Great video! The clean sound of Fender I have always loved. Can’t go wrong leaving it stock. I have a late 90’s American Telecaster in which I replaced both pickups with Hot Rails. Lost the tele sound, but gained something suited more towards my emotion or personality. User preference.
Yes for sure. Quick and easy way to change your tone without a new guitar and when you want to go back it's an easy swap. Thanks for watching and leaving a comment!
@@RideAcrossTheRiver Yeah, the thin sound is what a vintage strats typically sounds like, it's also cutting through the mix better. It's meant to be played with volume and gain on the amp and with more vintage sounding pedals like muffs/fuzz etc... Stuff that wouldn't necessarily work very well with a Hot Rails imho. However I agree I do tend prefer the Hotrails sound, especially in isolation like this or with more modern distortion ("modern" like a Rat or some of the Boss OD/DS units). For years I had a Hot Rails "neck" on my bridge and I really liked it, my setup was a Twin Reverb and Boss distortion pedals. The neck pickup is a bit weaker than the bridge version, but it's also more bass heavy, so it may mud up things more (on a bridge, there's not much bass content, so you actually end up pushing the lower mids/upper bass, which is where the mud is. The bridge Hot Rails does have the same problem of being muddy, real hum buckers tend to sit a bit further from the bridge where they start getting a bit more of the frequency spectrum). I moved to an Antiquity II Surfer on my Strats, and I had to change most of my pedal setup for the new pickup. The Antiquity II Surfer is slightly hotter than the pickup in this test but is still thin and piercing as the typical bridge Strat sounds. The Hot Rails is now sitting on a very decent squier mustang :)
@@MarioTorre I got a used Tele that had a Hot Rails in the bridge. The ceramics made it sound like an ice pick coming from the speaker. It also had too much magnetic pull on the strings. So I found a new old stock Duncan Vintage Stack and put that in with my old 1990s Hot Rhythm at the neck. Damn but I love that STR-2 ... best way to describe it is a 'dark bell' tone. Not fat, but just a bit dark with a bit of ringiness. It sounds like Billy's pickup on ZZ Top's "Fool for Your Stockings".
The hot rails don’t have the higher treble eq that the singles have. But bear in mind that this is also where your 60 cycle hum is in the mix. I have hot rails in the bridge and neck in my strat and it does clean quite well. If you want the treble that badly, you can always tweak your eq. That’s what the knobs on your amp are for. The hot rails neck is not as hot as the bridge, but you get really fast, warm tone out of it. Very fluid and vocal. Kinda like the best of a single and a humbucker.
The hot rails sound like a proper humbucker on a single coil slot. So I guess if you’re looking to get a humbucker punch in your strat, it’s the way to go
Both sound good and for different applications. You can kinda get the best of both worlds with a guitar like this as you can still get twangy sounds in the in-between positions
nice vid! I have one in the middle position of an ibanez for decades & never really explored much in the middle zone... I usually am full forward for the 'round bell' sound in clean mode or the bridge for something more cutting/super-busy and anything distorted. Your A/B completely educated me on the exact 'sound' of humbuck vs single.
@Greg Summers thanks for this video, it helped me decide and differentiate between hot rail and single coil for my Fender Stratocaster. thanks bro !!!!!!
For all this clean stuff, I prefer the stock white lace SCs. But the hot rails is better for metal and punk. PS - there are MANY guitarists who play Strats and Teles for metal and punk.
@@GregSummersMusic waiting to receive my seymour duncan P-rail pickups (fill size humbucker but it's actually a single hot-rail coil and a full P-90 in one pickup, wired in series like a regular humbucker). and i'm getting these fancy switches where you can split each pickup. it's called the seymour duncan triple shot. putting it in my epi les paul. hoping to mostly use the P-90 but praying i don't lose too much clarity on the humbucker mode
I've come around to the SD Lil 59 as my fav bridge pickup. Its brighter sounding than the Hot Rails and does have some quack in position 2, though not as much as a true single coil pickup. My solution to this eternal dilemma was simply to buy two Strats. One stock (but with SD SSL-2s which have to my ears much better sound than the Fender Player pickups), and the other with the Lil 59 in the bridge and SSL-2s in the middle/neck. When I truly need the quack, I just switch guitars.
Going to put HR in my elite single coil guitar. Love the neck pickup. Miss a humbucker in the bridge. Great video! Look the way you demonstrated the difference.
I agree with keeping the classic strat sound with the single coil...although the HR sounds sweet. I had a MIM stratocaster that had one and it was great for metal and heavy rock...but not so much for blues. I prefer using my PRS, LP, or RG570 for the heavier stuff though, and using my Strat and Tele for blues and country..
I've always wanted a bright white Stratocaster. I bought this exact model after doing some research and watching your older videos. After awhile the stock bridge checked out and just like you, I had a black Hot Rail kicking around, so I installed it. I always thought the black pickup would make the guitar look cooler, but after watching one of your videos you said the black-on-white looks odd... and that stuck with me and now I have to agree ha ha. Hopefully buy a white Hot Rail some other time or a different pickup altogether. Peace
Haha apologies for getting in your head like that! Well, my white Suhr standard came stock with a black humbucker and 2 white single coils so there's that...obviously someone likes the contrasting colors.
Hot Rails can get some quack but a Lil '59 or JB Jr may be better because they are lower in output. Another element of strat quack is that most strat single coils are alnico which are not only lower output than ceramics by nature but are also a bit sweeter.
Awesome job with the comparison video, Greg. I love the Hot Rails pickups in some guitars, but for me it's definitely a different beast entirely from a classic stock Strat pickup sound. I have had good results with the Duncan Classic Stack Plus (STK-S4b) in this scenario, where the pickups are noiseless but retain more of the classic single-coil proper Strat tone. Fattens up nicely with some fuzz and grit added but nowhere near as noisy as those stock pickups get in that situation. Keep up the good work man, cheers!
