PICKUP REVOLUTION !
The new Ultimate Lo-Impedance Pickups by Cees Bakker "Guitarplus Magazine."
Is Joh Lang of Langcaster Guitars, the new guitar pickup Guru?
Well it certainly looks that way! It started 5 years ago when Joh wasn't satisfied with the quality of existing famous pickups which he used in his handcrafted guitars. So he started developing his own state of the art pickups. Within one year he introduced his noiseless single coil Langcaster pickups with integrated PC board base in a 6 and 8 pole configuration. The 8 pole pickup design eliminated signal loss with string bending where the string is usually pushed away from the magnet pole. His pickups were installed in the unique Langcaster Swamp Kauri guitars. Swamp Kauri is a 35,000-year-old native hardwood which is used for expensive furniture but it now appears to be an excellent material for guitars and basses. Langcaster instruments became an instant success in the USA and also in Europe since the end of 2003.
Now Joh is an innovator, and inventor. So he knew the drawbacks of high impedance pickups, even his own, having signal and frequency loss because of the cable between guitar and amplifier and winding capacitance. He also noted that most guitarists used stomp boxes to obtain their overdrive sound. Last year Mr. Lang decided to develop a solution for both problems. Signal losses from guitar cables can minimized with a low impedance buffer amplifier in the guitar. A transformer can do this too, but there are certain losses in transformers. So Langcaster started at the front end: the pickups. After countless experiments with magnets, wire gauges and techniques, Joh Lang created his Langcaster Ultimate Lo pickups and these are truly revolutionary.
Not only do they have a low resistance of around 100 Ohms, but they can also be made as a completely noiseless humbucking pickup in a single coil housing. Normal coil resistance's are around 6,000 ohms. The inductance that those coils have is around 3 Henrys which is a very high impedance getting higher as the frequency rises. The new pickups have less than a hundredth of the inductance of the old high impedance ones. This extends the range of response and self-resonance is in the supersonic range at over 56 KHz. The result is a pure clear, crisp and open sound with no restriction or muddiness. The use of a 100 mt guitar cable and no! loss in treble is no problem !.
The next step was the development of an appropriate low noise preamplifier and a natural sounding overdrive circuit that would fit into the guitar cavity. After numerous and painstaking experiments, Joh Lang created an onboard overdrive, the Ultimate Drive, that is fully adjustable with the characteristics of a tube driven amp. As a bonus Joh integrated ( Optional) a red LED, which flashes when strings are picked in overdrive mode. The brightness of this LED indicates the picking force. This preamp was designed for a maximum dynamic range with an output capability of 2.5 Volts RMS and with a very low current consumption of only 450 microamps for a long battery life. For example, a PROCELL Alkaline battery with a capacity of 580mAH should last at least 1000 hours of continuous playing time. The battery is only connected when a jack plug is in the output socket.
The Langcaster is a real giant in the guitar world it outclasses all other guitars in volume, frequency range and clarity by far and with a flick of the switch you have a magnificent overdrive comparable to expensive boutique amps, eliminating the need for a Tube Screamer or similar effect. Because of its many outstanding features the pickups can be used for any playing style from country to jazz and from blues to Heavy Metal.
Langcaster has now also a FX model with additional digital delay & Chorus.
The Langcaster is not only a beautiful piece of art, it delivers more than anyone could wish for,
THE ULTIMATE SOUND!
NOW ALSO FOR SALE AS A KIT-SET! |
