Crusader

I don’t like to double post but there are various other aspects of this topic that I would like to put forward which don’t include cancellation of harmonics and might better define the way I see it. Diagrams would help but I don’t have the time. Perhaps I should have said these things at the beginning but I didn’t want the first post to be too long The sweet spot for the neck pickup is not like the sweet spot on a cricket bat because there is the variable of fretted notes. Because it is fixed it can’t be at the sweet spot for every fretted note played, it is more of a “best can do” spot. However I think what is the sweet spot for the open string is not necessarily the sweet spot for fretted notes If the pickup moved for every fretted note and stayed at a quarter of each fundamental, as you play up the fretboard it would get closer to the bridge. Also the string gets shorter and therefore brighter and to maintain a warmer tone there would be a benefit from the pickup getting closer to the antinode (the middle) of the fundamental, which is what happens as you play up to the 12th fret anyway Above the 12th fret the antinode of the fundamental goes past the pickup so at some point the middle pickup should sound warmer. However I don’t hear a huge difference between bridge middle or neck when playing at the very highest notes, its all just bright So I would not say that you get the warmest tone over the whole fretboard. I think there have probably been misconceptions arising from people trying to put forward simple explanations, not necessarily from ominous motives I hope that clarifies the way I see it and I know its just my opinion

The results of my experimenting has been much the same as what you have talked about here but I wouldn’t say the construction of a pickup has more to do with the sound than the position, they are two separate issues. No matter how the pickup is constructed it can’t read a different harmonic mix than the magnetic field will allow But do modern strats have the bridge and middle pickups in a different place now? I know some have a humbucker in the bridge position and from my experimenting it doesn’t affect the quack too much. But the main point I’m trying to make is I’ve never heard such a debate about the position of the middle pickup yet it involves all the same things This is my experience on the “quack factor” When I made the white strat copy pictured in my first post it had 25 frets and three single coils. I put the middle pickup half way between the bridge and neck so it looked good but it only had the “quack” from the 4th fret to the 13th fret (something like that I can’t remember exactly) So I went through and did all sorts of experimenting and to get the “quack” sound over the largest area of the fretboard I had to have the bridge and middle pickups in exact placings as a strat. So it meant the middle pickup was closer to the neck pu which looked a bit odd Now when that website says a humbucker filters harmonics of a much higher order, I don’t think its 100% accurate. A humbucker will cancel harmonics that have a node half way between the coils, almost as completely as a single coil will in that spot. So a regular Les Paul will cancel the fourth harmonic when playing the 1st fret. I mentioned this before and it can be proven by using a cappo on the first fret and playing the harmonic which is now over the 6th fret and this is quite a low-order harmonic I’ve seen various inaccuracies on websites such as the confusion between harmonics and overtones. The 1st overtone is the 2nd harmonic, the 2nd overtone is the 3rd harmonic and so on. But some people get the numbering mixed up Why do you think we need to know about your power cut-outs? Your posts are unnecessarily long with all this trivia and therefore rather meaningless. You change the topic and repeat things over and over. I cut and pasted your post into a WORD document and it took up three pages and you mentioned the changing length of string no less than eight times I dealt with this issue in my first post but you continue to imply that I have ignored it. When I get the time I will make more diagrams to show which harmonics go over the 24th fret node when playing above the 5th fret but they take time. But it seems to me that no matter what I say or do will have no impact on you That’s right, you haven’t done it but if you were genuinely interested you would have done so years ago along with much other research including the experiments I have done. You seem to be saying now that you have done the tests that I did but it wasn’t mentioned in your first post. If you really knew anything about this you would be able to make your point with greater clarity In any case where you are concerned this discussion has taken a back seat. I thought you were much younger but when you said you were at university in 1984 I realised you must be about the same age as I am. So I was prompted to re-view everything you have said and I have more than just a few issues because when someone your own age says something it has quite a different “slant” Starting at the beginning In your opening paragraph you are just stating the obvious but your wording leaves a person completely baffled as to what you are talking about. You admit you didn’t look at my sources in fact it seems you took no notice of anything I said because I did address the issue of harmonic mix and fretted notes – which you have now mentioned more than thirty times. You continued to use this type of repetitive dialogue and introduce irrelevant topics using very large diagrams which make your posts very lengthy Some of my references are from University physics lecturers but you refuted and dismissed them as “superficial science” “mojo” and “unreleased information” then accused me of “citing authority” and “playing a card” In fact you have made a string of accusations You have said all these things and yet you had the audacity to say I was making a personal slur when I suggested you were just trying to prove me wrong. But this is now obvious because you chose to do an experiment you knew wouldn’t work. A regular Les Paul will produce those harmonics at the open string but the experiment I suggeste was to cappo the first fret. I think you’ve had ample time and used enough thread-space to make a point but I can’t see that you have any other than you disagree and you dont' have to keep saying it I take offence to your barrage of insults and accusations. It is nothing less than slander and I have made a complaint about you to the forum administrator In any case I don’t know what other people do for a crust but I have a business to run and its tax time so I have my hands full with other things for a while