If you are playing on the bridge alone go with the hot rails but if your are playing in combo with the other pickups like bridge and middle is go with the single coil
The only real problem that I have with the hot rails is the leap in volume when switching from the single coils when playing the guitar to the hot rails.
Hot Rails. I have an SSS Strat and am getting Hot Rail put in the Bridge position. The single coil does not work for what I want to do which is heavier music
I’ve gotten more comfortable over the last year with single coils. Personally I’m not a huge fan of the hot rails in this situation probably due to my playing style changing over the years.
The hot rails really is extremely neutral sounding. Very different to a traditional humbucker to my ears. I'm undecided whether that's a good thing in general but I think it will work well for 80s style sounds og very high gain or "straight to the PA" style cleans. I don't think it pairs particularly well with the stock pups because the difference in output and chime is so high it's almost jarring when switching between positions. Maybe some modern noiseless pickups would pair better with it on a strat. Maybe even a HSH type setup with another hot rails in the neck.
Un position 2 the timbre changed slightly but it’s still sounding as a strat however it loses the sparkle aspect it’s not shiny anymore ! Difficult to say if it’s a strat on a record, In that case even the bridge tone knob becomes kinda useless ! Still delivering a Great tone!!! Nice humbucker.
Yes you will lose that quack for the most part in position 2. If I wired the hotrails parallel with the coil split, I could probably get some of that back. My son has kept this guitar original for now. Probably not putting the HR back in it.
I think I'm going to get one for my player plus strat. I thought I'd have more uses for the bright single coil in the bridge, and I use it, but not as much as I'd use a humbucker. I still would rather replace it with a hot rail, single coil sized pickup, rather than buying a strat that comes with a fender humbucker. Strats are famous for modding, so I'm actually pretty excited to become part of that tradition. It's my favorite guitar that I've ever owned and I think customizing it to my personal tastes will make it even more like my own thing. I might buy a second strat and leave the bridge pickup in there someday, that way I can have both options, but this is my plan for now.
Strat stock bridge pickup just needs to go through a compressor and it will give you all the needed mids and punch when clean. For dirty a good OD pedal takes care of the bridge
Thank you, that was a really concise comparison. I'm for either single coil or full size Humbucker, but the position 2 in the demo sounds really great with the hot rails
Lately I can get along with either SC or humbucker. My gigs have changed to church only so find I can really get some great stuff that was out of my harder rock genre before. I have other choices so it’s easy enough to grab what I need when I need it.
I thought the hot rails can be wired to coil split. Wouldn't that still make the 2nd positions have that quack? (btw, 2nd position with high gain is my fav overdrive Strat sound).
Been out of the game for a long time. Still have my VERY first guitar: a 1995 American Standard Strat my mom and uncle bought for me waaayyy back in 1996. EVERY guitar after that was either a Gibson Explorer, V or Jackson. I always hated how weak the Strat single was in the bridge. Now that Im 36 and want to get back into it, I dont have a lot of cash to spend on guitar gear. Ill be interested in hearing how my Strat sounds with a Hot Rail in the bridge to a Boss Wazu Craft SD-1 for boost into a 1996 Fender Champ 110 with a Celestion Ten 30 speaker upgrade.
I'm learning to gel better with the stock single coil bridge. The tone control is important for some of them to get rid of that high end, but I am enjoying some lower gain stuff lately so it's easier to work with now. The hot rails is a good option, although if I had it my way I'd slap a full humbucker in there, but it's not my guitar.
Hi i usually play mostly metal but i love to play other softer genres also and i planing to build stratocaster guitar(not owning it yet) with bridge hot rails for metal rhythm and solos, i also usually tend to use neck humbuckers for soloing for warmer sound on mine hh ibanez(i don't own any single coil gutar, i use to have sss squier but back then i didn't really know how guitar works at all xD), so my question does neck single coil strat pickup has good response to higher gains for metal or should i also replace it with hotrails? i would leave middle one stock for great straty sound and amazing cleans. I like versatility on guitars.
There are going to be benefits to each type. The single coil neck will have more clarity but less gain typically but there are so many pickup outputs and models that it’s hard for me to recommend something in particular. Personally I like single coil clarity in the neck pickup and will just boost it a little more during solo sections if I need to. I haven’t tried the hot rails in the neck position so I can’t speak for that one. Honestly I don’t have a ton of experience with all the different models of pickups and I don’t do a lot of swapping out. Generally I’ve just had a bunch of guitars for different variations. I use to have an Ernie ball luke 3 that was an HSS model. Those single coils were awesome and that guitar had a boost circuit built into the volume knob that was very cool.
Hi guys, Could any tell me how good splitting a HR sounds compared to an actual single coil? I have a strat and would like a hotter pickup in the bridge but that being said it’s a strat at the end of the day.
I was going buy a PRS but too pricey. So I'm going to get a Mexican strat and put Seymour Duncan in it ....now hearing the hot rails....hot rails for bridge and JB Jr for neck and middle and still have money left over 👍❗️
I actually prefer single coil in bridge for clean sound..But for rock n roll and metal distorted sound, hot rails sounded much better.. Is it possible to get single coil sized hambucker like HotRails but add coil split? so you can get best of both worlds?
Great video!! I just installed a Hot Rails bridge and for some reason the stock pock up sounds much better. Maybe i installed it wrong. Green and bare wire is soldered to the volume and the white and red soldered together and taped off. The black wire is soldered to the switch board. What do you think?
Like the stock set, but would consider a replacement set of single coils. The Strat sound is unique to the instrument, I played them for many years exclusively. All my early guitars were Fender or Squire and I learned a lot by tearing them apart and having customs built. 25 years before I bought a Gibson, and I still miss having a Strat around. You have all the essentials in your collection, so a genuine Strat is a keeper. Maple neck, that guitar is quintessential Fender Stratocaster. Thanks for the video Greg!
Agreed. I'm not a big fan of the stock pups but this is my kids guitar and he's not at a place where he can tell the difference. One day i may pick up another strat. I sold my american last year when I got the axe fx. I let it go for way too low but I wasn't a huge fan of the neck anyway. Would love to have something from the custom shop eventually but I would do a bit of traveling around to find the one I want.
