Entwistle HDN - High Definition Neodymium Pickups. Updated with a clip!

Well i've been playing these for around a week now and I didn't want to write this up straight away as I wanted to get familiar with the pickups and tweak the heights/polepieces to get them spot on.

And now a week later I am still completely impressed with them. Firstly there's the fact that they are high output and ultra tight in the low end, usually to have this kind of clarity and tightness you would have to sacrifice your cleans completely with say a ceramic pickup... But not with these you get those thick palm mutes and the pinches just really leap out at you going hand in hand with a great midrange grind. Then you switch over to the clean channel and get incredible bell like cleans that have a piezo like quality to them.

The neck pickup is just as impressive as the bridge its higher output than I am used to from my other guitars with Bare Knuckles in but it still retains that same clarity that the bridge had but with extra fluidity with is amazing for legato work and the cleans again are excellent being warmer and fuller than the bridge and very clean and crisp sounding.

Now onto tunings. I have used these pickups in tunings ranging from E Standard right down to B standard and the same qualities remain throughout the tunings and have even outshined the other pickups I own in some of these tunings.

In short these pickups are a metal guitarists dream come true but it doesn't stop there either.
If you knock the gain back on the amp you get into that 80s rock territory that many people crave.

The HDNs also react extremely well using an overdrive pedal which results in even more tightness and cut (not that they needed it) But all in all it makes for an extremely versatile set of pickups for the rock or metal guitarist.

I have a seven string coming my way this week too and i'm not even considering any other brand or type of pickups so far if Entwistle can provide the goods again.

Now you can buy these excellent pickups from here.

http://www.boyesamplification.co.uk/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=52

Flying V Stain Test + Pickup Update

Here's the primary test of finishing this guitar. I decided to go for a deep blue as the grain on this thing is terrible!

This is just one coat so far i'm going to let it dry overnight to see how dark it settles before deciding whether to do another coat or not.

Also I have an update regarding the pickups that are going in this.

They are something a bit unique that I have never tried before and I have been given promises they will be ultra tight, hot & extremely clear.

They clock in at 16.5k for the bridge pickup and 9.5k for the neck pickup and both feature Neodymium magnets.

I shall give a full review once I have the pickups in and the guitar back in one piece.

NGD: DIY Flying V

Well this was a heck of a lot easier than I thought it would be. It took about an hour from opening the box to get it together and setup fully.

I am actually pleasantly surprised with this. For £53 its a heck of a lot of guitar, there are no sharp fret edges and the wood is solid and it plays really nice & has a very warm & full acoustic tone.

Now onto the bad parts. The tuners are absolutely junk and these will be the first thing to be changed.
The pickups are also absolute junk but that is exactly what I wanted from them for my pickup experiment which shall be ready once i've got the PCBs fabbed.

Here's the obligatory photo but the lighting is crap so some proper ones along with a "stock" soundclip shall follow tomorrow.

And here is the clip!

DIY Flying V stock test clip by Tony Boyes

New Guitar Incoming....

Well kinda.

I forgot I bid on this a sometime over the last fortnight and completely forgot about it.

Its got the following spec.

Basswood Body
Maple Neck
Rosewood Fretboard
22 Frets
2 x Shit humbuckers

All the hardware will be replaced with something worthwhile and the pickups are part of my grand upcoming experiment which should be of great interest to the metal crowds.

Oh yeah it also cost the grand sum of £53

Preparing your Vero/Stripboard

I thought I should link to this before I start with the build log as my camera on my phone sucks for close up photos even with macro enabled!

http://www.societyofrobots.com/member_tutorials/node/90

The link above shows you how to cut the traces and also add in jumpers. It's all self explanatory really but this information is here now if anyone needs it.

The effects of capacitance on tone.

This is the first part of something that I was asked about on the MetalGuitarist forum.

In itself it can be quite awkward to explain but there are a few basic rules that apply and I will go through them in the simplest application there is to a guitarist.

The tone control. The main properies of a capacitor used in this application is to increase or decrease the high frequencies depending on how they are wired.

A common value that is used as a "tone" capacitor is 0.022uF if you increase this to say 0.1uF you will roll off a far larger amount of the high frequencies.

For a quick reference here are a few common capacitor values that are used in guitars

0.10uF - Darker sometimes described as a muddier sound (no good for metal imho)

0.047uF - Less dark, with a pleasant frequency curve through the travel of the pot.

0.022uF - This cap gives a brighter sound and does not roll off as much high end and also has a good frequency curve throughout the travel of the pot

Another point that i have seen come up on various forums is that a higher voltage capacitor will change/alter the sound. This is NOT true a using a 600v  Orange Drop will have the exact same effect as using a 100v Orange Drop as your guitar will never see 600v going through it and if it does there is something seriously wrong!

Also using a really low value capacitor will give the effect of reducing the low end frequencies when wired up with a pot this can be seen in an excellent post on the MetalGuitarist forum.

I shall do more of these in different applications if people request them.

New Amp Plans

Well I was kinda challenged to do this one but it's something I actually have an interest in myself so i'm going to roll with it and see how it turns out.

The challenge was to make a low powered amp thats around 20w or less that can do metal without the bass farting out as it's never really been done before.

Heres the plan so far

• Single Channel
• EL84 power stage
• Cascaded Gain Stages
• Variable Voltage Regulation for Power Scaling
• Built In Boost Circuit
• Adjustable Negative Feedback Control (Depth)
• Stacked Controls For The EQ Section Where The Second Stack Controls The Boost With The MV Control Being Push Pull To Turn The Boost On/Off

I wont be starting this until after christmas but i'm really excited for it.

Shock Treatment (SHO update)

Well I got around to rehousing this today and also labelling it up using a Dymo labeller.

Here's the final version.

Hopefully some more parts should be in tomorrow and I have decided to do the little angel chorus.

SHO style build

First off i'll give credit where its due.

I used the layout from http://tagboardeffects.blogspot.com that was made by IvIark
Its an excellent layout.

I built this using a 10k linear pot and wired it in reverse as i didn't have a 5k linear rev pot handy.
This gave great results as I now have a massive range of clean boost for the first half of the pedal before the dirt and crackle kicks in!

Also this is my first ever build using Vero/Stripboard so it isn't the tidiest but i plan on tidying it up later.

Also as my step drill bit still hasn't arrived its built in a "DIY" enclosure that was crafted by my girlfriend Laura.

I enjoyed doing this so much that I have also ordered parts for a chorus build and an OD that I am going to cannibalise a BIYANG OD8 for the chassis as its the perfect layout.

New Headshell Day!

I was originally going to use this for my next amp which would have a similar chassis but black with white lettering but i tried it with my current SLO and it just looks awesome.