Has anyone seen the Ulbrick noise reduction system?

[jay mitchell]

I'm always playing in front of my computer and yes even my humbuckers are noisy, I'm wondering if that would work as well with humbuckers,

No. It makes SC pickups into humbuckers. If your guitar with humbuckers is noisy, then either the coils in the pickups are not well-matched or the noise is being picked up by something other than the pickups.

 

[hunter]

250 bucks for a ringy thingy? eww

 

[norminal]

250 bucks for a ringy thingy? eww

I paid $160 used for the Ilitch. Worth every penny.

 

[Sascha Franck]

I paid $160 used for the Ilitch. Worth every penny.

I'd instantly pay that. Too bad, there's absolutely no market for these kinda things over here, so getting one used is completely out of the equation.

 

[norminal]

I'd instantly pay that. Too bad, there's absolutely no market for these kinda things over here, so getting one used is completely out of the equation.

Keep an eye on eBay. They pop up occasionally.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Keep an eye on eBay. They pop up occasionally.

Well, not in Germany. Ok, maybe once all 2-3 years. But even some pretty experienced folks, as annoyed as myself from SC noise, never ever even heard of the company.

 

[norminal]

 

[Sascha Franck]

Gotta say that's quite impressive!

 

[Sascha Franck]

Wondering how well shipping to Germany would work and how much it'd add to the cost. 279AUD are just something like €171, so that's fairly cheaper than the Ilitch.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

Wasn't it that Ilitch basically stole from Suhr? Could it be that there's still some uncleared ground, so he better stays sort of underground?

Nope. Suhr used the Illitch.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

Wondering how well shipping to Germany would work and how much it'd add to the cost. 279AUD are just something like €171, so that's fairly cheaper than the Ilitch.

Fralin used to sell the Illitch for 2/3 the price.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

Side note …Ulbrick used to make killin’ amps.

 

[dronerstone]

Wondering how well shipping to Germany would work and how much it'd add to the cost. 279AUD are just something like €171, so that's fairly cheaper than the Ilitch.

+ shipping
+ import taxes (Einfuhrumsatzsteuer)
+ tolls (calculated by the full price, including shipping)

Ordered a 179$ pedal from the US last year, paid about 250€ total.

Ordered a 99£ pedal from the UK this year, paid about 150€ total.

Also, shipments can sometimes spend a week or two in processing as they enter Europe.

Ordering from non-EU countries sucks.

PS: Nice to see someone else is as picky about single coil hum as I am.

 

[Sascha Franck]

PS: Nice to see someone else is as picky about single coil hum as I am.

I just hate it with as much of a passion as it gets.

Have been using a SC guitar for a musical once and had to open a tune out of a black (all lights out, so everybody was just intensely listening) with a pretty well distorting sound. Worked fine throughout the rehearsals (sure, some hum, but manageable and easily masked by the actual sound) but that show was in a theatre in the countryside. Soundcheck was still fine, but during the show when all the lights were going, they apparently had the dimmers on the same power circuit as the stage power outlets. So, once Mr. Franck switched on his sound it was like BRRRRRRRRZZZZZZZZZZZZZZRRRRRRRRZZZZZZ, covering around 70% of the guitar volume (seriously, I never ever had it that bad before). Fortunately, the guitar had a reverse wound middle pickup, so I quickly switched to the inbetween position - but we all know how lousy that sounds for rock-ish riffage.

Also, I really love setting up many of my sounds with more gain than what I typically need for rhythm stuff and dial the guitar volume down to clean up. Also only works well with not all that much hum coming from the pickups.

As a result, all of my live guitars are fully humbuck-ed (pseudo single coils included). But I really wish that wasn't necessary.

 

[2112]

@Sascha Franck I had a similar experience doing a gig for a local artist last year. She plays keys and sings so it's very much a "hang back with the rhythm section" gig. Soundcheck was fine, as soon as the lights came on it was like micing up a fridge motor.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Soundcheck was fine, as soon as the lights came on it was like micing up a fridge motor.