Greg Summers, I watched the factory tour video from LSL concerning their Saticoy. They’re a small shop, and they price under the custom shop. They also hit the vintage tones that I’m looking for. I love Fender, but have been playing them forever. Thumbed you up on your amp purchase, hope to see that come to fruition. Regards!
Cool! Thanks for the info. Hope to do that amp demo soon. Just came down with something (sick) from work travel so that may get me for the weekend video shoots.
SD sounds much fuller isolated but a bit muddy. The stock wins for me at the bridge/mid setting. Overall I'd go with the stock as it just sounds more like a Strat to me. Two completely different sounds, so largely a matter of personal taste. Thanks for the video.
All stock here so I believe these are 250k from the factory but I'm not positive. Different posts from people asking the same and then getting the 250k answer. This isnt my guitar so I would have to grab it and measure them but typically single coils are 250k
I've been playing my Strat a lot lately with the factory pickups. It's a 92 American Standard. For my taste they're too thin sounding unless you give it a lot of volume if you're playing clean. I'd like to beef it up a little bit. The hot rails sound great, but they seem like a bit too much for what I think of as a 'true' clean sound. Any recommendations on something in between? I need to do something! One thing I'm wondering - could it be that the pickups have lost some of their 'juice' since they're so old? Never been a tech 'guru'. I read that sometimes pickups need to be re-magnetized, so I don't know if that's a possibility.
I'm sure there are some out there. I'm no pickup expert but most manufacturers will give you the output. For example Seymour Duncan makes a Hot Strat pickup with an output on the bridge at 15.8k compared to the Hot Rails here at 16.6k so that's pretty close for a single coil. Other brands are out there so check around.
Help!! I need help choosing between two strats. both are MIM. The first one is a Fender deluxe Stratocaster 2016, it has the button that adds the bridge pickup to the 4 and 5th position. He wants $525. The second is a 60th anniversary classic player 50's strat. it has a hot rail pickup for the bridge which I like cause im a humbucker guy. He wants 500 even. again both are mexican made guitars. ANY SUGGESTIONS???
So, personally I would look at it from a playability standpoint. Strats are highly modifiable and you could add a hot rails to the other one. Check the neck profile and fret sizes. The deluxe will have a 12” radius and modern C neck. Its going to be a fast neck for the more modern player. It will also have noiseless pickups and those are a different animal that may take getting used to but are great for medium to high gain. The 50’s strat is going to have a totally different neck. 9.5 inch radius with a soft v neck profile. All that said it’s up to you on which one you prefer but will greatly affect playability for you and is honestly is the deal breaker for me when deciding on an instrument. That’s where most of your comfort comes in. Personally I’m a more modern player so I’d buy the deluxe. But I can only provide you the specs. My tastes will be different. Good luck man!
This is the line6 g10s. I’ve since sold it. Nothing but problems unless it was line of sight. The shure glxd16 is what I replaced it with. The line 6 is super convenient but not practical for me. Too many dropouts.
Hi! Very good comparison! I'm thinking about change my bridge dimarzio area 61, and put a hot rails or jbjr. Wathching some videos I felt Hot raill too mid frequency. Did you think that hot rails was a good choice for you? How about the balance between neck single and hot rails in bridge? If you already had some experience comparing jb jr and hot rails, could you comment about? Thanks a lot!
This was just something I had laying around from a previous strat I sold. My son wanted something more like a humbucker so I put it in. Unfortunately that’s all I can tell you as I have not compared similar stacked humbuckers. It did the job and was as balanced as a hotter pickup could be...with single coils.
Hi Greg, I like your video, can you please help me, is the middle+bridge position on your Hot Rails Strat hum cancelling? Because with mine it is not, I wonder is that even possible. Thanks!
It would be halfway if anything. I’d have to check. This is my sons guitar. With the bridge and middle you are adding the single coil which is not a humbucker so I don’t see how this would be possible. You would probably have a little buzzing from that SC.
@@GregSummersMusic Thanks for the quick answer! Yes, that's what I think too, I was wondering could hum cancelling be achieved if I'd swap neck and middle single pups or would I get out of phase issue doing that. It's better to ask than put the harness and the guitar together and regret later :)....thanks mate!
I think that what you would have to do (which should work, for a hum-cancelling position) is put in a selector switch which allows you to split the bridge hot rails pickup so that you're just running the coil which hum cancels when combined with the standard middle coil pickup. So you would be back to having just two coils in that position - one from the bridge humbucker, and the one middle pickup coil, wired RW/RP to each other. You could either add that function as a separate switch (eg. Push-Pull pot), or use a more advanced pickup selector switch & incorporate that coil selection into that position on the switch. I hope that makes sense! (-:
Joel Vestli I’d have to check again. This is my son’s guitar so I would need to grab it from him but the hot rails isn’t in there right now. Should be fairly balanced though. Typical pickup height for neck is much lower than the others. Are you noticing a big volume jump in the video? I’d have to rewatch the video to see.
Would it be worth it if i replaced my stock pickups on my squier strat with hot rails? Would it make a 170 dollar guitar sound just as good as a fender strat?
Ragin' Jason pickups are a great way to upgrade your sound. Truthfully when I think of a strat I don’t think about a high gain tone. The hot rails is a great option if those are the tones you are looking for and want the single coil form factor. A lot of fenders are routed for hum single hum so you may want to check under your pickguard. I love the fender neck pickup so I personally don’t think I would put a hot rails in the neck but that’s just me.
@@GregSummersMusic i understand you're point of view and agree but I'm just trying to find out if it would sound better with the hot rails rather than the shitty stock pickups?
Well, I can only speak for the bridge hot rails. The squire would sound about the same as this video (through my equipment) if you replaced it. I’m not familiar with the stock squire pickups. My point is that the hot rails are like adding humbuckers to your guitar. It’s just different than a single coil. If you like the way this sounds then you will have similar results.