Well I did a search on the “Strat quack” and found an explanation which I remember seeing before http://www.aqdi.com/pickups.htm They use very simple diagrams and don’t elaborate how the effect still occurs as you play up the fretboard but I am satisfied with their explanation. I used to have a strat and know you get the quack sound over most of the fretboard so who needs to know every scientific detail? I experimented a great deal with this and found the position of the middle pickup to be quite critical. It involves the same thing (nodes and antinodes) so why is it such an issue with the neck pickup? It just seems to me that it became an issue when lots of 24-fret guitars came on the market, even though for many years there was the SG and perhaps other guitars around with this pickup placement. I saw a semi-acoustic Gretsch not long ago which had the neck pickup set back, though it didn’t have 24 frets I’m not trying to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes and I don’t have anything to lose or gain. I was completely skeptical when I first heard about this but I didn’t make a conclusion until I actually heard it for myself, and that was a span of about 32 years. So I understand that people have reservations but I don’t understand how their opinion can be firm without doing the experiments (no offence) At first I thought it must involve some kind of “deep science” like the Butterfly Effect, and that btw is something I have reservations about to be honest. But this is just the cancellation of harmonics and if I could show someone in person I’m sure I could explain it clearly and I am confident that person would walk away laughing “Is that all it is?” It really is no big deal People always say that it’s subjective and I say yes-and-no. Whether you like the sound or not there is a distinctive tone when you have a pickup on or near the second octave node. If you move the pickup towards the bridge a little too far the sound changes quite a lot, then if you move the pickup the same distance again the sound hardly changes at all But maybe you have to hear it to believe it, I did

Well I'm not a scientist by occupation but I know a few things. Some people know more than me and others know less This is a revelation you must be about the same age as I am. And btw I appreciate that you did some of the experimenting I suggested You have had different results to psw and this is always going to be the case. Unless we are all in the same room it's very difficult to describe to another person accurately what we can actually hear. I appreciate that you have done some experimenting and I don't hold it against you to have a different opinion The combination of coils is of great interest to me and I was wondering if you could explain anything about the “Strat quack” cheers

I haven't read anything new tonight because I have a meeting to go to but I can quickly comment on this factor, which is very pertinent to the whole issue, and a good question This is my experience and the way I see it To say the pickup is in a "sweet spot" could be put the other way round. The position of the pickup creates sweet spots, or areas on the fretboard A pickup right on the second octave node creates sweet spots at the open string and 12th fret and moving it from that place greatly affects the sound at those points Playing in-between these areas I found only a slight difference between Coil A and Coil B

