I was told that if I replaced my pickups with EMG 81/85's that some amps can't handle these powerful pickups and will sound terrible.How do you know what your amp can handle?
Just pretend you have a 0-to-12 volume knob on your guitar and use 10 ...
These are active pups, right? Then turning down the guitar volume should take care of excessive amp input overdrive without killing the tone.
-=tension & release=-
Thanks for the advice.I haven't got replacement pick ups yet but was wondering how they would work.I've gotten conflicting advice about doing this myself vs. paying someone to install them.If I was to attempt this and find myself over my head,would a guitar shop then be able to help me or would they be reluctant to do so,especially since I didn't buy the guitar or the pickups from them?
Most good shops will help you out, no matter what problems your having. If they don't take it somewhere else. I have a guitar with EMG Active pickups and have never had a problem plugging into different amps with it.
joe
Hey dude
I've got a EMG 81 Active pick up. I find it a little excessive. It is hard to keep the harmonics at bay when you have loud volume with high gain. I must say that i find the tone a little flat as well. As for installing it, its pretty simple if you know how to solder well. Just be sure to get stereo jacks for your cable. As far as i know it needs a stereo jack to properly grounded. At least it doesn't ground at the bridge, so you won't get shocked :)
It's not the speakers that can't handle the signal, it's just that your amp's input is expecting a signal of a certain strength, and pushing more will create an 'overdriven' effect. Lowering your preamp volume will generally cure this.
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