Potential Neck Replacement PUP

[mitchewr]

So, I have one of the new PRS Se 245s. I absolutely love the guitar. Best value I've ever purchased. When I first got it, it came with the factory 9s and was setup perfectly- intonation and action was beautiful. Also, the neck pickup was sweet when playing on the clean channel on my Alchemist. However, I felt that the drive was lacking, being that the strings were 9s, so I had my luthier set it up for 10s and add a push pull tone pot on the neck pickup. Now the bridge pup is fine and sounds great with the 10s, but the neck sounds too thick and muddy, unless I activate the coil tap. It's no longer chimey =( I've tried raising the action and raising/lowering the pup, but I just can't get the same sound I was getting before.

So I turn to you all.

Has anyone else out there swapped out the neck pup on their SE with a different/ "better" PRS pup that could alleviate my issue? Your experience & knowledge is requested.

OR, am I just out of luck due to the difference of the strings thickness?

 

[Mikegarveyblues]

I swapped my neck pup for a Bare Knuckle Mule (Bridge for a Suhr Doug Aldrich after disliking the bridge Mule). It's setup with 10's but I'd have to say my Mule is thicker sounding than the stock SE245 pup. Not muddy though. I didn't experience any muddiness with the stock Se245 pups at all with 10's.

Nothing you can do with the EQ's of any pedals / amp?

I don't, personally, have any experience with US PRS pups so there's nothing I could recommend. Id do everything you can to see if you can get some more high end with the stock pups just so you save yourself from disappointment / cost.

May be worth temporarily going back to 9's and seeing what the difference is. See if it sounds as you remembered.

 

[John Beef]

Every guitar seems to be different. I've had a few guitars where I'd struggle to get a non-muddy tone from the neck pickup - namely a Mira I used to have, but my current Mira has one of the brightest neck pickup tones I've ever gotten from a humbucker guitar with the stock Mira pickup. Same model, same pickups, totally different neck pickup responses (the bridge pickups sound pretty similar).

I don't know if the stock SE245 pickups come with a coil split wire, did the tech add that for you? It's possible something changed unexpectedly while the pickup was disassembled if so.

 

[mitchewr]

The tech did add the split coil for me, so I suppose that could have something to do with it. I could try bumping up the treble and reducing the lows, but treb is already 75% up an the bright switch is on. If I did go back to 9s, then I'd need to get a new nut put in as I've already had the slots widened.

 

[vchizzle]

You should be able to switch back to 9's with no ill effect from the widened nut slots. I've had good luck using a Duncan Jazz pickup in the neck. They are pretty clear and brighter sounding in my experience.

 

[jfb]

I have never switched pickups in anything. I am usually quite satisfied with stock stuff.