I really shouldn't be doing this. I have work tomorrow and its waaaay past midnight, but... I think each individual has a different level of what will convince or satisfy them. I am satisfied with what I found with nodes over the pickup, the sound tests and the references I put up Here is one of the references I put up in my first post and part of what it says There are several websites with this type of info but they only talk about the fourth harmonic They're not out to prove the whole concept, they just touch on the topic while they're talking about various general things http://www.gmarts.org/index.php?go=233 “The single coil strat neck pickup reads the string at a single point exactly 1/4 the length of the string from the bridge (where the 24th fret would be), although some more recent 22-fret strats have the pickup a fraction closer to the bridge So the 2nd harmonic component of the string vibration has its node (the "dead spot") over the 12th fret, the same as if you played a harmonic by damping the string over the 12th fret This 2nd harmonic has its largest string vibration at 1/4 the length of the string from both the nut and bridge - that's over the 5th fret, and the neck pickup. Hence the strong 2nd harmonic Now consider the 4th harmonic which has nodes at the 5th fret, the 12th fret and the neck pickup - there is no 4th harmonic vibration over the neck pickup. This strong difference in harmonic levels plays a major part in the unique character, or timbre of this pickup” Here is another reference I found today (Some parts are a bit confusing but you should get it) http://online.physics.uiuc.edu/courses/phy...Instruments.pdf “The location of pickups on an electric guitar is not “mindless”. The neck PU’s of the Fender Strat and Tele and pole-adjustment screws of the humbucking neck PU of the Gibson Les Paul are located near the 2nd anti-node (from the nut) of the n = 2 harmonic, and therefore are simultaneously near the 3rd node (from the nut) of the n = 4 harmonic. The middle PU of the Strat is located near the 3rd anti-node (from the nut) of the n = 3 harmonic, and therefore is simultaneously near the 5th node (from the nut) of the n = 6 harmonic Thus, when playing open strings on the Strat, Tele or Les Paul with the pickup selector switched to the neck pickup, the 2nd harmonic (4th harmonic) will be enhanced (suppressed), respectively. When playing open strings on the middle pickup of the Strat, the 3rd harmonic (6th harmonic) will be enhanced (suppressed), respectively. The bridge PU on the Strat, Tele or Les Paul is not located near any anti-nodes or nodes associated with the low-order harmonics of the open strings” If you search around the forums you will find people here and there saying the same thing as I am but we don't know each other and have never talked. I have figured this all out on my own with just a few clues like someone in the previous thread mentioned the word "Cancellation" I'm sorry but to my mind you haven't asked any actual questions, you have just said a whole bunch of things. And I think you have taken me the wrong way, I don't see how I have made any personal "slurs" Have a read of this to understand what I mean Tone Blind http://helios.augustana.edu/~jvh/courses/105/lecture1109.ppt Now this is an actual question This is something that baffled me for a while and what you're saying is true in a "relative" way. Except that the harmonics cancelled with a 24 fret guitar are of a slightly higher-order And yes I found the 2nd fret actually sounded better than with the pickup on the 24th fret. But it was all on its own, the nice tone did not "carry over" to nearby frets. But when I put the cappo on it all changed and it had the same characteristics as the coil on the second octave. There was a similar "sweet tone" but a bit more "sparkly" - I will talk more about this if you like I have an Excel document which you can type in the scale length + compensation and position of the pickup and it will indicate the positoin of nodes at that point up to the 22nd fret. It goes up to the 128th harmonic which is overkill but it's good to know more than you need to. It doesn't indicate actaul "notes" though I agree that diagrams are very helpful and can make up more to show the whole fretboard

With all due respects your posts are always so long and any point you are trying to make is lost in a sea of words. And you keep bringing up the same issue “the waveforms shorten with the length of the string…” etc. You mentioned this three times in your last post and four times in the one before I addressed this right at the beginning with the help of diagrams (see diagram 5) There are always nodes of lower-order harmonics right over or close to the pickup so they are fully or partially cancelled. I believe this is the reason for the unique sound and I supplied references which say the same thing, although they only mention the fourth harmonic I acknowledged there are fluctuations in the harmonic mix as you play up the fretboard when I pointed out that the 5th fret doesn’t sound as sweet as the open string. I described how there is a different sequence of harmonics cancelled and this is reflected in the tone. Some people may try to kid you that the tone is exactly the same for every note you play but I have been realistic Frequency analysis. Isn't that what the Donald Tillman demonstration applet is all about? I never intended this to be overly scientific and the diagrams make it easy to see what I am talking about. I have suggested ways of proving that cancellations occur and you can do any of the experiments I did which involve nothing more than your own guitar & ears and it’s up to the individual to try these experiments if they are interested Now here is another diagram which some people might find interesting. I found a pickup on the second octave node seems to have its warmest sound between the open string and 19th fret and this is the two extremes of the middle half of the Fundamental, between the antinodes of the second harmonics Adios

