Worthwhile Upgrade to My Vintera '60s Jazzmaster...

[Surfysonic]

I must confess, I wasn't a fan of the Fender Pure VIntage '65 Jazzmaster pickups, finding them a bit too mid-rangey on the Fender American Vintage '65 Jazzmaster that I eventually sold.

Prior to selling the AV '65 JM, I had bought a set of the PV '65 Jazzmaster pickups as an upgrade to my Squier J Mascis Jazzmaster. They were alright, but I found them (maybe combined with the anodized pickguard) a bit too honky sounding. The Squier JM JM sat unplayed for some time.

Eventually, I acquired via a trade a set of Joe Barden Two-Tone Jazzmaster pickups (awesome, btw) and put them in the Squier JM JM. Happy with this upgrade for the Squier JM JM (and now getting more play time), the PV '65 pickups were put in a drawer.

A bit later on, I watched Fender's demo on YouTube of their Fender Parallel Universe II Jazz Strat with the Pure VIntage '65 pickups and I guess I was finally sold on them - I really loved the tones from that guitar. I eventually bought a Jazz Strat and it's a keeper.

Then I bought the Vintera '60s Jazzmaster as a consolation for selling off my '63 Jazzmaster (it still hurts ). I've been playing my Vintera '60s Jazzmaster with the stock "‘60s Jazzmaster single-coil pickups" for some time now, wanting to give these pickups a chance. I've found them to be a bit "Stratty" more so than "Jazzmaster-y".

TLDR, I finally swapped out the stock pickups with the PV '65 pickups. This beastie has come to life and I'm very glad I made the upgrade.

If you've been on the fence about upgrading your Vintera Jazzmaster (or frankly, any of the Vintera line of guitars, of which I have a few), you can't go wrong with swapping out the stock pickups. The only caveat to this is I do not own a Vintera '60s Jaguar so I can't comment on the stock pickups. Unfortunately, I really can't justify a Vintera '60s Jaguar since I'm holding on (for dear life) to my '63 Jag and I have a Squier VM Jag project with PV '65 Jaguar pickups.

I've also upgraded my '50's Vintera Tele with Fender Custom Shop Texas Specials. I think the Vintera guitars have excellent bodies and necks. Sure, i may get around to upgrading the controls but for now, I'm alright with the stock electronics (excluding the stock pickups).

I have a Vintera '50s Strat that I'm going to have to go pickup upgrade hunting...my immediate thought is to get some PV '59 pickups since I already have an AV '65 Strat. Please feel free to recommend other Strat pickup upgrade possibilities - I've looked at Fralin pickups and I'm tempted but they get a bit pricey. This coming from a guy who has Fralin pickups in a Tele, Mustang, and Gretsch hollowbody.

[tune_link]

I mentioned this in another thread recently but I’ll drop it in here as well since you brought up the Vintera 60s Jag. I bought a Vintera Jag recently and could not get along with the stock pickups in it. I already knew I loved the AV65 Jag pickups from having them in other Jags that I had sold off. I swapped them out and now the Vintera is my fav Jag I’ve owned - great build, good quality components, nice neck, color is amazing. The only things I did to it were put in the different pickups and drop a Staytrem bridge in.

I haven’t messed with a lot of boutique JM pickups but I have two guitar with the AV65 JM pickups in them and I like them a while lot!

[timtam]

We don't have much good info on the Vintera pickups. The implication of the Vintera pickup part descriptions (below) is that they are actually wound in Mexico rather than say Korean sourced. If so, one would expect that Fender's manufacturing process would be similar to the MIA AVRI/AV/PV pickups. I mean it doesn't make much sense to put much work into re-designing/re-tooling for a pickup that's going into a MIM guitar (marketing descriptions below notwithstanding). Maybe they just use cheaper components (coil wire, magnetic pole pieces) or coil wire that's easier to work with (eg stronger) rather than aiming for 62/65 vintage-consistency as in the AVRI/AV/PV pickups. Or maybe they're actually closer than we think ? AFAIK the dimensions are similar (unlike say other "JM" pickups that have different size coils to real JM pickups).

I would be good to get some DCR measurements on them as a start, for comparison to the PV JMs (6.8k) and PV jags (6.8k).

PU ASSY 65 JAZZMASTER NK MEX AGD WHT 7716107000
"We revoiced the pickups to be more 60s-accurate. They’re full of the warm, rich tone that made Fender instruments famous."
- 'revoiced' compared to what ??

PICKUP ASSY JAGUAR 65 NECK MEX 7716133000
"We recreated the pickups to be more 60s-accurate. They’re full of the articulate tone that made Fender instruments famous."
- more 'accurate' than what ??