I put SD hot rail on my strat bridge ,but I lost 2rd position ,it’s very unlikely tone ,can you help me? How you wire that you still have 2rd position?
Regardless, here is the standard wiring: red and white solder together and tape. Connect them only to each other. Nothing else. Solder the green and bare wire, then solder them to the back of the pot. Solder black wire to the lug on the switch that the old one was on. Should be in line with the other 2 pickups. They are all soldered on 3 different switch lugs but all in line.
Mine was same that you said ,but the problem is that 2nd position is very very thin and without bass ,not usable ,and noisy ,so where is the problem? can you help me ?
Yea that’s going to be difficult for me to help. Sorry. My suggestion is getting in one of the Seymour Duncan forums or strat forums. Other than basic wiring I’m not very good at troubleshooting pickup issues, especially remotely. Sorry man
This is the stock 250k. I know 500 is recommended but this was just something I had laying around and my kid wanted more gain. If I had experienced muddy tone I would have looked into changing the pot but it wasn’t enough to worry about it.
cool comaprison, helpful for me lol. yea your son should just save up for a les paul or sg even and keep that beautiful strat stock. that's just my 2 cents lol! then he can get a p90 guitar, and maybe even a fancy one. that way he can get all 3 sounds but not have to try to do it all in one guitar. IMO single coil fender pickups are not really copy-able with other pickups/guitars. that's why we all need so many guitars ;) lol
Hello, i just saw this sequel of the hot rails/ stock single coil comparison, on cleans definitely worth sticking With the stock single coil, so considering cleans and distorted sounds i would leave a strat as It Is, thank you for the very informative videos!👍🏼
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that's how a comparison should be done. thank you
Glad you enjoyed the video
I bought a seymour duncan for the bridge because of your video. Nice one for the clear comparison!
Great! Let me know how it goes!
@@GregSummersMusic very well! Beefy and full! And it's nice being able to switch to the front pickups if I want that strat sound back!
@@samusordicus yes agreed...front pickups are that sound for sure.
Great video! The clean sound of Fender I have always loved. Can’t go wrong leaving it stock. I have a late 90’s American Telecaster in which I replaced both pickups with Hot Rails. Lost the tele sound, but gained something suited more towards my emotion or personality. User preference.
Yes for sure. Quick and easy way to change your tone without a new guitar and when you want to go back it's an easy swap. Thanks for watching and leaving a comment!
I prefer the hot rail on the bridge. The stock pickup sounds too thin for me. Thanks a lot for your demo.
That single-coil is what a Strat sounds like.
Yea they sound way to thin to my ears also. I definetly prefer the hot rails
@@RideAcrossTheRiver Yeah, the thin sound is what a vintage strats typically sounds like, it's also cutting through the mix better. It's meant to be played with volume and gain on the amp and with more vintage sounding pedals like muffs/fuzz etc... Stuff that wouldn't necessarily work very well with a Hot Rails imho. However I agree I do tend prefer the Hotrails sound, especially in isolation like this or with more modern distortion ("modern" like a Rat or some of the Boss OD/DS units). For years I had a Hot Rails "neck" on my bridge and I really liked it, my setup was a Twin Reverb and Boss distortion pedals. The neck pickup is a bit weaker than the bridge version, but it's also more bass heavy, so it may mud up things more (on a bridge, there's not much bass content, so you actually end up pushing the lower mids/upper bass, which is where the mud is. The bridge Hot Rails does have the same problem of being muddy, real hum buckers tend to sit a bit further from the bridge where they start getting a bit more of the frequency spectrum). I moved to an Antiquity II Surfer on my Strats, and I had to change most of my pedal setup for the new pickup. The Antiquity II Surfer is slightly hotter than the pickup in this test but is still thin and piercing as the typical bridge Strat sounds. The Hot Rails is now sitting on a very decent squier mustang :)
@@MarioTorre I got a used Tele that had a Hot Rails in the bridge. The ceramics made it sound like an ice pick coming from the speaker. It also had too much magnetic pull on the strings. So I found a new old stock Duncan Vintage Stack and put that in with my old 1990s Hot Rhythm at the neck. Damn but I love that STR-2 ... best way to describe it is a 'dark bell' tone. Not fat, but just a bit dark with a bit of ringiness. It sounds like Billy's pickup on ZZ Top's "Fool for Your Stockings".
The hot rails don’t have the higher treble eq that the singles have. But bear in mind that this is also where your 60 cycle hum is in the mix. I have hot rails in the bridge and neck in my strat and it does clean quite well. If you want the treble that badly, you can always tweak your eq. That’s what the knobs on your amp are for. The hot rails neck is not as hot as the bridge, but you get really fast, warm tone out of it. Very fluid and vocal. Kinda like the best of a single and a humbucker.
I’ve never tried the neck. Sounds like it would be a good choice.
I just commented on your other video... The hot rails has more meat and this clean demo has been really helpful. I might just do it!
Glad you found them helpful. Enjoy!
the stock sounds good for like light music like sultans of swing type stuff
This was super informative and really helped me make up my mind for modding my old strat, thank you for making this and demonstrating the difference!
Just finished installing mine in my Squier and I love it, thank you very much for the demo
You’re welcome!
Hey sir im planning to install hotrials on my reissue japan strat will it chug?
Lot meatier for being able to play more songs. I’m totally ordering one now to put in the strat
I have three Hot Rails on my strats but I wired a push-push switch to split them up, I want the punch but I still need the Strat's classic tone
yes I would have loved to do that. I've got it back to stock at the moment though. Thanks for the comment!
perfect video. back n forth clean tone, thank you !! yeah I have no use for stock strat bridge pickups. texas specials are cool.
Thanks! I’m glad that you enjoyed it.
I love the stock pu's way more, the hot rail sound harder but losing definition, the stock give that lovely fender sounds.
hotrails all the way baby!!!
The hot rails sound like a proper humbucker on a single coil slot. So I guess if you’re looking to get a humbucker punch in your strat, it’s the way to go
Yep!