It seems really important to you to prove me wrong

I thought you must have known about Ed Roman from what you were saying before. I’m sorry I should have left it out but I agree he’s nuts I will go over it quickly again with a few details I may have left out before. And if you tell me what part you don’t understand I will clarify it for you The white guitar in the first post originally had 25 frets and I was never happy with the neck pickup. It sounded okay above the 4th fret but lacked at the open string. I chopped out the neck and got the pickup on the node and now it sounds like the Les Paul except with a brighter tone due to the timber etc. Before all this was completed I did a ton of research and experimenting and came to the conclusion that the unique sound was due to cancellation of harmonics. A pickup in any position will cancel overtones but the neck pickup gets down to the lower-order harmonics. And it doesn’t just cancel that one harmonic but every one above it that has a node over the pickup. It scoops out a whole range of overtones With a pickup at the second octave you cancel lower harmonics than you can with a 24 fret guitar and let me explain further what this means. I am using the 5th string as an example At the open string it cancels every fourth harmonic A A E A C# E G A B C# D E F# G G# A You get the Fundamental and the first octave but above that all octaves are cancelled along with others At the 12th fret every second harmonic is cancelled A A E A C# E G A B C# D E F# G G# A You only get the Fundamental because all the octaves of it are cancelled. And it’s the same for other harmonics up the series Of course in other areas of the fretboard you don’t get this in fact at the 5th fret none of the octaves of the Fundamental are lost, because it is every third harmonic cancelled D D A D F# A C D E F# G A B C C# D If you listen carefully you can hear it is kind of “inverted” from the sound you get at the 12th fret or open string Above the 12th fret you go into the higher-order harmonics As you play in-between all these points you get partial cancellation With all these missing harmonics the Fundamental is heard closer to a “Pure Tone” which is pleasing to the ear. This is a term used in physics Pure Tone http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Pure_tone Pure tone is a single frequency tone with no harmonic content (no overtones) Ironically however if you removed all the overtones and achieved a real Pure Tone it actually sounds boring! http://science.jrank.org/pages/3221/Harmonics.html With the white guitar before I got the pickup on the second octave I chopped it out and got it where the 26th fret would be. And it actually sounded quite good in the quest for the elusive neck pickup sound like the Les Paul. Its just that with it right on the second octave it was a lot more “there” if you can follow what I mean Now Here’s a little test you can do with your Les Paul to prove that these cancellations actually occur just the way I have described in my diagrams First play the fourth harmonic at the 5th fret using the neck pickup and compare it with the bridge pickup. Also compare it with the 12th and 7th fret harmonics…and do this every time Now put a cappo on the 1st fret and play the fourth harmonic which is now at the 6th fret You should hear almost nothing Now put the cappo on the 2nd fret and play the fourth harmonic which is now at the 7th fret The sound will be a little louder just like the open string This shows just how large the harmonic dead spot area is Now to add to this you can put the cappo on every fret up the board and play the fourth, third and second harmonics. You will find they are faint – at the appropriate places - just as I have described in my first post and shown in the diagrams I know this is all very scientific and it sometimes takes a while to sink-in but if you look into it as deep as I have you can say “I know” instead of “I believe” Ed Roman’s scientist friend brags that he has studied the harmonic series up to the fifth harmonic. I have several excel documents going as far as the 128th harmonic up to the 22nd fret. I can type in the scale length and the position of the pickup and determine where cancellations and partial cancellations occur. It shows much the same results as Donald Tillman’s demonstration applet Talking about the harmonic series, yes I know it is not in tune with Western tempered systems The Harmonic Series of a Vibrating String “Any note, as produced by any of the instruments, is accompanied by a varying number of attendant notes, called ‘harmonics’ ‘overtones’ or ‘upper partials’…Not all of these are perfectly in tune, however, according to any scale in actual use” [The Oxford Companion To Music by Percy A. Scholes] This along with the fact that frets are placed with equal temperament tuning has little to do with what I am talking about and still holds true even if you use a slide or have a fretless instrument

