Hamels are in

Oh. My. Fucking. doG.

It's been a long time since I got knocked on my ass by an "upgrade." But this is it.

Keep in mind this was just a couple minutes of living room wanking (and scaring the cats) but these are the smoothest, most "articulate" Tele pickups I've ever heard. And I heard Bill Hullett's nocaster in my hot little hands.

Keep in mind, the pickups the Hamels replaced were not slouches. Lindy Fralin Blues Specials are great, great pickups in their own right, it's not for nothing Brad Paisley uses them.

But Hamels are in a class by themselves. Holy Moly.

I just hope they can solve their production issues and tget the business going better. They're worth every cent.

The Fralins are for sale. Pre-relic'd for your convenience.

That's just what I wanted to hear. Bill, JP, Redd, and now Pete. Time to spend some money. FWIW Elliot swears by anything Alan builds.

I'd love to hear some sound clips of those, Pete.

Jack, you still interested in the Fralins? If so, drop me a note. You've got first crack if you want them. Pre-Relic'd for your convenience. Please let me know soon, if you don't want 'em I'll try to sell 'em to someone else here. Gotta pay for the Hamels.

Next jam I do, I'll use the Tele.

Pete, you got mail.

I love to hear these as well. Hamel have a website?

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Originally Posted by bluesgtr20

I love to hear these as well. Hamel have a website?

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Not yet.

He's been having some production problems and has to get caught up.

You can hear the neck pickup on this. It's DI with software amp emulation but it still gets the point across. More sound samples will be coming as I have time to do them.

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Originally Posted by Jack w/his radar

Pete, you got mail.

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Reply sent.

Great sound Pete!

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Originally Posted by pbradt

Not yet.

He's been having some production problems and has to get caught up.

You can hear the neck pickup on this. It's DI with software amp emulation but it still gets the point across. More sound samples will be coming as I have time to do them.

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I can't wait to hear more!! thanks Pete. How much are these pups anyways?

Fuck.... And thats the neck!

Just to avoid misunderstandings: GREAT sound....

How do they compare to Kinman tele pickups??? I've heard those are amazing as well, and noiseless.

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Originally Posted by bluesgtr20

I can't wait to hear more!! thanks Pete. How much are these pups anyways?

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Set of Tele pickups is $240 shipped I think. I paid 225 but they are raising prioces due to the cost of parts (they had to change suppliers). I'm already saving for my set of Strat pickups.

A lot of money for a set of pickups, but if you want your Tele or Strat to sound like a REAL Tele or Strat, these are what you want. I was speaking with Bill Hullett yesterday, and he said if you closed your eyes and listened to James Pennebaker's '52 (with pickups from 1952) and his CS relic with the Hamels, you could not tell the difference.

As for how they compare to Kinmans, I couldn't say, I've never heard Kinmans that I know about. Hamels are single coil and thus are NOT noiseless, but IMO, you can't even shield the guitar without diminishing tone. You can have less noise and less tone but I've never seen a guitar with noiseless pickups or heavy shielding that sounded as good as an unshielded guitar with a great set of single coils.

But as most of you know, I'm a purist mudafuka.

i'm glad you like the pups pete. and i'm glad things got cleared up. last time i visited alan he was mundo backed up.

one more converted.

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Originally Posted by pbradt

but IMO, you can't even shield the guitar without diminishing tone. You can have less noise and less tone but I've never seen a guitar with noiseless pickups or heavy shielding that sounded as good as an unshielded guitar with a great set of single coils.

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Damn Pete! I thought I was alone on this one too! Mudafuka is right. :cool:

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Originally Posted by fezz parka

Damn Pete! I thought I was alone on this one too! Mudafuka is right. :cool:

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You'd be surprised. A few others we know about ;) also believe this.

I bet you can guess who. :D

I shoulda clarified..."Alone on the forums". :D

I know that Lindy Fralin, Elliot, & JP feel this way about shielding. And I'd rather have MIM Standard ceramic p'ups than those Fender "vintage toneless" or Lace Sensors or Kinmans for that matter... I too am a purist mudafuka when it comes to electromagnetic induction. :lol

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Originally Posted by fezz parka

I shoulda clarified..."Alone on the forums". :D

I know that Lindy Fralin, Elliot, & JP feel this way about shielding. And I'd rather have MIM Standard ceramic p'ups than those Fender "vintage toneless" or Lace Sensors or Kinmans for that matter... I too am a purist mudafuka when it comes to electromagnetic induction. :lol

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Having played all the pickups mentioned above (vintange noiselss, lace, kinmans) and original early 60s strat pickups, I thought that nothing new could hang in there with the originals, especially not new noiseless pickups ... That is, UNTIL I heard the Kinmans. To my ears, they definately have "that" sound... they don't sound like noiseless pickups at all. And they have historically correct DC resistance, magnet material, and output. I'm intrested in these Hamels, but try the Kinmans before you judge! :)

I agree onetube.

