active fender jazz 5: single pole pickup question

thumbot · #1 01-24-2011, 09:17 PM

Came across a good price for a mid- or early 2000 fender jazz v, active eq, great condition. but it has stock pickups that are single poles. i couldn't find online info about it, and fender appears to be solely doing the more traditional pups now. anyone know about those single pole pups? ...a failed fender experiment?
thanks!

pyrohr · #2 01-25-2011, 06:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thumbot

Came across a good price for a mid- or early 2000 fender jazz v, active eq, great condition. but it has stock pickups that are single poles. i couldn't find online info about it, and fender appears to be solely doing the more traditional pups now. anyone know about those single pole pups? ...a failed fender experiment?
thanks!

The pups you have were modeled after the John Suhr noiseless pups that were installed after 1998 when he left Fender. The MIA basses had a Suhr pre and pups installed between 96-98 and changed to "noiseless" Fender pups after that. MIM basses got the pups modeled after the Suhr's but they are good but not the same, neither is the pre-amp compared to the MIA bass. Still a great bass as I still have my MIM dlz jazz but sold my MIA98 dlx because of financial issues.

thumbot · #3 01-25-2011, 06:08 PM

hey pyrohr

thanks much for that insight. i might be able to hunt more info on that online now. i am especially curious to learn if the suhr design is more or less of the "jazz" tone, w/ the scooped mids. i play a sadowsky 4 (fretted) and 5 (fretless), and was wondering if the single pole is less or more in that direction compared to the double pole.

later

Brendan5 · #4 01-26-2011, 01:09 AM

The single pole are regarded as better than the double. The preamp that came with them is too. I had one and it sounded great. I don't know about scooped mids per se, but the mid control definitely worked on the preamp. I like mids so I kept it pretty much pegged. I too sold mine cause I needed the money, but I wasn't in love with the fat neck it had. If I buy another one I will go for the old single poles. Noiseless don't get much love, and they are just a copy of the real thing anyway.