bassbiscuits Posted April 3, 2017 Share Posted April 3, 2017 (edited) I've installed a PJ set of Hot Rod pickups (formerly Wizard Pickups) in my passive Mike Lull PJ4. It originally came with a set of Lindy Fralins, which were beautifully articulate and open sounding, with lots of high-end shimmer and a lush airy sound. But for my sort of sound I felt they were perhaps a bit too vintage-voiced, and I wanted a bit more in terms of low-end thump. For reference, I'm primarily a finger style or pick rock player, with occasion visits to slapping if I'm asked nicely... Cue the Hot Rod PJ set, made up of a Thumper and a JB84. The Thumper has 14k ohms resistance, which is a fair whack hotter than the Fralin. The JB84 11.5k ohms, which is much the same as the original Fralin bridge pickup, tho a bit darker and dirtier sounding. Result? Well they certainly add a lot of low end oomph and overall volume - the bass on this thing is really hefty now! The trade-off? If anything, it has lost something of the hi-fi openness at the very high end of things, and now overall has a hotter, slightly darker sound. On such a naturally bright-sounding, ash-bodied bass, that actual evens out to a very nice, full bass tone. Cranking it up and digging in on the weekend was an absolute pleasure, and i can't wait to gig it this weekend for the first time in its new configuration. Edited April 3, 2017 by bassbiscuits Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Conan Posted April 4, 2017 Share Posted April 4, 2017 Interesting. The '84 Jazz pickup was designed to be a bit "dark" sounding - but the Thumper (at least the old Wizard one) was not particularly lacking in top end. Maybe they have changed the specs slightly... Still, sounds like a result Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bassbiscuits Posted April 4, 2017 Author Share Posted April 4, 2017 Yeah the JB84 is the dark one of the two - the Thumper is just fat and loud - no complaints there at all! I may yet experiment with running the Thumper paired with the original Fralin jazz pickup... I'll gig it this weekend and get a proper feel for how it sounds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ead Posted April 7, 2017 Share Posted April 7, 2017 I have a set of the JB74s in my Sandberg TT (acquired on here). Can't recall the static impedance but they are hotter than the std fit items but not as extreme as Quarter Pounder type items. For me they are just right; went with some cream covers too. [sharedmedia=core:attachments:236844] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bassmachine2112 Posted April 8, 2017 Share Posted April 8, 2017 Hiho,I have a wizard thumper in my P.frankenstein,here,s what Andy from Wizard told me about the Thumper. It,s got a good output,if you pull back the volume to about 8.5 it,s like a P but max volume and it,s like 11 with added presence.Pull back the tone and the added presence cuts back and it goes goes big fat thumping which lets you know there is a lot of bottom end. That,s the basics of the conversation and yup that,s what it does.Andy also mentioned that the controls are more usable for different sounds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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