I've gotten an awful lot of positive comments about my Tele tone here and at shows, and that blue Tele uses Vintage Noiseless pups.

However, they DO NOT sound like vintage Tele pups. No way. It just so happens that I love the way they sound, made even stranger by the fact that I personally hate the way VN Strat pups sound.

However, on my ash Tele, the Kinman AVNs were beyond belief. Not one so-called Tone expert knew those pickups weren't stock Fenders--in fact, the bridge pup was constantly being mistaken for a Nocaster pup.

It's all totally subjective of course. Because, after saying all that, I still have to completely agree with Fezz & Pete that I can't stand the way a "well shielded" guitar sounds. It just seems lifeless to me. Go figure. :rolleyes:

I have extremely critical ears. I noticed no degradation in tone, whatsoever, when I sheilded my Tele, Strat, LP, and Jazz Bass. If anything, I noticed a tonal improvement, gaining more clarity and harmonic response.

And the Kinmans don't sound anything like the Vintage Noiseless or Lace Sensors. If you haven't played them, you just have no idea how good they sound.

And I've played many many 50s/60s Teles- some few sounded better than the Kinmans, many sounded extremely similar, and a lot sounded worse. There IS NO SUCH THING as a "vintage sound" - that is, there is no good sound created solely because a pickup is "vintage." It's total luck of the draw.

And to compound that, it's hard to know what's the old pickup and what's the old wood. I'm inclined to think that if you put Kinmans in a great old 50s Tele, the guitar would sound even better. I do know that you can put really good vintage pickups into an iffy guitar and get a sound just like you'd get with Duncans or stock Fenders.

I have heard the grail, Bill Hullett's Nocaster, and the Hamels match that. I haven't heard every pickup under the sun, but Hamels are by far and away the best sounding Tele pickups I've ever heard. My Tele is unshielded and shall remain so.

First off, I can't think of anything I haven't played. I've been doin' this for 40 years. I've also got extremely critical ears (I make my living with them), have played Kinman's, and they still do not sound like good single coils. They sound nice, but not what I like to hear in a pickup. Maybe I just like a little buzz :D
Same thing with shielding. I, and many other pro players I've talked to, can hear a difference. As far as Hamels go, my good friend Elliot Easton has several Hamel built teles, right down to the pickups, and they are the best thing you can get, next to the real thing. And this is comparing them to his stock '58 Tele. Of course Elliot is so good, he could make rubberbands and a shoebox sound great. :dude

And pc is right it's all subjective. Go for what you like. That's what I do. :yay

So, Pete, like, where's the clip of the bridge p'up, mudafuka? :ola

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Originally Posted by Dwell

And to compound that, it's hard to know what's the old pickup and what's the old wood. ... I do know that you can put really good vintage pickups into an iffy guitar and get a sound just like you'd get with Duncans or stock Fenders.

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I have to agree with you on these points.

I don't understand how a lack of shielding could improve tone. I mean, the shielding is there to reduce interference from sources other than the pickups and the strings. And if hum is reduced, wouldn't one hear more of the sound they're supposed to hear?

Just thoughts, people. Not criticizing or nuthin.

Perhaps your ear is so used to the hum that when it's gone you're just unfamiliar with the result. Or perhaps with the hum present, it sorta "softens" the perception of the resulting sound.

I dunno. I'm a :da. I'm glad you're so happy with your pickups, Pete.

Shielding increases the capacitance of the circuit, affecting the upper midrange. Some (like me) say can hear a difference, some say there's no difference. Shielding affects more than just the hummmmmmmmm. :D

Yeah Curt, I know it's weird.

All I know is that I had two guitars shielded with some or all of the GuitarNuts specs. Both of them lost a touch of high-end sparkle and chime (one was a Strat with CS 54 pups, one a Tele with SD five-two neck & Fender nocaster bridge pups). The one that was "fully shielded" lost more than the one that was partially shielded too.

