NPD for one of my shred sticks! More folks with Duncan stack experience?

[Speeddemon]

This was in the works for a while, but I finally managed to get my hands on a used Seymour Duncan STK-S6 Custom Stack Plus, for the neck position in my H-S superstrat.
It's a no-name guitar, with the only marker being a '7667' inlay in the neck. No serial, no other markers.
Control cavity wasn't shielded and there was some Daewon Korea humbucker in the bridge originally (now a Duncan TB-5 Custom) and the neck single-coil turned out to be a Tonerider Classic Blues. Kinda strange combination, I mean, not something you'd see in a stock guitar, so it may have been some builder's one-off.

So, over the weekend I took out everything, shielded the cavity, replaced the volume pot with a 500k push-pull pot to coil-split the TB-5 (great split tone btw!), added a treble bleed circuit (1nF + 100k Ohm parallel) and put it back together. Initially it didn't work perfectly... I had like 3% sound; turned out the stupid jack connector lug was ever so slightly grazing the shield-painted cavity innard. Fixed that and boom, tone!

The good:
-As a sort of my take on Hamer Californian (a grail guitar for me, but not willing to pay today's redonkulous prices) meets Andy LaRocque sig. guitar, this does what it supposed to do; rock hard, shred hard.
-I was pleasantly surprised to hear the Custom's split tone; very useable; a dead ringer for the clean intro tone of Sweet Home Alabama.
-The Custom Stack Plus indeed behaves like a warmer/fatter, higher output single-coil under (high)gain, with plenty of zing and sparkle.

The so-so:
-I expected the Custom Stack Plus to perform similarly when played clean, but it was somewhat less sparkly, eventhough I hooked it up to a 500k pot.

Were my expectations wrong for the clean tones perhaps? Because I need some decent output too and going to a Classic Stack Plus would probably leave me with a too low output neck pickup. I've been considering the Lil' Screamin' Demon as well, but based on the sound samples on the Duncan site, that one would probably be even darker with clean tones, unless you split it. And the noiseless humfree aspect was the main thing to go for this STK-S6.
Compared to the Dimarzio Chopper in my Kramer SM-1's neck position, it falls right in between the Chopper not-split and split tones.
The Chopper in humbucking mode sounds beefier and thicker/smoother than the STK-6. The Chopper when split becomes a bit thinner sounding (and humming).

 

[Uzi Nein Millimetah]

I have a LaRocque with the Custom Stack Plus and generally agree, although I have zero problem with cleans. I don't use the neck position alone on any guitar for clean chords or most clean playing anyway, always some combination that gets me closer to Strat #4 (the ULTIMATE clean in my book). I can get great cleans using the middle position on the ALR-II, although it does a very good approximation of a Strat for neck only. If you wanted more single coil sparkle, there is always the STK-4 Plus. I think the ESP SS-120 (found in some ESP Lynch models) is awesome, although you can't buy that separately.

I also have the Chopper and agree with your comparison. It's got a rounder tone, approaching a mellow full HB tone for leads.

It's tough to find a hotter noise free neck single that also has very pure Strat chime/cleans, it's a balancing act and you have to decide which matters to you more.. At least when you have a middle single, you can choose something very pure/bright for that position to make #4 more Strat like.

 

[Speeddemon]

Good points @Uzi Nein Millimetah .
I do get great cleans in the middle position (it's just a 3-way blade switch), especially when coil-splitting the TB-5.
I guess I just have to come to terms that for really bluesy or Blackmore-y neck pickup stuff, I just need to grab my Strat and that this guitar isn't the #1 tool for that means.

 

[Uzi Nein Millimetah]

Good points @Uzi Nein Millimetah .
I do get great cleans in the middle position (it's just a 3-way blade switch), especially when coil-splitting the TB-5.
I guess I just have to come to terms that for really bluesy or Blackmore-y neck pickup stuff, I just need to grab my Strat and that this guitar isn't the #1 tool for that means.

Another alternative if you are willing is installing the EMG SPC midboost. I've done that on tons of my guitars, mostly with actives, but some with passives also, will beef up any single big time. So you can buy something chimey for the neck and boost it from the guitar when you need it.