Clean mode has too much distortion.

[PTModIT]

Hello, My son just bought a pair of active humbucker pickups.The output is around 58k ohms..Pots are 2 volume, 1 tone ,3 way switch. Pots are 25k.The problem seems to be when he switches between heavy distortion to a clean mode. There seems to be much distortion in the clean mode.It's not clean enough.He has a Marshall MG100 HDFX head with 412A &B cabinets.Are the pickups just too heavy to play clean or did I miss something in the wiring. I just thought of something, I didn't change the Tone capacitor that I used for the passive pickups. Would it be a different value. Thanks.

[violation]

What active pickups? EMG's come with all new electronics and you have to use what comes with them otherwise they don't work right (currently using 3 pairs of EMG 81 / 85). All mine sound fine on the clean channel... that said I use all tube amps and sometimes a hybrid Marshall. Try switching the 9 volt battery for a new one and try using the neck pickup.

My next guess would be the amp. Try turning the gain down on the clean channel. Other than that, turning the volume down on the guitar when you go to the clean channel is really the only other option I can think of.

Personally I'd just go ahead and blame the amp, lol Marshall's solid state stuff is far from great.

[PTModIT]

Thanks for replying . He did ask me maybe he should put in a new battery. So we will try that . I'll let him know about the the other setting ,but I think he tried that . Thanks.

[Budda]

first thing I would do is try to dial in the amp again.

[peter benn]

Are the pickups set too close to the strings?

[gtrguy]

Definitely put in a fresh battery before anything else. A low battery in an EMG system can definitely produce a distorted sound.

gtrguy