, I learned so much.

To answer your clarified question: Most of us are used to
the variations we find in Gibson guitars. If you think it's
strange about the variations in the SG, you should spend
some time on a Les Paul forum. Those guys get all cheesed
off about very small variations. *laughs

Gibson guitars have been made for decades, and originally
included a lot of hand work. The company has been bought and
sold, it has been re-organized and re-located... Gibson recently
went bankrupt. Lots of changes in management, probably lots of
changes among the designers and engineers... and the number of
people who have worked on the line building the instruments must
number in the thousands.

To me, it's amazing that the SG design has remained so consistent
over so many years. Of course there's been changes: some coming
from the front office, some from the design room, some from the
sales guys and some just from the men handling the files and rasps.
Anyway that's my opinion. I love the tones I get from both pickups
on my SGs, and that's why I still have them.

Not everybody does. We see many posts where somebody just could
not relate to their beautiful SG, and sold it at a loss. Usually it's the
neck shape, and not the pickup placement. Guys who believe they can
only play one kind of neck are very unlikely ever to be happy.

Guitar sluts like me seem to love ALMOST any guitar, whatever it
looks like or feels like. Guitars make me happy just being there.

 

[AMonteiro]

Col Mustard: many thanks for your detailed comment. I didn't think it was patronizing at all. We do not know each others so your answer was more than OK!
I can tell that I play guitar since about 52 years ago! I also have a Les Paul Custom maybe since 30 years ago, and other guitars already mentioned above.
I bought this guitar (the SG) because I have a 2 year old Ibanez RG which I love, but even with 9-42s it is a bit hard for me to play several hours a day (now I'm retired) given that the way I play has a lot of bending. And with a 25.5" scale, with the same strings you have to make more effort to get the same result. The LP is heavy like hell and as I play sitting it hurts my right leg visibly!...
So I have researched the market and even with all those problems with Gibson (namely due to a Youtube video), I decided that the SG was the right choice.
I love the neck and the scale and the sound in general, with the possibilities of single coils on both pickups.
I never expected this guitar to sound like no other (like strat, Ibanez RG ou LP). But I remember to have already made a repair to an SG and I dont recall the type of sensation (I mean negative) I feel with respect to the bridge pickup.
By the way, there is another thing odd with this guitar: the 3rd and 6th strings have the intonation adjustment in the limit but it is not enough! I don't want to draw conclusions before I change strings the first time, but the bridge placement doesn't seem correct. To me it is not a problem once that the tuning is almost right and I also can reverse the saddle pieces to get two more millimeters. I mention this in the line with the part of your comment regarding what Gibson went through in the last years, construction-wise.

DrBGood: I've looked at the pickup height already. Nevertheless after your comment, I've lowered it a bit more and raised the screws (that on this pickup are on the neck side) as to reduce the effect of the other coil. It is worth to mention that I love the bridge single coil sound (the coil not closer to the bridge). Although sounding as a SC, with all that brightness and less fat we all expect, it has not that harsh tone I find in the full HB.

Thanks again for your comments. I'm really enjoying this exchange of thoughts.

 

[DrBGood]

DrBGood: I've looked at the pickup height already. Nevertheless after your comment, I've lowered it a bit more and raised the screws (that on this pickup are on the neck side) as to reduce the effect of the other coil. It is worth to mention that I love the bridge single coil sound (the coil not closer to the bridge). Although sounding as a SC, with all that brightness and less fat we all expect, it has not that harsh tone I find in the full HB.

Thanks again for your comments. I'm really enjoying this exchange of thoughts.

What is the distance between strings and pole pieces and/or casing ? There is rarelly a case of a pickup being too low.

 

[cerebral gasket]

Get a Junior with P-90.
Problem solved.