I ran out of credit there for a while, isn’t prepaid broadband a wonderful thing? but before this thread gets too old… In hindsight I may have presented all this quite differently but it's hard to anticipate what readers will find too long and boring. I hoped people would ask questions then I would only provide necessary information and keep it short, clear and concise. There are still diagrams I am making up to clarify a couple of things but they take so long Yes it makes sense to me, would you say it is like the difference between a fretted note and the open string? I think I know what you are talking about. Just before my credit ran out I discovered this http://www.edroman.com/techarticles/22vs24.htm http://www.edroman.com/techarticles/scalelength.htm I actually agree with some of what he says but I don’t like his attitude and I certainly hope I don’t come across like that. My aim is to arrive at a logical and sensible conclusion to this topic and you might notice I have not bad-mouthed anyone. And I certainly have not been put off buying a 24 fret guitar in fact I have come to a better understanding of pickup placement. I think when 24 fret guitars came on the market in the 1970’s instead of saying the Neck pickup issue was just distance from the bridge, salesmen should have promoted it as sounding better, because it actually does sound better in certain ways What I am talking about is not rocket science and it’s really not necessary to got so deep into the physics of it all. You just have to do the simple experiment of moving the pickup and let your ears be the judge. You will find there is quite a different sound with a pickup on or near the second octave and it suits certain types of music, from Lester to Guns and beyond Still working on a couple of more diagrams

That's the obvious thing to do and your comment made me get off my butt and you were correct, the louder coil was still louder Getting back on topic once again I will state that I am only talking about how the position of the pickup affects the sound. If we start talking about other factors lets turn the volume control all the way down and then we have no sound at all! (ha ha) And if you strum across the 12th fret while using a Bridge pickup it will sound very warm but still have the characteristics of the Bridge pickup, would it not? Anyhow its good to see a few others chiming in, thanks for your input. At this point I will like to say I am still learning as I go along and I find it is not actually desirable to have a single coil right on the second octave. The sound is a bit dull and having the pickup a little closer to the bridge adds back a bit of “sparkle” A humbucker with one coil right on the node however sounds okay to my ears. And when you think about it the first Les Pauls with the P90's could not have had the pole pieces right under the node because the pickukp is too wide...just an observation The main objective here is to explain why having the pickup at the second octave node is not just good for the open string. It also affects the fretted notes. Btw I find it hard to decide how to describe all this so I hope my explanations are not too complicated Before I continue I will add some more explanation to Diagram 5 in my first post I figure a Harmonic produces its loudest sound in the middle half and decreases rapidly in the last quarter at each end. We know the Bridge pu has less output than the Neck with identical pickups Diagram 7 shows some points of full cancellation and Diagram 5 shows that as you play between these points the nodes of lower order harmonics are always less than a quarter of their length from the second octave node. I have studied this in great detail and this occurs all the way up the fretboard Looking again at Diagram 7 Another factor which attributes to the “clean” sound with Coil A is that the full cancellations occur at major harmonic points of the open string And when playing the 12th and 19th frets the Fundamentals themselves are Harmonics of the open string With Coil B Harmonics that are fully canceled are not at harmonic points of the open string Having cancellations at harmonic points is good for two reasons. You are canceling lower-order harmonics than Coil B and when playing fretted notes you don’t get interference from vibrations of the open string. Vibrations of the open string are still present when playing fretted notes because what we call Standing Waves are actually Traveling Waves which recur at the same point and just appear to be standing still To further understand this you have to look at the basics of guitar-building. The reason you have an angle at the headstock is to create a boundary which keeps most of the vibrations within the nut and bridge. When you play a fretted note you don’t want to press too hard or you will be out of tune. So a lot of vibrations still travel between the nut and bridge and the two sets of vibrations exist together I don’t know the full extent of this but obviously with your finger in the way the traveling waves of the open string are not able to propagate into transverse waves. So they are not heard but as far as I can figure out they have an effect on what you do hear I experimented by putting a cappo on the 2nd fret when using the coil closer to the bridge and it sounded much better. It was like listening to a radio tuned-in properly and with it off it was like someone had bumped the dial and there was interference and noise getting in Okay so that just about wraps it up but I know at the end of the day anything can be subjective. Here and there I have said things like “this is better” but it just hard to decide on how to phrase things. I am not saying there is anything wrong with the sound of a Neck pickup on a 24 fret guitar, it’s just different and is good for various styles of music. Just as much as single coil guitars are better suited for some types of music and humbuckers for others I think people like Chet Atkins and Les Paul would have said this is a better sound while younger generations might think otherwise. I suppose it’s just that the idea of a neck pickup is to get a warm sound and you can’t get any warmer than having it at the second octave. With more modern techniques of building you could probably have 24 frets and still have a pickup close enough to capture the effects of the cancellations. I have managed to keep the 23rd fret and the pickup is right on the node Hope you have enjoyed reading this and that it makes sense. This last post has taken me about seven hours straight, so it better! cheers