Both sound good and for different applications. You can kinda get the best of both worlds with a guitar like this as you can still get twangy sounds in the in-between positions
nice vid! I have one in the middle position of an ibanez for decades & never really explored much in the middle zone... I usually am full forward for the 'round bell' sound in clean mode or the bridge for something more cutting/super-busy and anything distorted. Your A/B completely educated me on the exact 'sound' of humbuck vs single.
Glad you got something from the video. Thanks for commenting!
@Greg Summers thanks for this video, it helped me decide and differentiate between hot rail and single coil for my Fender Stratocaster. thanks bro !!!!!!
You’re welcome. Happy to help.
Great video, exactly the comparison I was looking for. 👍👍
Theres just something really pleasing to the ear with that thick seymour duncan tone that'll cut through a rock mix
Yep for sure!
Thank you for the demo!
Very welcome!
For high gain I love a hot rails in the bridge of a Strat 🎸
For all this clean stuff, I prefer the stock white lace SCs. But the hot rails is better for metal and punk. PS - there are MANY guitarists who play Strats and Teles for metal and punk.
I like the Hot Rails bridge with a push pull split option. It splits really well.
I get asked the split question quite often but never tried it. Good to know. Thanks for leaving a comment!
@@GregSummersMusic waiting to receive my seymour duncan P-rail pickups (fill size humbucker but it's actually a single hot-rail coil and a full P-90 in one pickup, wired in series like a regular humbucker). and i'm getting these fancy switches where you can split each pickup. it's called the seymour duncan triple shot. putting it in my epi les paul. hoping to mostly use the P-90 but praying i don't lose too much clarity on the humbucker mode
@@dannap8831 sounds like a great pickup with lots of versatility. I will have to look that one up.
Try an auto-split using the 5-way switch.
I've come around to the SD Lil 59 as my fav bridge pickup. Its brighter sounding than the Hot Rails and does have some quack in position 2, though not as much as a true single coil pickup. My solution to this eternal dilemma was simply to buy two Strats. One stock (but with SD SSL-2s which have to my ears much better sound than the Fender Player pickups), and the other with the Lil 59 in the bridge and SSL-2s in the middle/neck. When I truly need the quack, I just switch guitars.
Still get the quack on my Showmaster,, in position two the humbucker splits to single coil, don't know if you can with a Hot Rails.
I like them both. They both have their applications
Perfect comparison. Your a beast too. Subbed
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!
Love these pickups!
Going to put HR in my elite single coil guitar. Love the neck pickup. Miss a humbucker in the bridge. Great video! Look the way you demonstrated the difference.
Thank you!!
Love the riff at the three mins in.
Thanks!
I agree with keeping the classic strat sound with the single coil...although the HR sounds sweet. I had a MIM stratocaster that had one and it was great for metal and heavy rock...but not so much for blues. I prefer using my PRS, LP, or RG570 for the heavier stuff though, and using my Strat and Tele for blues and country..
Yep. Just get more guitars!
@@GregSummersMusic can never have too many, that is for sure
@@GregSummersMusic although my wife may beg to differ...lol
@@MikmawWarriorBrave truth
I've always wanted a bright white Stratocaster. I bought this exact model after doing some research and watching your older videos. After awhile the stock bridge checked out and just like you, I had a black Hot Rail kicking around, so I installed it. I always thought the black pickup would make the guitar look cooler, but after watching one of your videos you said the black-on-white looks odd... and that stuck with me and now I have to agree ha ha. Hopefully buy a white Hot Rail some other time or a different pickup altogether. Peace
Haha apologies for getting in your head like that! Well, my white Suhr standard came stock with a black humbucker and 2 white single coils so there's that...obviously someone likes the contrasting colors.
@@GregSummersMusic All good. Definitely a cool channel and great playing. Subbed!
Hot Rails can get some quack but a Lil '59 or JB Jr may be better because they are lower in output. Another element of strat quack is that most strat single coils are alnico which are not only lower output than ceramics by nature but are also a bit sweeter.
Nice video! Great comparison.
Love the HOT RAILS!!!!
Awesome demo... A+ thinking about swapping out pickup
Glad you enjoyed watching it. One of the easiest and cheapest upgrades on a guitar to improve tone (or make it worse depending on pickup lol)
Awesome job with the comparison video, Greg. I love the Hot Rails pickups in some guitars, but for me it's definitely a different beast entirely from a classic stock Strat pickup sound. I have had good results with the Duncan Classic Stack Plus (STK-S4b) in this scenario, where the pickups are noiseless but retain more of the classic single-coil proper Strat tone. Fattens up nicely with some fuzz and grit added but nowhere near as noisy as those stock pickups get in that situation. Keep up the good work man, cheers!
Yea if it was my strat I’d swap out the entire set but I’m liking the classic one back in personally.
The hot rails in the bridge sound like a neck pickup... I think you need a brighter pickup if u want 3 pickups to give u a huge diversity in the sound
If you are playing on the bridge alone go with the hot rails but if your are playing in combo with the other pickups like bridge and middle is go with the single coil
Yes definitely like the single coil bridge and middle combo rather than HR and middle together. ;-)
The hotrails clean sound is very similar to the stock bridge and middle mix. Dont need a hotrail at all in the cleans i guess
Nothing wrong with the stock pick up. I, however, prefer the hot rails on the bridge. Just my opinion.
It’s definitely great to have options
awesome video! really great for me now that im trying to build a guitar and wondering if i should use hot rails or humbuckers
The only real problem that I have with the hot rails is the leap in volume when switching from the single coils when playing the guitar to the hot rails.
Wow! What a difference!
Hot Rails. I have an SSS Strat and am getting Hot Rail put in the Bridge position.
The single coil does not work for what I want to do which is heavier music
Yes for sure a great option (and inexpensive) to turn your strat into a heavier sounding guitar
Stock is clear and articulate. Gotta know how to play it. I prefer the stock pickup. Way more dynamic range.
