Multiscale Replacement Pickups

[BusinessMan]

A few months ago I picked up my first 8 string since 2014, a schecter silver mountain ms8. First multiscale guitar which I seemed to adapt to pretty quickly. It plays really well and I like the neck but I’m not liking the pickups. They’re too muddy in my personal opinion and I would like something with a bit more clarity and a little hotter as well (which might be a little counter intuitive for wanting something with more clarity).

My main question here is what options are there for replacing these pickups? I’m tuning this down to F instead of F#, so I’d also like to ask for string gauge recommendations.

 

[lost_horizon]

First off, what are the angles? 10/12/14 degrees? They are some of the common ones.

If you know that you can give that to a manufacturer and they can crank them out.

Or you can send them off to be rewound, e.g. MJS custom https://mjscustompickups.com/mjs-custom-handwound-pickups/

Other option is once you know the baseplate angle, you can buy a normal 8 string and modify it to the baseplate making sure not to break it. Guy once bought a set of 14 degree Rags off me and converted them to straight.

 

[oracles]

Instrumental can do custom angles, or a rewind. Ethan is top notch.

 

[BusinessMan]

First off, what are the angles? 10/12/14 degrees? They are some of the common ones.

If you know that you can give that to a manufacturer and they can crank them out.

Or you can send them off to be rewound, e.g. MJS custom https://mjscustompickups.com/mjs-custom-handwound-pickups/

Other option is once you know the baseplate angle, you can buy a normal 8 string and modify it to the baseplate making sure not to break it. Guy once bought a set of 14 degree Rags off me and converted them to straight.

I don’t know what the angles are. It’s my first multiscale guitar so I’ve still got some stuff to learn about maintenance and such. I’ll look into the angles. Thanks for the info

 

[torchlord]

I don’t know what the angles are. It’s my first multiscale guitar so I’ve still got some stuff to learn about maintenance and such. I’ll look into the angles. Thanks for the info

I came across these angled Pickup upgrade options for Bare Knuckle pickups if you're interested in going that route. https://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/shop/product/custom-angled-baseplate

 

[budda]

Your guy @ElysianGuitars has you covered.

 

[Chri]

Unless you absolutely hate the pickups, have you tried messing around with an EQ before hitting the rest of your signal chain? That could clear them up, and make the signal a bit hotter too if that is indeed what you want.

 

[eaeolian]

Your guy @ElysianGuitars has you covered.

This. I'm very impressed with the set of his non-slanted pickups I have, too.

 

[BusinessMan]

Unless you absolutely hate the pickups, have you tried messing around with an EQ before hitting the rest of your signal chain? That could clear them up, and make the signal a bit hotter too if that is indeed what you want.

I haven’t tried it, but I’ll give it a shot

 

[gh0styboi]

I feel your pain, man. I bought an Agile Geodesic that has a 25.5" to 28 5/8" fan, and the pickups ended up at something like 24 degrees. Finding something to fit them is a fucking nightmare. I've heard so many good things about @ElysianGuitars I'm gonna write to them and see if they can save me, because while the pickups in my other 8 string Agile are just fine, these things sound like absolute flub and I hate them...

As for the string gauge question, that guitar is a 27" scale on the low end, yeah? Don't see why an Ernie Ball Gray or Red pack of 8 string strings wouldn't work - you're only talking a half step down from F# Standard... I usually go red pack because I like a little more tension for my aggressive pick hand, but either should work fine for your purposes.

 

[BusinessMan]

I feel your pain, man. I bought an Agile Geodesic that has a 25.5" to 28 5/8" fan, and the pickups ended up at something like 24 degrees. Finding something to fit them is a fucking nightmare. I've heard so many good things about @ElysianGuitars I'm gonna write to them and see if they can save me, because while the pickups in my other 8 string Agile are just fine, these things sound like absolute flub and I hate them...

As for the string gauge question, that guitar is a 27" scale on the low end, yeah? Don't see why an Ernie Ball Gray or Red pack of 8 string strings wouldn't work - you're only talking a half step down from F# Standard... I usually go red pack because I like a little more tension for my aggressive pick hand, but either should work fine for your purposes.