Yeah, lights are evil, especially in case they're not using their own isolated power circuit. Things have actually gotten quite a bit better now that there's more and more 100% LED based light systems, but it's still not great. And it's really making me wonder how people sometimes are taking so little care of it, especially in locations with a regular live band schedule.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

@Sascha Franck I had a similar experience doing a gig for a local artist last year. She plays keys and sings so it's very much a "hang back with the rhythm section" gig. Soundcheck was fine, as soon as the lights came on it was like micing up a fridge motor.

When i did India i had to use a wireless since most places the power/ground was so messed up the only way it worked otherwise was being barefoot and keeping my foot on the chassis of a pedal.

And here in Germany that floating ground, instead the thirds pin is also an immense pain when you physically want to lift ground.
And thats even before lights get into the equation.

 

[laxu]

I just hate it with as much of a passion as it gets.

Have been using a SC guitar for a musical once and had to open a tune out of a black (all lights out, so everybody was just intensely listening) with a pretty well distorting sound. Worked fine throughout the rehearsals (sure, some hum, but manageable and easily masked by the actual sound) but that show was in a theatre in the countryside. Soundcheck was still fine, but during the show when all the lights were going, they apparently had the dimmers on the same power circuit as the stage power outlets. So, once Mr. Franck switched on his sound it was like BRRRRRRRRZZZZZZZZZZZZZZRRRRRRRRZZZZZZ, covering around 70% of the guitar volume (seriously, I never ever had it that bad before). Fortunately, the guitar had a reverse wound middle pickup, so I quickly switched to the inbetween position - but we all know how lousy that sounds for rock-ish riffage.

Also, I really love setting up many of my sounds with more gain than what I typically need for rhythm stuff and dial the guitar volume down to clean up. Also only works well with not all that much hum coming from the pickups.

As a result, all of my live guitars are fully humbuck-ed (pseudo single coils included). But I really wish that wasn't necessary.

I've learned to just embrace single coil hum. I've never been able to get "supposedly single coil sounding humbuckers" to sound exactly like single coils, so I'd rather just deal with the hum to get the SC tone.

In a live situation it's annoying so I would mostly play humbucker guitars but with SC you just need to turn loud and call it rock n' roll, there's something to the "everything hums and buzzes and sounds like it might explode at any moment" experience.

My current apartment seems to be some weird hum central with lots of EMI issues. I think it actually got a bit better recently, so maybe they have fixed a transformer, mobile network antenna or whatever nearby, or fixed something in the electrical network of the building. The building is made in the 2000s so you'd think this sort of stuff would be sorted already.

I'm glad that the Axe-Fx 3 has such a flexible noise gate and my BluGuitar Amp 1 has one too.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

I've learned to just embrace single coil hum. I've never been able to get "supposedly single coil sounding humbuckers" to sound exactly like single coils, so I'd rather just deal with the hum to get the SC tone.

In a live situation it's annoying so I would mostly play humbucker guitars but with SC you just need to turn loud and call it rock n' roll, there's something to the "everything hums and buzzes and sounds like it might explode at any moment" experience.

My current apartment seems to be some weird hum central with lots of EMI issues. I think it actually got a bit better recently, so maybe they have fixed a transformer, mobile network antenna or whatever nearby, or fixed something in the electrical network of the building. The building is made in the 2000s so you'd think this sort of stuff would be sorted already.

I'm glad that the Axe-Fx 3 has such a flexible noise gate and my BluGuitar Amp 1 has one too.

Its funny, the only gate ive ever found acceptable was the volume blick with envelope attached in the Axe.
But i dont use it fir SC issues only fir too much gain noise.

As for the Illitch thing, when i still lived up in Malibu i wasnt too far from him and he asked me over fir some consulting and i A/B’d his backplate coil a lot and its nothing like a noiseless SC.

Now that said, and folks think im nuts for this. ..to me the 60 cycle hum (which is just slightly sharp of Bb) works almost like a verb around the note. Especially when tuned a half step down.

 

[laxu]

Now that said, and folks think im nuts for this. ..to me the 60 cycle hum (which is just slightly sharp of Bb) works almost like a verb around the note. Especially when tuned a half step down.

I think you are on to something because if you remove the noise there's almost like there's something wrong with the sound. You are used to it being singlecoil tone + hum.