$160 USD

Impersonator MV ..... a versatile Icon, from Marvin to Malmsteen

                            For over 30 years, Chris Kinman has pursued a single goal: to create the best noiseless Strat pickups, engineered to reproduce the authentic sound, feel and dynamic response of a great vintage Stratocaster while totally eliminating 50/60-cycle mains hum. We call our patented technology Zero-Hum™ because it more precisely describes what our patented designs actually achieve.

A real '54 Strat - an Icon of twang, but now there's the Impersonator MV
A Kinman Gen-2 Strat* pickup	Brett shows of the MV's versatility Andrew Farnham enjoys the fabulous top end bite in this boppy cruise around the fretboard.  And yup, these are noiseless ... so why is the sound so unexpectedly better than non-noiseless?  How is that possible when everything you heard was about noiseless pickups being dull and lifeless?

Impersonator MV (Modern Vintage - formerly Impersonator 54 (v5) with Kinman's patented Gen-2 technology

Stuart says ..."These Kinman Impersonator MV (54) pickups sound very similar to the Bare Knuckle 63 Veneer 64's – but better. There’s more clarity, and there’s more top-end. Honestly, the Kinmans are making my other Strats sound dark – and they’ve got true single coil pickups in them.  Noiseless pickups aren’t supposed to have better top-end than true single coil pickups but these do."  (read the Report Cards for more from Stuart)

Outstanding sonic characteristics:  You can expect a sound comparable with the best Fender Strat* pickup you've ever heard but with more presence from the  plain strings, greater clarity and more overall girth, especially in the bridge position.  Produces a very nice twang with heaps of piano-mid-tones from the wound strings, and very nice high note glassiness ... more so than other Strat pickups (play the YouTubes above).  Better dynamics and note separation than a real Strat and more bounce from the E-6th low wound.  More intense Position 2 & 4 Knopfler-esque ‘cluck’ sounds.  

Customers report the MV is the most outstanding bridge pickup of all time, especially for Hank Marvin's sound because we've hit a sweet spot that's not as sharp as regular Strat pickups and is packed with beautiful piano-mid-tones.

Enoyability factor on a scale of 1~10:  Twelve, with the best Fender non-noiseless Strat pickup being 10.

Additional benefits:  There is 40% less magnetic string pull than regular Strat pickups so consequently there is no Strat-itis frequency warbling and string crash, just sustaining pure musical energy alive like you've never heard before.  Like all Kinman Fender genre pickups the MV has balanced G-3rd string loudness.

Loudness:  Noticeably louder than the Impersonator E56 making it the optimum companion for the E56 in the middle and neck. 

Tech stuff:  The Gen-2 models have taller magnets and taller coil with Kinman's patented tone and attack enhancing magnetic focusing device incorporated which means it's a highly responsive pickup.  In concert with a squashed 600 Ohm hum-sensing coil all these new features produces non-aged sound.  As of 10-Sep-2018 the pickups that have narrow and intermediate magnet spreads incorporate our (CSCT) coil spread compensation technology which restores the slight but noticeable loss of attack & presence when the magnets are placed closer together.

Opinion:  And not just our's, "Kinman makes not only the best noiseless Strat pickups but the best Strat pickups period"  Dave Cohen (RIP) - founder of Equilibrium Guitars in Boston.

You will also appreciate the absence of Ice-Pick and our proprietary Alnico-K** rod magnets for low string pull and no Strat-itis pitch warble.

Noiseless & Zero-Hum — Precisely Defined

If you're searching for the best noiseless Strat pickups, you've found one of the original pioneers.  Chris Kinman has spent over 30 years solving the problems that traditional stacked pickups fail to solve: IE eliminating hum while preserving the full dynamic response, harmonic bloom and expressive feel of a genuine vintage Stratocaster pickup.  It took a Patented magnetic invention to achieve this lofty performance.

We call them Zero-Hum™ pickups because that is technically more accurate than "noiseless."  Hum generated inside the pickup is eliminated. Buzz noise generated elsewhere in the guitars wiring is a different phenomenon and is minimized through proper shielding.  See >Technical > Perfect Guitar Shielding for newer guitars)

Signal Chain Matters
For maximum tone and dynamic range,  as with all passive pickups use a low-capacitance cable.  Learn why ordinary cables restrict performance Any old cable won't do.

** Alnico-K is a unique proprietary rod magnet developed by Kinman in 1985.  It has 40% less string pull than Alnico-5 so sustain is longer and there is much less clatter from string crash and no Strat-itis string warble ... and yet it produces the identical sound of Alnico-5.

*Stratocaster and Strat are a Trade Marks of Fender Musical Instrument Corp.  Kinman is not connected to Fender.

Released 1-Dec-14
 

Technical & Application info:

Under the hood of the Impersonator '54 but not all is visible     Impersonator '54's 3rd incarnation nomenclature

US Patents  5,668,520   6,103,986   8,791,351 B2

Works well in any Kinman Goodbye-Soldering Harness for Stratocaster.

This model represents a major milestone in the evolution of Fender type pickups as it has taken about 26 years of inventive and innovative thinking to achieve. The Kinman P-90 Hx and this new model re-affirms Kinman as the King of noiseless.

Kinman, like no other noiseless Strat pickup, has broken through the compression / transparency barrier.  Now you can compare Apples with hum to Apples without hum.  Introducing the 2nd generation noiseless Stratocaster pickups, the world’s first non-aged hum-cancelling Strat pickup and the finest Strat pickup money can buy.

Height adjustment:

With the 12th fret closed the neck pickup gap between top of magnet and bottom of E-6th should be 2.2mm and for the E-1st it should be 3mm.  This is our experience and a good starting point but might need to be tempered somewhat for different amps, strings and guitar responses.

Mixing and matching with other Strat pickups: Some players will love the Impersonator MV in all 3 positions (bridge, middle and neck) to get nicely balanced authentic vintage sounds from all 5 positions.  The new Texas Jalapeno Extra, surprisingly, has higher output, and makes a good companion bridge pickup and pos 2 is reasonable authentic Knopfler-esque.  But if you prefer an even hotter bridge pickup the Big-Nine-O is powerful, sweet, thick and loud, a perfect companion at the bridge if growl is your thing.  However position 2 sound will not produce authentic Knopfler-esque sound but will sound good anyway with a lot of retained attack.