Surface Mounted Full Humbucker on Carved Archtop

[Mike Conner]

]A thread by Greg Martin some time ago discussed using a full size humbucker with a carved archtop:
http://www.mimf.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=4245

I have finally completed a build using a surface mounted full size neck position humbucker on a 16" carved archtop guitar:

The full humbucker is a Golden Age from StewMac, total height including the mounting tabs is about 7/8". This is the space needed between the top plate surface and the plain of the fretboard.

I adjusted the carved arch of the spruce front plate to give a little more slope to the neck block. I modified my neck angle jig to allow space for the humbucker. The neck angle needs to be about 4.5 degrees to have enough space for the pickup, and the bridge height ends up about 1-1/8", not too much taller than normal.

[Mike Conner]

A Dremel with a metal cutting blade trimmed off the standard mounting tabs and reduced the extra length of the pole piece screws:

After the build was finished we can feed the shielded cable through a hole in the front plate. Double sided tape adhesive attached the humbucker to the plate, and also a shop made ebony trim ring. No big window through the front plate, and no extra screw holes to attach the hardware:

I use a stereo endpin jack with the humbucker to the tip connection and JJB piezo sensors to the ring. A string ground is always good idea, so a hole drilled at an angle from the tailpiece bracket location lets the wire pass through the tail block and back out the endpin jack hole to connect to ground.

Copper foil tape in the ebony tailpiece anchor block completes the connection:

[Mike Conner]

Shatten thumbwheels for volume and tone control are hidden inside the edge of the bass side f-hole:

The humbucker height levels out with the fretboard height with a good clearance and room for string to string balance using the pole pieces.

The tone is really great, more full range and acoustic timbre compared to my Ibanez AF95 laminated hollowbody.

[Mike Conner]

No guitar post is complete without the obligatory shot of the back:

//mike

[David King]

Beautiful Guitar and very nice work all around Mike.
On a side note I once got to compare the sound of the Golden Age pickups vs some of the others that are available for more money and the differences were quite noticeable. We all thought that the Golden Age sounded good until we put it up against a few others. Interestingly enough the Gibson aftermarket pickups were the hands down favorites at $200 a pop.

[Mike Conner]

Thanks David!

The Golden Age was a decent price (about $50 USD) and I knew I would be modifying it for this build, so it was a reasonable choice. I have used Vintage Vibe (Pete Biltoft) neck mounted humbuckers on prior builds. Pete is great to order from but not cheap at $125 or so. The neck mounted mini humbuckers have a nice warm acoustic tone, great for jazz. I wanted to see if I could get the extra punch from a surface mounted full humbucker, and this definately worked well. Fuller range sound compared to the standard Ibanez AF95 neck pickup.

The mounting with double sided tape means I can upgrade later to another pickup without too much trouble. I'll likely contact Vintage Vibe about building a full humbucker without mount tabs like I used here. If someone wants to commission a build I'll use whatever their budget will allow VV, Lollar or others I'm sure would be able to build this pickup.

[Randolph Rhett]

I'll second that Golden Age are OK, but not what I would put into a guitar that has that much craft and artistry. Lots of great options at that $130 price point (Seth Lover's, Antiquity, '57 Classic, Fralin "Pure PAF", etc.) Extra $80 doesn't seem too much.

My main concern would be that it would fall off. Double stick tape is impressive stuff, so maybe I'm wrong. Time will tell.

[Brian Evans]

The choice to go full depth was purely auditory? You felt the thin-line HB's designed for archtops have some deficiency? Or (and this is why I would do it) you did it to see what would happen and because you could? FWIW my electric archtop has a full sized Johnny Smith style neck mount, an oddity because I don't think you can buy that size anymore, and I have a Demarzio something or other in the case. Not the guts that came with the outside, I used to swap them around for some reason. It sounds nice, though. I do like your guitar.

[Mike Conner]

Randolph: Since I was not entirely sure of the end results, a lower cost humbucker was a reasonable option and a lower price/pain point if I messed it up. This really sounds good, so I'll start thinking about an upgrade in a few months - probably Vintage Vibe since this a custom configuration (no mounting brackets).

The adhesive tape should be pretty trustworthy since it's 3M VHB for outdoor applications (can't seem to attach the photo right now...)


Brian: The motivation was first auditory - the neck mounted mini humbucker sound great for a warm jazz tone, but I will use this guitar in a worship band setting and want a bit more punch available in the tone. The stereo output to a Radial Tonebone pre-amp means I can switch between electric or acoustic tones without changing guitars (or even blend the signals). And, yep, just cause I could!

[David King]

It would be very easy to break the mounting tabs off the baseplate of any HB pickup. I've never heard the Vintage Vibe pickups but I can think of at least 30 custom pickup makers off the top of my head that would be happy to work with you there.

[Greg Martin]

Im glad to see your build with a full sized bucker ,great job.

[Bob Francis]

Great post thanks Mike.