[HarlowTheFish]

We don't have much good info on the Vintera pickups. The implication of the Vintera pickup part descriptions (below) is that they are actually wound in Mexico rather than say Korean sourced. If so, one would expect that Fender's manufacturing process would be similar to the MIA AVRI/AV/PV pickups. I mean it doesn't make much sense to put much work into re-designing/re-tooling for a pickup that's going into a MIM guitar (marketing descriptions below notwithstanding). Maybe they just use cheaper components (coil wire, magnetic pole pieces) or coil wire that's easier to work with (eg stronger) rather than aiming for 62/65 vintage-consistency as in the AVRI/AV/PV pickups. Or maybe they're actually closer than we think ? AFAIK the dimensions are similar (unlike say other "JM" pickups that have different size coils to real JM pickups).

I would be good to get some DCR measurements on them as a start, for comparison to the PV JMs (6.8k) and PV jags (6.8k).

PU ASSY 65 JAZZMASTER NK MEX AGD WHT 7716107000
"We revoiced the pickups to be more 60s-accurate. They’re full of the warm, rich tone that made Fender instruments famous."
- 'revoiced' compared to what ??

PICKUP ASSY JAGUAR 65 NECK MEX 7716133000
"We recreated the pickups to be more 60s-accurate. They’re full of the articulate tone that made Fender instruments famous."
- more 'accurate' than what ??

I can only speak to the Mustang ones, but tune_link had similar thoughts about the Jag pickups - they sound pretty good, but they have this weird high-end that's not really super right for the offsets (my benchmark for the Mustang tone being McLaughlin on Bitches Brew). Fender's got a habit of being like "hey we made the offset pickups better" but not really getting why some of their objective deficiencies work well in the context of the guitars and the sound people want out of them, so they end up being kinda funky or just not hitting the spot. IIRC they had Tim Shaw work on these and he really goes hard on "it's vintage-accurate but also fixed" which is contradictory and generally leads to stuff that's even more finicky than the originals.

[tune_link]

PU ASSY 65 JAZZMASTER NK MEX AGD WHT 7716107000
"We revoiced the pickups to be more 60s-accurate. They’re full of the warm, rich tone that made Fender instruments famous."
- 'revoiced' compared to what ??

PICKUP ASSY JAGUAR 65 NECK MEX 7716133000
"We recreated the pickups to be more 60s-accurate. They’re full of the articulate tone that made Fender instruments famous."
- more 'accurate' than what ??

These were my thoughts EXACTLY. They love to use this generic jargon in the accompanying one sheets for the instruments and it's ultimately almost meaningless. I'd honestly rather them just put the values or components used and let us make the comparison ourselves. I've been thinking about how when they went to the Classic Vibe Squier line recently and moved away from the SD made pickups and wonder how the Fender ones compare to the SD ones in the Vintage Modified series. I can honestly say I really like the Vintage Modified JM pickups pretty well! Would be interested to see someone compare those side by side considering I'm assuming the aim is for a vintage type PUP I'd love to see for that price range what Fender's definition of a vintage tone is vs Seymour Duncan's haha.

[timtam]

I would be good to get some DCR measurements on them as a start, for comparison to the PV JMs (6.8k) and PV jags (6.8k).

Just noticed that the parts manual for the Vintera JM and jag include pickup specs:

Vintera JM:
Neck Alnico 5, 6.1-7.5k, North
Bridge A5, 6.1-7.5k, South
https://www.fmicassets.com/Damroot/Orig ... 1_2019.pdf

Vintera jag:
Neck Alnico 5, 6.1-7.5k, South
Bridge A5, 6.1-7.5k, North
https://www.fmicassets.com/Damroot/Orig ... 1_2019.pdf

So it looks like they're all nominally wound to 6.8k DCR, +/- 0.7k.

[Larry Mal]

These were my thoughts EXACTLY. They love to use this generic jargon in the accompanying one sheets for the instruments and it's ultimately almost meaningless. I'd honestly rather them just put the values or components used and let us make the comparison ourselves.

They could also put in the plot point graph that literally every microphone maker routinely includes. Those aren't perfect, and some companies fudge them a bit, but they provide good information as to what the microphone maker intended them to do.

But guitar pickup makers just serve up meaningless word salad.

[peterherman]

They could also put in the plot point graph that literally every microphone maker routinely includes. Those aren't perfect, and some companies fudge them a bit, but they provide good information as to what the microphone maker intended them to do.

But guitar pickup makers just serve up meaningless word salad.

Are you saying that talking about impedance numbers won't actually tell you anything about how a pickup sounds?! I am SHOCKED. Certainly when they publish the inductance numbers THAT translates directly to sound quality, right?!