What is your definition of a Jazz pickup?
A Jazz bass pickup is the pickup in a Fender Jazz bass, and its various copies. It's between 3.492" and 3.625" long, .628" wide, .695" high. It has .780" tall magnets, with two per string. It's wound to around 8.6k to 9k. It has four mounting tabs and screws into the wood.
On the other hand, the RD had the Series 3 humbuckers, and measured 3.16" long, was 0.83" wide and 1.07" tall. So it's shorter, wider and taller than a Jazz bass. It's also wound very differently, at 6k and 11k. It might have been based on the Bill Lawrence designed pickups used in the G3, but hum canceling.
Saying an RD humbucker is a Jazz pickup is like saying a Tele pickup is a Strat pickup. Or that a Fender Wide Range humbucker is a PAF.
They are both pickups, but only a Jazz pickup is a Jazz pickup, Clearly the RD did not have the pickups it has in this reissue.
Certainly the G-3 had a very Fenderish sound.
I guess. What's a Fender bass sound like? But it didn't have a pickup setup like a Fender. The Triumph bass could also sound like a Fender, as could the Grabber and Victory bass. So can a Rickenbacker. I think the point is none of them were as quirky as the EB series, or as bright as the T-Birds.
So by definition they need to have 8 poles ?
But some so called Jazz pickups are stacked humbuckers right?
All Jazz pickups have had 8 poles. It was part of Leo's patent. There are hum canceling Jazz pickups, because time marches on, and people get hung up on details, so rather than putting a differently shaped pickup in a Jazz bass, companies have made exact size replacement's that don't hum. But that's because you have a hole to fill, and you want to sell a pickup!
I do it as well. Mine is shaped like a Jazz pickup, and fits into a Jazz bass, but that's where the similarity ends.
![Wink ;)](https://bassoutpost.com/Smileys/default/wink.gif)
In the end, pickups are pickups. There are all kinds.
Gibson had designed a very modern and original bass with the RD series. But they can't be bothered to recreate the original pickups, so they just got an off the shelf part as a replacement. Like I said, imagine if they started doing that with the T-Birds. Just put them out with some Jazz or a P/J setup. Or how about a SG bass with P pickups? People would have a fit!
I say it's just Gibson being cheap. At the very least they could have had Duncan make a copy of the original. He also did the Ripper pickup, complete with the custom molded case.