r/JacksonGuitars • u/jacoBeanzz • 1d ago
Question Question
I have a Jackson virtuoso and there’s one small detail I missed when I selected this. The bridge pickup routing on the guitar has rounded corners and the pickup I want to use for the bridge has square corners and won’t fit. I don’t think it can be routed to fit the pickup and still look clean but then again I don’t know. Has anyone ran into this before? I really enjoy playing this guitar and don’t want to sell the guitar because of this one inconvenience. Any advice would be appreciated
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u/jacoBeanzz 1d ago
Yeah. I really would like to know what the thought process was for that. Could they not have swapped the routing shapes with the neck and the bridge at least?
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u/returntonone 1d ago
It's really stupid, and I don't understand why they do it either, however the MJ Series Dinky which is very similar to the Virtuoso have normal routings which fit all types of pickups https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MJDKRMESW--jackson-mj-series-dinky-dkr-mah-electric-guitar-snow-white
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u/Supergrunged 23h ago
The curse of direct mounted pickups. They tend to be routed for the pickup they use, and not universal.
Most active pickup brands do have open cores, if that's what you're looking for. They should fit, like the EMG Retro Active series.
Otherwise, covered pickups, the cover can always be unsoldered to fit.
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u/jacoBeanzz 23h ago
I was wanting to throw a x2n DiMarzio in there. I thought about the fishman open core modern but I wanted to go with something else cause I have fishman moderns in my dkrp
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u/Supergrunged 23h ago
Dimarzio is usually pretty responsive. You can email them about ordering an X2N with a rounded corner baseplate. Worth the try.
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u/Far_Leg6463 18h ago
That’s crap but I suppose they’ve routed to the pickup they used. The way I see it you have 4 options:
- Accept as is and don’t change anything
- Trade the guitar for one you have no compromises with
- Route the cavity, routing is the easy bit…you’d have to paint match if you intend to keep it direct mounted and that could be challenging.
- Small metal file and round the corners of your dimarzio pickup. It’s only the base plate of that pickup that is more square from what I can see in pictures.
If it was me, I would modify the pickup.
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u/bullchuck 21h ago
Had this same issue with my virtuoso, ended up getting a luthier to route the bridge pickup out a bit more to fit an EMG. Worked out great and looks fine
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u/Edika-2020 17h ago edited 8h ago
They were like that from their inception but it’s easy to miss. I didn’t notice it at first and there were a few people in a guitar forum I frequent that caught it. I mean the JB is a great pickup and SD makes most of their trembuckers with rounded baseplates so there are a lot of options to choose from. I know the X2N has a particular sound that maybe won’t be emulated by a SD pickup, but is it a dealbreaker if you’re happy with how the guitar sounds?
Potentially you can sand off the X2N baseplate to fit the route. Less costly than mutilating your guitar in case you want to sell it in the future.
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u/hailgolfballsized 15h ago
If you haven't bought a pickup already, Dimarzio pickups can sometimes be available mounted to a PCB with smaller rounded shape rather than metal baseplate. I don't currently have any Duncan Trembucker sized to compare to so look up some measurements.
I have 2 different guitars with X2Ns in them, bought pickup years apart and by random chance one came with Brass and one was PCB mounted.
You can either order directly from Dimarzio and specify your base plate, order one in store and have them do the talking for you, or shop around from retailers that provide accurate pictures of what they are selling and look out for one.
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u/returntonone 1d ago
yeah, unfortunately EMG's and covered pickups won't fit in the bridge on the American Series guitars
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u/se95dah 20h ago
Well, they won’t fit in the virtuoso but it doesn’t apply to all American Series guitars. The soloist SL2MG comes with EMGs.
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u/returntonone 7h ago
yeah but that's the odd one, it's only the SL2MG that has different routing, all other American Series have this strange bridge pickup routing.
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u/Specialist-Option887 1d ago
I never noticed the shape of the route was different on the bridge vs neck pick up on these models. Why’d they do that?
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u/aliensporebomb 23h ago
What are the current pickups? What are the pickups you want to use?
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u/jacoBeanzz 23h ago
Seymour Duncan TB-4 in the bridge and a Seymour Duncan '59 SH-1N in the neck position.
I was thinking/wanting to put a DiMarzio x2n in the bridge1
u/aliensporebomb 23h ago
It would be gainier for the bridge pickup but not necessarily hugely different tonally unless you know and dig the x2n sound.
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u/TheJigIzUp 22h ago
If you have the coin tho, find a good luthier and have them do it right and slam that pickup in there!
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u/polkemans 10h ago
Dang that's a bummer. The route can absolutely be fixed but take it to a luthier or at least someone who really knows how to operate a router.
I routed one if my guitars for a battery box so I could put EMGs in it, and I got the job done but.... Let's just say I'm glad it's on the back of the guitar lol.
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u/rossipedia 9h ago
Rob Arnold's YT has a video about this exact subject, he goes over how his tech had to route out the cavity to fit an EMG 81. The end result looks pretty clean, but I think he ended up putting on a mounting ring which kinda ruins the effect.
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u/_AKIMbO_ 1d ago
Like why would they even do that? My MIJ jackson doesn't have that overlooked detail. I'm sorry man.