Thanks for the string advice. I’ll give those a try. Since the ones I have a bit flubby

 

[Gtan7]

that's the guitar i really really wanted a couple years but never found one used so went with LTD m1005 which pretty happy wiht. Anyway, bridge angle you can estimate from blueprints at hipshot and then pickup is something less than that or you could do a tracing on pickup and mail it to a builder/rewinder

8 String Multi-Scale Fixed Guitar Bridge

11° - .125 Dimensions 11° - .175 Dimensions 18° - .125 Dimensions 18° - .175 Dimensions 21° - .125 Dimensions 21° - .175 Dimensions 26° - .125 Dimensions 26° - .175 Dimensions Our Multi-Scale Fixed Bridge is the tool you need to bring out the best that Fanned-Fret® guitars have to offer...

hipshotproducts.com

 

[Das Gitarrenwiesel]

I feel your pain, man. I bought an Agile Geodesic that has a 25.5" to 28 5/8" fan, and the pickups ended up at something like 24 degrees. Finding something to fit them is a fucking nightmare. I've heard so many good things about @ElysianGuitars I'm gonna write to them and see if they can save me, because while the pickups in my other 8 string Agile are just fine, these things sound like absolute flub and I hate them...

As for the string gauge question, that guitar is a 27" scale on the low end, yeah? Don't see why an Ernie Ball Gray or Red pack of 8 string strings wouldn't work - you're only talking a half step down from F# Standard... I usually go red pack because I like a little more tension for my aggressive pick hand, but either should work fine for your purposes.

Ormsby has If i remember 17 and 24 degrees ... I built custom versions of my Blackbirds for one a while ago for a customer ... kinda wish there was some standardisation going on ... with pole spacing too ... on several occasions I've had to custom CNC stuff for weird and wonderful measurements!

 

[SalsaWood]

Word to the wise from someone who has done this a few times. Things will not go perfectly. I've done this about four or five times in my life going back about a decade or so now, trying to swap multiscale pickups.

For one, I have never gotten a properly sized baseplate. Not ever. Not even from pickup manufacturers who produce the actual factory loaded pickups. No idea why, but nobody can get this simple crap right ime. Not a big deal. It's weird as hell, though.

 

[Das Gitarrenwiesel]

Word to the wise from someone who has done this a few times. Things will not go perfectly. I've done this about four or five times in my life going back about a decade or so now, trying to swap multiscale pickups.

For one, I have never gotten a properly sized baseplate. Not ever. Not even from pickup manufacturers who produce the actual factory loaded pickups. No idea why, but nobody can get this simple crap right ime. Not a big deal. It's weird as hell, though.

Pretty much right ... I had a customer come to me with a pair of custom shop pickups ... I won't mention the make ... he'd filled out all the paperwork, degree of slant ... yada yada yada, it still too five months to deliver an admittedly visually lovely set of pickups ... with totally the wrong angle! This is when I started to laser cut baseplates to the exact measurements of the instruments for customers. It seems that a lot of folks have problems reading the numbers these days ... it's not really rocket science!

 

[MoistTowelette]

As long as the pole piece spacings are the same, you can use the baseplate of the stock pickups. You can use calipers and the dimension schematics of whatever pickups you want to confirm the spacing. The schecter doesn’t seem to have a dramatic fan so I’d bet that it has standard 8 string spacing. Just have to unscrew the old and new coils, unsolder the ground and switch the baseplates (resoldering the ground). Probably the easiest way to change pickups without requiring any custom work.

If the pole spacings don’t match up, you can buy fiberboard blanks, trace the old baseplate, and cut a new one. You would need to stick some copper tape on it to solder the ground wire.

As for string gauges, that’s more personal preference. I would probably go with a 10-56 set and an 85 for F standard with that scale.

 

[gh0styboi]

Ormsby has If i remember 17 and 24 degrees ... I built custom versions of my Blackbirds for one a while ago for a customer ... kinda wish there was some standardisation going on ... with pole spacing too ... on several occasions I've had to custom CNC stuff for weird and wonderful measurements!

1,000% on the standardized measurements for these angles. I love my multiscale 8, but it's a massive pain in the ass in this regard.

You make/wind pickups? I tried to check the website in your bio page, but it's a dead link. Would you take a commission to wind a set of 24 degree 8 string pickups? I've got the schematic draw up as well from the manufacturer - the baseplate has some weird angles for the ears where they're screwed in.

If so, message me with your info? Might be interested.

 

[Mmartell1205]

Elysian has those angles and can build you a set pretty quickly. The guitar pickups used to get these angles was in fact my old Schecter Silver Mountain multiscale 8, so they'll be right on the money.