When I got up this morning it occured to me that my guitar is in need of a new set of strings. Old ones that have been taken off and put back on again have flat spots which cause buzzing and may be what I percieved as "wolf notes" As for cancellation of the fourth Harmonic it does not only affect the open string. When you play the 5th fret the third Harmonic is cancelled and when you play the 12th fret the second is cancelled, yet they are all the fourth Harmonic of the open string

Point taken. It is an area of physics I am not 100% on The other factor you were speaking about I understand is to do with Fourier's Theorem. "...standing wave patterns which have a node at the pluck point will not be excited" Obviously you get a different sound depending on where you strum or pick but this is introducing other factors and I am only talking about the position of the pickup. You can get a warmish sound from your bridge pickup by strumming over the 12th fret. But the resulting sound will be a combination of the two. Likewise you can strum close to the bridge while using the Neck pickup but you will still have the Neck pickup character in the sound, it doesn't completely change Anyway I logged on just now to give an update on my white guitar with the pickup on the node. It is a brand new Dimazio PAF wired up to swap between coils and to go full humbucker. The primary coil (Coil A) is right on the second octave node and the 5th fret harmonic is cancelled on every string The secondary coil (Coil B ) is louder than Coil A. It is usually the other way round and it must be due to the missing harmonics. My Les Paul has the pickup 1.5mm closer to the bridge and did not completely cancel the 5th fret harmonic when I had the modified PAF in it. I also suspect it is causing "wolf notes" Just something that people might find interesting

Of course there are many factors which affect the final sound but I am specifically talking about how it is affected by the position of the pickup. Take any guitar regardless if it's bright or warm and you will only get this "type" of sound with a pickup in the area I am talking about. Now that I have the neck pickup of the white guitar on the second octave it has the same sound character as the Les Paul although it is a lot brighter due to the timber, especially the maple neck I also found Tillmans demonstration applet a bit confusing at first. I don't think its totally accurate and I'm sure he points that out. For example He says that it shows sub-harmonics even though guitar strings are not capable of supporting them. On his other page he says something about the fourth harmonic being cancelled by the neck pickup http://www.till.com/articles/PickupResponse/index.html And this website says the same thing with a diagram similar to this one http://www.gmarts.org/index.php?go=233 (Quoting the webpage) "Now consider the 4th harmonic which has nodes at the 5th fret, the 12th fret and the neck pickup - there is no 4th harmonic vibration over the neck pickup. This strong difference in harmonic levels plays a major part in the unique character, or timbre of this pickup. A way to prove this is to play this harmonic by damping an open string above the 5th fret (making sure not to pluck the harmonic at its nodes over the 12th fret or neck pickup). You will hear almost nothing from the neck pickup, but a strong note if you switch to the middle or bridge pickups" When I first heard about this issue of the neck pickup I was immediately skeptical and replied "But when you play up the fretboard it all changes" The shop owner commented that everybody says that and went back to reading his book. He knew I didn't have any money after buying the Les Paul so he wasn't trying to sell me anything, he just wanted me to bugger-off out of his shop Like me, most people don't have a problem with the pickup being in the best pozi for the open string. Its when you play up the fretboard that is not understood. Those websites I referred to speak of the sound I am talking about and say it is due to the fourth harmonic being cancelled and I have just gone the step further to show how there are still harmonics cancelled or nearly cancelled all the way up the fretboard

