The Steel Guitar Forum

I have had my Ultra almost 2 years and the only changes I have made is add a tuner out jack on the endplate and change to an Alumitone pickup. Which made me wonder why GFI made no provision for pickup height adjustments.

Granted, the Alumitone did fit, (barely) but I was sweating some. Could it be they wanted the pickup mounted solidly to the top, or maybe they only meant to allow fit for the stock pickup?

No real problem, just wondering.

I have an older GFI ultra, '99 I think it is.
I put an alumitone in it, and yea, it is an issue. It is a pretty hot pickup and it was really too close to the strings. It caused problems when I really dug in.

I don't know why the alumitone has such long legs. It comes with screws and springs so it can be adjustable but the legs are too long.
I liked the pickup but was unable to really use it. I put a Telonics in it and its twangy enough, mostly, and I don't have the issue.

I don't have any problems with the Alumitone and I like the sound.

My Ultra is a 2022 and I put a Lawrence 705 in after trimming the mounting plate to fit. It's barely enough clearance to the strings. No adjustments possible. I like the tone with the 705.

Larry Dering wrote:My Ultra is a 2022 and I put a Lawrence 705 in after trimming the mounting plate to fit. It's barely enough clearance to the strings. No adjustments possible. I like the tone with the 705.

I thought about the 705 but went with the Alumitone. It fits and sounds good to me. It would be nice to have some height adjustment. The Alumitone is mounted solidly flat to the body and the string spacing is okay. I would not want it any closer to the strings. I have no argument with GFI about their build decisions. I like the guitar. However, just a little extra spacing between top plate and strings to allow for up and down pickup height adjustments would be a good thing.

I agree Bill. I considered routing the cavity deeper and wider but I couldn't bring myself to it on a new guitar. I only had it a couple months before changing the pickup. The GFI III pickup was just too bright and I tried everything to tame it. Bobby Seymour loved the Alumitone pickup in a GFI. I had a 705 on hand so it got the 1st call. I'm happy with it now.

Larry Dering wrote:I agree Bill. I considered routing the cavity deeper and wider but I couldn't bring myself to it on a new guitar. I only had it a couple months before changing the pickup. The GFI III pickup was just too bright and I tried everything to tame it. Bobby Seymour loved the Alumitone pickup in a GFI. I had a 705 on hand so it got the 1st call. I'm happy with it now.

Larry, the problem I had with the stock pickup was the bottom. My guitar had the GFI II"s and the lows had a tendency to bloom and overpower. I had been wanting to try a Alumitone pickup and this was my chance. I was pleasantly surprised by the excellent build quality, and it looks good as well. I have used E66"s for years and on this guitar the Alumitone works and sounds good. I still have E66"s on the other guitar.

I do like the E66 and have a spare on hand. My Derby SD10 3x5 and a Zum D10 9x9 has E66 pickups. I wanted to put one in the GFI but those bolts extended from the E66 bottom would make it too tall and I wasn't going to enlarge the cavity. If I didn't have that 705 the Alumitone pickup would be in it's place.