I was confused at first also--it doesn't seem to make sense. I did some reading and came up with answers that seemed to explain it. The copper paint/shielding just "steals" some of the magnetic field from the pups. I think that's the idiots way of saying what Fezz said in proper terms. :D

Some improvement was made on the Strat by making sure the copper tape didn't come as close to the pickups on the underside of the pg.

NF: soon as I shake this wretched cold.

I gotcha. Interesting, I'm applying copper shielding tape at this very moment to the insides of my red Tele...

I have not actually run such experiments to see if I can notice a difference in the tone between shielded and unshielded. It would seem to me you'd have to play a guitar with no shielding and then play it with shielding and be able to remember or record the sound precisely enough to make a fair comparison.

One thing I notice with my shielding and Kinman pickups - there just isn't any noise! I love the tone I get and even with a whole steaming heap of gain I don't hear a whisper until pick hits string. It's eerie.

To each his own. I'm better able to enjoy my guitarin' if there's no annoying hum. I've got a strat with SD lipstick tubes and while I love, love, love the tone, I hate, hate, hate the hum.

Let's clarify- if you shield the inside of Strat pickup covers, yeah, it can darken the sound a bit. And that's what the treble tone knob on your amp is for. It's exactly like the difference between covered and uncovered humbuckers- very slight. How sharp or rounded the edge of your pick is makes a bigger difference.

But a proper shielding job doesn't increase the capacitance of the circuit whatsoever. When you have zero ohm potential between any parts of the circuit ground, that's a very good thing.

BTW, on a Tele, Leo intended for all the pickups to be shielded- it's just that most of us preferred to use the bridge shield as an ashtray.

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Originally Posted by Dwell

But a proper shielding job doesn't increase the capacitance of the circuit whatsoever. When you have zero ohm potential between any parts of the circuit ground, that's a very good thing.

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I'm talking about capacitance, not DC resistance.:hmm

I guess Lindy Fralin doesn't know what he's talking about then. :D



I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. :yay

I understand the difference between capacitance and resistance. And I haven't found that shielding negatively affects the capacitance of the circuit. But any potential between ground points induces noise and ground loops, and anyone can hear how detrimental they can be. My guitars are so thoroughly star-grounded that I can disconnect the bridge/string ground and have no change in the amount of noise. It's zero.

Lemme hedge a bit- the amount of capacitance can increase by a degree that's well within spec for a "250K" pot. This means that a different tone or volume pot can make more difference than shielding.

On my Strat and Tele, which are the most sensitive to capacitance, I have relatively high value volume pots (the Tele's measures 263K- don't remember the Strat's, but it's close). And the tone pots have had clear nail polish put on the wiper in the "10" position, so when the pot is full up, it's out of the circuit. Turn it to 9 and then it's in the circuit and performing normally.

I also use Kinman's cap and resistor trick on the volume pot to retain highs as the pot is turned down.

The result of every little component change and shielding approach is a quiet, full-spectrum guitar. Not dark, not piercing. Great tone.

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Originally Posted by NeoFauve

So, Pete, like, where's the clip of the bridge p'up, mudafuka? :ola

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You axed for it, mudafuka!

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Originally Posted by pbradt

You axed for it, mudafuka!

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Great job Pete :dude

So...
If I wanted More information on Hamels, or even wanted to Purchase a set, how would I go about it? They sound REAL impressive, and I want to know more about what is available.

Thanks - FJ

They're having parts supplier problems right now. I'd call Ron Ellis at 760-436-2913 and try to find out. The last wait time was 12 weeks though some have waited longer. Give Ron a call and talk to him. Like so many of these "boutique" guys they're long on "art" and short on business savvy. I got mine after a two month wait and I'd say they're worth the wait but I'd be less than honest if I said I was happy about it. They ARE worth it, however.

They do not offer much in the way of "Hot" pickups. They specialize in "vintage" (meaning REAL) reproduction of the original Fender pickups. If you're looking for hot pickups, other makers are a better bet, esp Lindy Fralin.

Kinmans did sound different than the single coils I've had. I have the AVn-48 tele pickups, and compared to my Voodoo TE50's and my muddy Waters tele pickups that I A/B'ed it to, it sounded like the difference between Digital vs. Analog. Digital is nice, with the super-precise response and perfection, but for sound production (as opposed to sound re-production) I prefer analog. The Voodoos and the Muddy Waters pickups both had more warmth, complexity, and more "naturalness" (sorry for that lame adjective, I couldn't come up with anything better) than the kinmans. The kinmans had more precision and sounded kinda hi-fi ish.

I'm among the school of thought that you can't get a noiseless pickup to sound like a true single coil.