I’ve gotten more comfortable over the last year with single coils. Personally I’m not a huge fan of the hot rails in this situation probably due to my playing style changing over the years.
The hot rails really is extremely neutral sounding. Very different to a traditional humbucker to my ears. I'm undecided whether that's a good thing in general but I think it will work well for 80s style sounds og very high gain or "straight to the PA" style cleans. I don't think it pairs particularly well with the stock pups because the difference in output and chime is so high it's almost jarring when switching between positions. Maybe some modern noiseless pickups would pair better with it on a strat. Maybe even a HSH type setup with another hot rails in the neck.
Agree totally. He’s enjoying having it back to stock and working with the regular single coil. Thanks for the comment!
Un position 2 the timbre changed slightly but it’s still sounding as a strat however it loses the sparkle aspect it’s not shiny anymore ! Difficult to say if it’s a strat on a record, In that case even the bridge tone knob becomes kinda useless !
Still delivering a Great tone!!! Nice humbucker.
Yes you will lose that quack for the most part in position 2. If I wired the hotrails parallel with the coil split, I could probably get some of that back. My son has kept this guitar original for now. Probably not putting the HR back in it.
I think I'm going to get one for my player plus strat. I thought I'd have more uses for the bright single coil in the bridge, and I use it, but not as much as I'd use a humbucker. I still would rather replace it with a hot rail, single coil sized pickup, rather than buying a strat that comes with a fender humbucker. Strats are famous for modding, so I'm actually pretty excited to become part of that tradition. It's my favorite guitar that I've ever owned and I think customizing it to my personal tastes will make it even more like my own thing. I might buy a second strat and leave the bridge pickup in there someday, that way I can have both options, but this is my plan for now.
There are definitely other stacked humbucker options so you don’t necessarily have to jump on this one. Check out their Little 59 as well.
Strat stock bridge pickup just needs to go through a compressor and it will give you all the needed mids and punch when clean. For dirty a good OD pedal takes care of the bridge
Great tips! Thanks!
Thank you, that was a really concise comparison. I'm for either single coil or full size Humbucker, but the position 2 in the demo sounds really great with the hot rails
Lately I can get along with either SC or humbucker. My gigs have changed to church only so find I can really get some great stuff that was out of my harder rock genre before. I have other choices so it’s easy enough to grab what I need when I need it.
I thought the hot rails can be wired to coil split. Wouldn't that still make the 2nd positions have that quack? (btw, 2nd position with high gain is my fav overdrive Strat sound).
When using noiseless or hot rails pickups can you use the Headrush pedalboard to dial in the Strat or Tele sound tone your looking for?
Been out of the game for a long time. Still have my VERY first guitar: a 1995 American Standard Strat my mom and uncle bought for me waaayyy back in 1996. EVERY guitar after that was either a Gibson Explorer, V or Jackson. I always hated how weak the Strat single was in the bridge. Now that Im 36 and want to get back into it, I dont have a lot of cash to spend on guitar gear. Ill be interested in hearing how my Strat sounds with a Hot Rail in the bridge to a Boss Wazu Craft SD-1 for boost into a 1996 Fender Champ 110 with a Celestion Ten 30 speaker upgrade.
I'm learning to gel better with the stock single coil bridge. The tone control is important for some of them to get rid of that high end, but I am enjoying some lower gain stuff lately so it's easier to work with now. The hot rails is a good option, although if I had it my way I'd slap a full humbucker in there, but it's not my guitar.
Hi i usually play mostly metal but i love to play other softer genres also and i planing to build stratocaster guitar(not owning it yet) with bridge hot rails for metal rhythm and solos, i also usually tend to use neck humbuckers for soloing for warmer sound on mine hh ibanez(i don't own any single coil gutar, i use to have sss squier but back then i didn't really know how guitar works at all xD), so my question does neck single coil strat pickup has good response to higher gains for metal or should i also replace it with hotrails? i would leave middle one stock for great straty sound and amazing cleans. I like versatility on guitars.
There are going to be benefits to each type. The single coil neck will have more clarity but less gain typically but there are so many pickup outputs and models that it’s hard for me to recommend something in particular. Personally I like single coil clarity in the neck pickup and will just boost it a little more during solo sections if I need to. I haven’t tried the hot rails in the neck position so I can’t speak for that one. Honestly I don’t have a ton of experience with all the different models of pickups and I don’t do a lot of swapping out. Generally I’ve just had a bunch of guitars for different variations. I use to have an Ernie ball luke 3 that was an HSS model. Those single coils were awesome and that guitar had a boost circuit built into the volume knob that was very cool.
Finally a video that answers the question.. hit rail all the way
Try an SSL6 custom flat in the bridge best of both worlds.
Or the SSL5 which is the staggered version.
And blend well with the other pickups.
Thanks for the suggestion and thanks for leaving a comment. The original pickup is back in here but would be cool to experiment some more.
I love Seymour Duncan hot rails on the bridge position can play rock blues and heavy metal
Hi guys,
Could any tell me how good splitting a HR sounds compared to an actual single coil?
I have a strat and would like a hotter pickup in the bridge but that being said it’s a strat at the end of the day.
HOT RAILS 🔥🔥🔥 & if you happen to have any spare ones lying around please insert those as well in the near future 👍👍👍
Yea, I'd like to do more of these. Just don't have any more single coils around :-(
I kind like the hot rails. Did you change any pots or caps when you added them?
I was going buy a PRS but too pricey. So I'm going to get a Mexican strat and put Seymour Duncan in it ....now hearing the hot rails....hot rails for bridge and JB Jr for neck and middle and still have money left over 👍❗️
Yes they are great guitars to upgrade for sure
Thank you so much for those videos they really help Thanks dude
You’re welcome!
@@GregSummersMusic bro I just bought that pick up after watching you GREETINGS FROM EL SALVADOR
Awesome! Hope you enjoy it! Greetings! Thanks for taking time to leave a comment ;-)
I actually prefer single coil in bridge for clean sound..But for rock n roll and metal distorted sound, hot rails sounded much better.. Is it possible to get single coil sized hambucker like HotRails but add coil split? so you can get best of both worlds?