Yes that came up during my research on this and is a good guide towards what I am talking about Geo thankyou for your positive response. When I posted this up I cut lots out to keep it short so there are lots of factors left to explain, or should I say theories to put forward? In regard to this being subjective. While I was experimenting I liked Coil B so much I have re-wired my pickups so I have it as a permanent option. It has a funky sound which is good for lots of the music I like to play while Coil A is simply outclassed by the pickup in full humbucking mode for other styles of music But the issue here is this. Around the second octave node there is a small area where you get a completely different sound to anywhere else between the bridge and the neck. I believe you would have to put the pickup at the 12th fret to improve on this type of sound and to my knowledge it is called "Clarinet Tone" In regard to the "sampling window" of a pickup I can assure you without a word of a lie that a single coil on the second octave will not produce the 5th fret harmonic. If you want to try this you may have to adjust the bridge saddle because it seems most manufacturers place the pickup slightly off the node. In any case even a Humbucker will be rather faint I wasn't going to go into it that deep but seeing as you brought it up. Tell me if I'm wrong First here's something to try Play an open string harmonic on the 6th string. You can actually put your finger back on and it will keep sounding out. You will see the nodal area does not vibrate and to me it appears to be about 8mm (As soon as you touch the area where it is vibrating you dampen the string) As you go up the Harmonic Series there are more and more of these nodal points introduced so the section of string that actually vibrates becomes less and the pitch becomes higher. They become slightly out of tune with the Fundamental so wouldn’t canceling them result in a "cleaner" sound? PLEASE NOTE The numbers I have chosen in this diagram are just to give you the idea. They are not out of a science lab

The Neck Pickup Sweet Spot Several weeks after I bought my first Les Paul in 1977 I asked the shop owner why they don't make them with 24 frets and he said the neck pickup needs to be where the 24th fret would be to get the best sound. I thought he meant it has to be in that exact location so I was very skeptical. At another shop a few months later I heard a young salesman talking about the same issue and he said it was just distance from the bridge I decided the only way to find the truth is to do my own experimenting and now I have done what I wanted to do all those years ago. I studied the Harmonic Series and compared pickups in different positions on three different guitars to arrive at my conclusions and I am convinced they are correct Here are a few websites that cover the topic of the Harmonic Series and some of them touch on what I am talking about but I still haven’t found any that actually give a complete explanation http://wapedia.mobi/en/Harmonic_series_(music) http://www.physicsclassroom.com/Class/sound/U11L5b.cfm http://www.gmarts.org/index.php?go=233 Most of my experimenting was on this guitar which I routered to get a pickup on the second octave where the 24th fret would be (I will call this position A) Before that I could only get it where the 26th fret would be (I will call this position First I moved a middle pickup in stages to position B which is 42mm and it was only slightly warmer each time. In other words position B just sounded like a warm middle pickup Then I moved it 10mm further and noticed a significant change in tone as well as a steep increase in warmth. Finally another 7mm at position A the sound had completely changed to a clean rounded tone which seemed to cover the whole fretboard To me this proves there is a sweet spot but the location does not have to be exact Next I installed a modified PAF which has adjusting screws on both coils to get a back to back comparison of position A & B Coil A went from the open string to the 19th fret and was especially sweet at the 12th fret (Above the 19th fret sounded the same as the bridge pickup) Coil B went from about the 4th fret to the 21st and sounded nicer at the 14th fret (Above the 21st fret sounded the same as the bridge pickup) Although Coil B had this rounded tone it was not as nice as Coil A except at the highest frets. This diagram depicts the sound quality of each coil So these simple tests indicate what I was told 33 years ago is quite true but what is so significant about the second octave? It is also the antinode of the second harmonic of the open string which would have a lot to do with warmth but what about the "clean" sound? When I played a 5th fret harmonic tuning up with Coil A there was no sound from the amp and I thought it had blown a fuse. I have always known the neck pickup is not the best for harmonics and I have heard people talk about cancellation but did not expect this After studying the Harmonic Series for each fret I found there is always a node on or near the second octave so they would be cancelled or very faint At the open string the fourth harmonic is cancelled When you play the 1st fret the fourth harmonic is still virtually cancelled When you play the 2nd and 3rd frets the fourth and third harmonics are both very faint At the 4th fret the third harmonic is virtually cancelled At the 5th fret the third harmonic is fully cancelled At the 12th fret the second harmonic is cancelled then it goes back to the third then fourth harmonic at the 19th fret So this means the distance from 19th fret to pickup is quarter of 19th fret to bridge. It has the same relationship to the pickup as the open string Obviously a pickup in any position will cancel overtones (along with every harmonic above it that has a node at that point) but at the second octave it cancels the lowest-order harmonics possible so you get the most cancellations. If you remove all the overtones you end up with just the Fundamental which is known as a "Pure Tone" http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Pure_tone I found where you get the best sound (see diagram 2) is also where the most cancellations are but it also depends on which harmonics are cancelled At the 12th fret every second harmonic is cancelled A A E A C# E G A B C# D E F# G G# A This means you never hear the octaves of the fundamental so it is closest to a Pure Tone and sounds the best At the open string every fourth harmonic is cancelled A A E A C# E G A B C# D E F# G G# A At the 5th fret every third harmonic is cancelled D D A D F# A C D E F# G A B C C# D You hear every octave of the fundamental so it is less of a Pure Tone and is probably why it does not sound as sweet as the open string or the 12th fret So to sum it up in a brief explanation "A pickup at the second octave cancels lower order harmonics leaving the fundamental of most notes on the fretboard as an almost pure tone" I hope I haven’t gone overboard with this explanation but there are still other factors I have not mentioned

