Guitar Gear Forum

Has anyone used one? Apparently I have for the last 34 years.
I've got a 1989/1990 Fender HMT Tele that I got brand new in 1990, I knew it had some sort of DiMarzio in it but never bothered to see what kind it was until recently. The story is Fender went to Dimarzio to mod the Super Distortion with more mids, rolled highs and tighter low end and got this. Dimarzio later started selling in 1994 as the Super 3. I didn't care for it much because it was so mid heavy.
Then after learning what the pickup was, I read how to use it best. Cut the mids some, increase bass, treble and presence and I used a G12T-75 IR or a V30 works good too. Wow, it's 1980's hair metal, now I see why they used that pickup.
I only played around with it in my POD Go using an 80's preset. Its tight, smooth and pinch harmonics scream. I'll have to use my Mesa Roadking tonight to hear it through a real amp and see if it still holds true.
You want to use in a brighter guitar as it is a dark sounding pickup, so I think any maple/ basswood super strat would work best.

I'm a huge fan of the Super 3 on superstrats. It makes them sound like a Les Paul with Super Ds. I have an Ibanez RG with one here and it sounds as fat as my Gibsons.

Yeah I definitely would like to get a super strat of some sort and put one of these in there. I've also got an old Peavey Nitro 3, I'm sure one of these would bring some life to it.

I keep saying I’m going to put one back in my HM. I put mine together from parts and while I had the original singles I didn’t have the bridge pickup. So I went with an Evolution and have been using since. But I should do a Super 3.

greatmutah wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2024 4:01 pm I keep saying I’m going to put one back in my HM. I put mine together from parts and while I had the original singles I didn’t have the bridge pickup. So I went with an Evolution and have been using since. But I should do a Super 3.

You definitely should. The HM with the Super 3 is hard rock heaven.

Yeah the Super 3 was tech OEM for those fender HM series. I still have and use my HM fairly regularly and I did end up putting back in the Super 3. That pickup in that guitar with its oddball 25.125 scale length and the bridge pickup is physically the furthest away from the bridge of any guitar I’ve owned, which also warms it up a bit too. But my point is the HM Strat is one of the fullest and biggest sounding guitars because of that pickup and it’s smoothed out highs and full bass and boosted mids. When I first got my first HM Strat it was the biggest and fattest sounding guitar I had ever played . It beat out my LP at the time.

That’s what sorta bummed me out about the re-issues. Is they didn’t keep the distance from the bridge the same and of course they didn’t use the Super 3. They did keep the 25.125 scale but the neck profile isn’t even close. It’s basically a standard Strat profile which was lazy on them. I really wanted to like the re-issue cause I missed my white HM Strat and I bought one! But I returned it cause my legit 87 HM sounded so much bigger and more aggressive and just played better

I never played a reissue but that’s interesting. I always thought mine was very… Ibanez like for the neck profile? But maybe not quite as thin. Super flat radius too. Like 17” or something. Mines a mutt as the body is from 88 and has the Kahler Spyder, but the neck is a 1991 with the Floyd locknut and string retainer and the smaller digital strat logo. Part of me wants to get a neck from 88 or 89 and sell the newer neck because I actually like the gaudy Strat logo on the late 80s ones.

That’s weird that they changed the neck profile and pickup spacing though. I knew the singles were wrong at the least as they hyped them up as a hotter single coil, etc. but we all know that most original HMs had American Standard single coils. Didn’t realize the reissue was a completely different guitar though. I don’t hate the Kahler Spyder either. Its not my favorite trem but it’s not bad once set up right. I also have four springs on it because I didn’t know shit about how far I could screw in the trem claw when I put this thing back together so while it floats, it’s a bit stiffer than some trems. Great for double stop bends though and I’ve never felt the need to change it.

I agree about the HM Reissue. I was really excited when they announced because the original HM is one of my favorite guitars, but the reissue was way off. It's not a bad guitar per se, but like ET said, it's just a strat with the HM look and scale. Every other aspect of it that made it special was omitted.

Made me think of these comparison clips.



















I go through a listening binge on this channel, comparing sounds.

Those are cool! I found one of the Super 3 vs the Evo. I can hear the top rolled back a bit in the Super 3 and more crunchy mids. Imma have to try this pickup.