Yes from what I read, you can split this. Not sure how it sounds but it’s possible.
Great video!! I just installed a Hot Rails bridge and for some reason the stock pock up sounds much better. Maybe i installed it wrong. Green and bare wire is soldered to the volume and the white and red soldered together and taped off. The black wire is soldered to the switch board. What do you think?
Sounds like you have it installed correctly. Black should be at the front outermost lug.
Can you pls help me. ,how did u install the wiring from the Hotrail mine sounds soo thin ..HELP
Like the stock set, but would consider a replacement set of single coils. The Strat sound is unique to the instrument, I played them for many years exclusively. All my early guitars were Fender or Squire and I learned a lot by tearing them apart and having customs built. 25 years before I bought a Gibson, and I still miss having a Strat around. You have all the essentials in your collection, so a genuine Strat is a keeper. Maple neck, that guitar is quintessential Fender Stratocaster. Thanks for the video Greg!
Agreed. I'm not a big fan of the stock pups but this is my kids guitar and he's not at a place where he can tell the difference. One day i may pick up another strat. I sold my american last year when I got the axe fx. I let it go for way too low but I wasn't a huge fan of the neck anyway. Would love to have something from the custom shop eventually but I would do a bit of traveling around to find the one I want.
Greg Summers, I watched the factory tour video from LSL concerning their Saticoy. They’re a small shop, and they price under the custom shop. They also hit the vintage tones that I’m looking for. I love Fender, but have been playing them forever. Thumbed you up on your amp purchase, hope to see that come to fruition. Regards!
Cool! Thanks for the info. Hope to do that amp demo soon. Just came down with something (sick) from work travel so that may get me for the weekend video shoots.
SD sounds much fuller isolated but a bit muddy. The stock wins for me at the bridge/mid setting. Overall I'd go with the stock as it just sounds more like a Strat to me. Two completely different sounds, so largely a matter of personal taste. Thanks for the video.
Well said! Thanks for the comment. I’m with you as well for stock.
Or just get a push pull pot to split the Hot Rails.
is that a 250k or 500k volume pots? gonna change my bridge to a hotrails soon.
All stock here so I believe these are 250k from the factory but I'm not positive. Different posts from people asking the same and then getting the 250k answer. This isnt my guitar so I would have to grab it and measure them but typically single coils are 250k
I've been playing my Strat a lot lately with the factory pickups. It's a 92 American Standard. For my taste they're too thin sounding unless you give it a lot of volume if you're playing clean. I'd like to beef it up a little bit. The hot rails sound great, but they seem like a bit too much for what I think of as a 'true' clean sound. Any recommendations on something in between? I need to do something! One thing I'm wondering - could it be that the pickups have lost some of their 'juice' since they're so old? Never been a tech 'guru'. I read that sometimes pickups need to be re-magnetized, so I don't know if that's a possibility.
Check out the Seymour Duncan Cool Rails. They’re the same design as the Hot Rails but not quite as hot, they should be a good in between on the two.
I want the sound of a single coil and the output of the 2rail
I'm sure there are some out there. I'm no pickup expert but most manufacturers will give you the output. For example Seymour Duncan makes a Hot Strat pickup with an output on the bridge at 15.8k compared to the Hot Rails here at 16.6k so that's pretty close for a single coil. Other brands are out there so check around.
Duncan Quarter Pounder in the bridge is a monster
Help!! I need help choosing between two strats. both are MIM. The first one is a Fender deluxe Stratocaster 2016, it has the button that adds the bridge pickup to the 4 and 5th position. He wants $525. The second is a 60th anniversary classic player 50's strat. it has a hot rail pickup for the bridge which I like cause im a humbucker guy. He wants 500 even. again both are mexican made guitars. ANY SUGGESTIONS???
So, personally I would look at it from a playability standpoint. Strats are highly modifiable and you could add a hot rails to the other one. Check the neck profile and fret sizes. The deluxe will have a 12” radius and modern C neck. Its going to be a fast neck for the more modern player. It will also have noiseless pickups and those are a different animal that may take getting used to but are great for medium to high gain. The 50’s strat is going to have a totally different neck. 9.5 inch radius with a soft v neck profile. All that said it’s up to you on which one you prefer but will greatly affect playability for you and is honestly is the deal breaker for me when deciding on an instrument. That’s where most of your comfort comes in. Personally I’m a more modern player so I’d buy the deluxe. But I can only provide you the specs. My tastes will be different. Good luck man!
Nice vid! What wireless transmitter/receiver are you using?
This is the line6 g10s. I’ve since sold it. Nothing but problems unless it was line of sight. The shure glxd16 is what I replaced it with. The line 6 is super convenient but not practical for me. Too many dropouts.
Nice video! Did you have to change the pots as well?
No. This pickup is designed to be a drop in with the factory 250K pot.
Can you split the coils on the HR?
Yes you should be able to. I didn’t on this one though.
hot rails for sure I'm gonna buy one ASAP.
Awesome! Good luck. 👍🏼
Hi! Very good comparison! I'm thinking about change my bridge dimarzio area 61, and put a hot rails or jbjr. Wathching some videos I felt Hot raill too mid frequency. Did you think that hot rails was a good choice for you? How about the balance between neck single and hot rails in bridge? If you already had some experience comparing jb jr and hot rails, could you comment about?
Thanks a lot!
This was just something I had laying around from a previous strat I sold. My son wanted something more like a humbucker so I put it in. Unfortunately that’s all I can tell you as I have not compared similar stacked humbuckers. It did the job and was as balanced as a hotter pickup could be...with single coils.
I guess I'm in the small group that prefers the single coil. Hot rails sound too muddy to me.
I love the stock pickup as well. I’ve grown into single coils over the last couple years.
Hi Greg, I like your video, can you please help me, is the middle+bridge position on your Hot Rails Strat hum cancelling? Because with mine it is not, I wonder is that even possible. Thanks!
