Pearly Gates vs Pearly Gates Plus

  • Thread starter Thread starter notCardio
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notCardio

I walk the line
Anyone ever able to do a side-by-side with these?

The Plus, besides the coil tap, have different magnets, otherwise it'd be a no brainer. The PG has Alnico II, the Plus Alnico V.

I know that generally you'd find the PG in an LP, and the Plus in a Strat, but I'd consider that less important tone-wise than the magnet type.

So if anyone's had any experience with both, please chime in. I don't want to blow a bunch of money on a Plus, only to find out that it doesn't even resemble a standard PG.

Thanks.
 
I've never played them back to back (and, evidently, never played a regular Pearly Gates, since my experience has just been with the Pearly Gates Plus that ships in Strats), but it sounds like they're quite different. From Seymour Duncan's site:

The Pearly Gates is rather different than the "Pearly Gates Plus" that is on various Fender instruments including the Lone Star StratT®, Fat Strat, Big Apple Strat and some Showmaster® guitars. The Pearly Gates Plus is only available on select Fender guitars or from Fender dealers. The main difference in these pickups is that a Pearly Gates has Alnico II magnets, while the Pearly Gates Plus has Alnico V magnets. Alnico V magnets tend to give a brighter, glassier tone, while Alnico II magnets tend to have a warmer, rounder, more mid-rangier tone. The closest pickup available in our regular line to a Pearly Gates Plus is a '59 Model with 4-conductor cable. The '59 is an Alnico V pickup with a wind very close to that of the Pearly Gates Plus. The '59 usually comes in single conductor cable, but it can be ordered with the 4-Conductor wiring option.
Click to expand...

Also, much as I hate to post a Harmony Central link, there's a lot of good discussion here:

Pearly Gates vs Pearly Gates Plus in a Strat
 
Thanks. I don't know how I missed that part on the '59 comparison when I looked at the sight. I'll check out the HC thing, too. I've been wondering how significant the tonal difference would be between an 'F' spaced pickup and a regular. I might want the 'warmer' regular PG in my strat, or I might want the coil-tapping capability in the LP or something else.
 
After reading that HC thread, and the pissing match that the 'Gibson pickups' thread has become, I've come to the conclusion that, unless you can hear it, pickup opinions are so subjective as to be almost useless.
 
notCardio said:
I've been wondering how significant the tonal difference would be between an 'F' spaced pickup and a regular. I might want the 'warmer' regular PG in my strat, or I might want the coil-tapping capability in the LP or something else.
Click to expand...

It shouldn't make much of a tonal difference, if any. IIRC, the E to E polepiece spacing is 53mm on an F spaced and 50 on a non, so from the centerline the low and high strings are going to be 1.5mm further out from the center than each polepiece underneath. Strings move MUCH farther than that as you bend notes, and eyeballing the polepiece size on the Dimarzio AT1 in the bridge of my Strat, it looks like they're maybe 4 1/2mm wide anyway, so if a non-F spaced pickup throws your alignment off 1.5mm on the outer edges, you're still going to be maybe .75mm from the edge of the polepiece - not centered, but still comfortably over the pole. I've never tried this myself, but I know guys who have who insist the difference is purely cosmetic and they can't hear a difference between F and non-F versions of the same pickup in the same guitar.
 
Well, I went ahead and pulled the trigger on a PG Plus. Actually, it's a Lonestar setup, a PG Plus and two Texas Specials. I won't be able to do anything with it for a couple of weeks, but it should be fun once I get 'em in there. I'm a big old-school ZZ Top fan, so this should be right up my alley in that department.
 
Nice! I've got a pair of Texas Specials in the mail to me at the moment as well, to go with the Dimarzio Andy Timmons in the bridge of my Strat. We should have reasonably similar setups when everything's said and done. :)
 
I'd like to try my '70s Super Distortion in it, but someone cut the legs off of it. Oh well, this will be fun for a while.
 
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