Who is Vinny? But yeah I also agree that the guitar with the computerised movable pickup is not the best-looking on the market, but that's not the issue All I am saying is the idea of moving pickups from bridge to middle to neck is out there Just for the record what I forgot to mention is that guitar is called "Sweet Spot Select" Look it up in your search engine Hey maybe I just made a few sales for them I would buy one if I had a rich uncle with a credit card....LOLOLOLOL Always laughing I am don't you know?

Another thing to consider is the thickness of the body, which goes along the same lines as chambering...etc... meaning a thicker body would have more affect on the sound, a thinner body less Also it has been my experience that the neck and fretboard material has a lot to do with the "initial attack" and when you think about it, most of the time that is all you hear in guitar-playing All the guitars I made have a 1-piece Maple neck and it dominates the sound, which sometimes I like...however... To cut a long story short I am in favour of the Mahogany neck with a Rosewood fretboard...or can you make a whole neck out of Rosewood? I'm pretty sure that would be the best bet to counter-act the bright Maple body 2c

My experience is to stick to standard positions but here is another movable pickup setup thats out there. Got a little computer in it to move the pickup to pre-selected positions!

Very nice I like how the grain follows the shape of the guitar Or does the shape of the guitar follow the curve of the grain? Nicely chosen top for the instrument Swedish Luthier, great info there!

Something that I don't think has been mentioned is string vibration. When you strum or pick the string/s you know the vibrations travel in both directions and most of them rebound from the nut and bridge, but some continue on to the tuning pegs and tailpiece, then rebound from there All the guitars I have made use the Gotoh Gibson-style bridge/tailpiece setup and I decided to go with Gibson dimensions just in case there was some reason behind it. A few months ago I did some measuring and found an interesting fact from my Les Paul. The neck pickup is 1/4 the distance from the Tailpiece to the middle of the headstock. I doubt if there is any real benefit from this but its just something that goes into the equation Other guitars like the Howard Roberts have a lot more string beyond the bridge, but that guitar also has a different length for each string beyond the bridge So I would suggest to keep the same dimensions because there might be a good reason behind it. However keep in mind, what scale are you using? A lot of people use 25 1/2 inches whereas the Gibson is 24 3/4 inches

My immediate thoughts are that the neck may continue to twist over time But apart from that I think its a good idea

I actually find it easier to deal with when there are just millimetres. I wish they would make steel rules without those half millimetre marks, its just a bunch of lines which kind-of blurr into each other and my eyes start to hurt like after looking into one of those 3D images Top idea, thats a bit like how a slide-rule works

I'd say its a home-made job You said it has no radius, but in the second pic it does appear to have a bit...? Why was it taken out of the bin? ....LOL

I measured the frets on two of my bought guitars and wrote the results down to 0.1mm When I compared the measurements to the calculated dimensions I found I was within 0.1mm accuracy except for the 5th fret on one which was 0.5mm out So I think that proves my measurements were good, and that the manufacturer was right on the money So yes, accuracy is important...and I have found that I can't do it!!!