Congratulations Tip, On your addiction and your overdose. There is a one a day rule for PRS guitars.
Your comments Sound familiar with my observations too.
It's rare that a guitar gives you tones that you appreciate and surprise with very little work, As I usually have to work a fair amount to coax the tones from the guitar.
Yes indeed those low output pickups have some amazing character with that 24.594 Inch scale
3/32" longer makes such a difference.
The other thing that I forgot to mention was how much I love the jumbo frets. I have had to re-fret so many guitars with jumbos. I definitely struggle with small frets, these flattened down leveled jumbos are PRS's genius again at work.
I've already decided that the 59/09 is going to have to come back out. It's definitely a very workable Combination though, The middle position is interesting, a very stereo effect, you can literally hear the 2 pickups trying to blend with each other. It is an opportunity for unique string muting dynamiics. I actually think that was a great part of the magic of the previous set up, the 2 identical pickups Sensing different parts of the string created the very interesting tonal synergy (telecaster like).
So I think MA Pete Has a very good idea With putting the high winds, i.e. identical 58/15's in both positions, Can't wait to hear how that goes.
While it is quite Impressive and satisfying on the high gain channel, I feel like I gave up too much of that character you just described. I've tried the 59/09 (output resistance 9.24 k ohms) in about 3 or 4 different positions raising and lowering the pickup, to see if I can get some of the low gain pick dynamics back. The single coil is okay, Very solid, (Played The Who I can see for miles and miles very authentically) the LT however is borderline spectacular. Rolling the volume down on the 59/09 not nearly as satisfying as the LT, It seems like some of the important mids disappear. This is a classic case of gaining value at one end of the spectrum while losing value on the other end. It's a tough decision, I feel like I've improved it on one hand and then I dial it down a little feel like oh I lost a little on the other hand. I don't want to get too far away from the designers intent for this guitar. So I've ordered the 85/15 that should be a much closer match to the neck pickup. 7.8 k ohms
It seems to be the classic problem of a higher gain pickup, it compresses the volume and tone, the pick attack is muted. I do have to admit that I was able to add some sparkle back in with my exotic effects EP booster, it actually seems to save the pickup, Some of the pick attack comes back. I'm re-learning that one guitar Cannot do everything under the sun, I've learned it 23 times. I do want to let this guitar Do what it does Best use it for the range it performs best in. Let the God of thunder do what it does best. So I should get the 85/15's this weekend.
See if that compromise works, I have no problem putting the LT back in. There are some real magic tones in there.
So I saw somebody was already putting dibs on the 58/15LT, but I think I better keep it, for a while anyway.