It would be halfway if anything. I’d have to check. This is my sons guitar. With the bridge and middle you are adding the single coil which is not a humbucker so I don’t see how this would be possible. You would probably have a little buzzing from that SC.
@@GregSummersMusic
Thanks for the quick answer! Yes, that's what I think too, I was wondering could hum cancelling be achieved if I'd swap neck and middle single pups or would I get out of phase issue doing that. It's better to ask than put the harness and the guitar together and regret later :)....thanks mate!
I think that what you would have to do (which should work, for a hum-cancelling position) is put in a selector switch which allows you to split the bridge hot rails pickup so that you're just running the coil which hum cancels when combined with the standard middle coil pickup.
So you would be back to having just two coils in that position - one from the bridge humbucker, and the one middle pickup coil, wired RW/RP to each other.
You could either add that function as a separate switch (eg. Push-Pull pot), or use a more advanced pickup selector switch & incorporate that coil selection into that position on the switch.
I hope that makes sense!
(-:
@@EvLoutonian
Thanks, in the end I guess I'll just use it like it is, rith all the hum, after all it is a Strat.
Thank you very informative
Wish you would have used some distortion pedals
Look in the video description. There is the first video that has what you want. People complained they wish I did clean lol so I did this one.
are the hot rails noiseless?
My man is playing ocean size for the first clean demo LOL
My man delivering a confusing comment
Is this without the split in position 2? Meanings theres no hum cancel in 2?
No split. Just full hotrails and middle in position 2
Hi! Loved the comparison. I was just wondering.. is the volume very different between the stock neck and middle and the hot rail? Thanks.
Joel Vestli I’d have to check again. This is my son’s guitar so I would need to grab it from him but the hot rails isn’t in there right now. Should be fairly balanced though. Typical pickup height for neck is much lower than the others. Are you noticing a big volume jump in the video? I’d have to rewatch the video to see.
There is very good and balansed volumes in the video. I just asked because i am installing a hot rails in my bridge. My neck and middle is stock.
Joel Vestli oh ok. Yea I don’t recall anything unbalanced. Just more gain from that hot rails of course, but not volume necessarily
Would it be worth it if i replaced my stock pickups on my squier strat with hot rails? Would it make a 170 dollar guitar sound just as good as a fender strat?
Ragin' Jason pickups are a great way to upgrade your sound. Truthfully when I think of a strat I don’t think about a high gain tone. The hot rails is a great option if those are the tones you are looking for and want the single coil form factor. A lot of fenders are routed for hum single hum so you may want to check under your pickguard. I love the fender neck pickup so I personally don’t think I would put a hot rails in the neck but that’s just me.
@@GregSummersMusic i understand you're point of view and agree but I'm just trying to find out if it would sound better with the hot rails rather than the shitty stock pickups?
Well, I can only speak for the bridge hot rails. The squire would sound about the same as this video (through my equipment) if you replaced it. I’m not familiar with the stock squire pickups. My point is that the hot rails are like adding humbuckers to your guitar. It’s just different than a single coil. If you like the way this sounds then you will have similar results.
"He wants to be Jimi Hendrix but he can't relate to single coils."
stock pickups for mellower playing styles, sd for aggressive playing.
Differences between Di Marzio Chopper and Hot Rails?
alejandro sabatini I’ve never tried the dimarzio. Sorry
I put SD hot rail on my strat bridge ,but I lost 2rd position ,it’s very unlikely tone ,can you help me? How you wire that you still have 2rd position?
You have no sound from second position or is it just that it doesn’t sound right?
Regardless, here is the standard wiring:
red and white solder together and tape. Connect them only to each other. Nothing else.
Solder the green and bare wire, then solder them to the back of the pot.
Solder black wire to the lug on the switch that the old one was on. Should be in line with the other 2 pickups. They are all soldered on 3 different switch lugs but all in line.
Mine was same that you said ,but the problem is that 2nd position is very very thin and without bass ,not usable ,and noisy ,so where is the problem? can you help me ?
Yea that’s going to be difficult for me to help. Sorry. My suggestion is getting in one of the Seymour Duncan forums or strat forums. Other than basic wiring I’m not very good at troubleshooting pickup issues, especially remotely. Sorry man
Greg Summers I soldered green and bare wire to the top of volume pot ,can it be the problem?
With the hotrail, did you change the pot to 500k or left the stock 250k?
This is the stock 250k. I know 500 is recommended but this was just something I had laying around and my kid wanted more gain. If I had experienced muddy tone I would have looked into changing the pot but it wasn’t enough to worry about it.
1:18 1:40
2:00 2:21
2:42 3:02
If u want almost the same sound on clean, put a vol pot 500k
Alone, Hotrails; +middle, stock.
I'm going to buy a hot rails bridge pickup for my strat I prefer the hot rails tone
-for me, I prefer the fuller sound of the hotrails
Hot coils, just watched the other video. I can’t believe how versatile this guitar is and your playing really shows it 👍🏻
Yes it’s a really great guitar for the money for sure!
cool comaprison, helpful for me lol. yea your son should just save up for a les paul or sg even and keep that beautiful strat stock. that's just my 2 cents lol! then he can get a p90 guitar, and maybe even a fancy one. that way he can get all 3 sounds but not have to try to do it all in one guitar. IMO single coil fender pickups are not really copy-able with other pickups/guitars. that's why we all need so many guitars ;) lol
Yep this one is back to stock and has been for a while. He bought his own les Paul a while ago. He’s got his own little collection.
@@GregSummersMusic oh sweet! He's doing it right then!
Hello, i just saw this sequel of the hot rails/ stock single coil comparison, on cleans definitely worth sticking With the stock single coil, so considering cleans and distorted sounds i would leave a strat as It Is, thank you for the very informative videos!👍🏼
Awesome thanks again for checking them out and leaving your feedback! I agree with you for stock.
I rather stock pickups, if you got for humbuckers, you are killing the strat magic sound