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I went boooteek cos Filtertrons were too bloody expensive. Glyn wasn't making them at this stage.

vintage52 wrote: ↑Mon Aug 29, 2022 11:08 am

sizzlingbadger wrote: ↑Mon Aug 29, 2022 10:33 am I'd like to put Filtertrons in my Gretsch to replace the Black Top Broad'Tron's, but I can't find any cheap enough.

I have some Black Tops to go into my G5122 to replace the no name HBs that are in there.

Was looking at some Filtertrons as well but they above my pay scale at the moment.

Just need to find someone in Wellington to do the swap and find out what parts I need to make it happen.

Rob?

robthemac wrote: ↑Mon Aug 29, 2022 11:37 am I went boooteek cos Filtertrons were too bloody expensive. Glyn wasn't making them at this stage.

What did you get? And how do you rate it?

Some from Porter pickups. Haven't set them up yet as I wasn't happy with my efforts when it came to spraying nitro.

Mr Glyn's pickups are priced around about or below new sets of Seymour Duncan, DiMarzio, Bareknuckle etc at local music retailers. They sound great, made locally, and his customer service is pretty good.

I thought about going to Tone Riders instead but I don't trust them to be as good as Mr Glyn's pickups. Sure, probably not twice as good when comparing price but I just feel I would want to upgrade them again if I get a set of Tone Riders.

I've got my Greg Bennett semi-hollow body finally loaded with Mr Glyn's "Integrity" PAF humbuckers.

They sound bloody marvelous compared to the Duncan Designed 59s I've had before. I'm very chuffed with them. Thank you, Mr Glyn! I'll be happy to buy more pickups from him in the near future.

It was installed by the lovely Ramsay Phillips - sooner than I expected (he looked like he had a massive backlog when I dropped the guitar off). Again, I will be asking for his services in the near future.

I feel privileged to live in the same city as two people at the mastery of their respective crafts.

Great choice man, Glyn is a magician!

Installed a Cloud 9 into my Horizon today. Clear under high gain, articulate, great harmonics and cleans up well. The man knows how to make a pickup, that's for sure. Better than I can describe one anyway.

The Cloud 9 really is great - exactly as you describe

Alright, here we go.
Got sick of researching every Tele pickup on the planet and thought I’d throw some gold at a well priced and local option.

Ordered a set of Cruel Mistress’ for my Tele.

Also might get a Cool 90 for the neck later.

TmcB wrote: ↑Sun Nov 20, 2022 9:54 pm Alright, here we go.
Got sick of researching every Tele pickup on the planet and thought I’d throw some gold at a well priced and local option.

Ordered a set of Cruel Mistress’ for my Tele.

Also might get a Cool 90 for the neck later.

TmcB wrote: ↑Sun Nov 20, 2022 9:54 pm Alright, here we go.
Got sick of researching every Tele pickup on the planet and thought I’d throw some gold at a well priced and local option.

Ordered a set of Cruel Mistress’ for my Tele.

I've got that set in my partscaster. They sound awesome. You won't be disappointed.

Miza wrote: ↑Mon Nov 21, 2022 9:28 am

TmcB wrote: ↑Sun Nov 20, 2022 9:54 pm Alright, here we go.
Got sick of researching every Tele pickup on the planet and thought I’d throw some gold at a well priced and local option.

Ordered a set of Cruel Mistress’ for my Tele.

I've got that set in my partscaster. They sound awesome. You won't be disappointed.

Ah great to know. The demos aren't particularly helpful – Brett Kingman was too clean and the other ones were buried in effects.

TmcB wrote: ↑Mon Nov 21, 2022 9:48 am

Miza wrote: ↑Mon Nov 21, 2022 9:28 am

TmcB wrote: ↑Sun Nov 20, 2022 9:54 pm Alright, here we go.
Got sick of researching every Tele pickup on the planet and thought I’d throw some gold at a well priced and local option.

Ordered a set of Cruel Mistress’ for my Tele.

I've got that set in my partscaster. They sound awesome. You won't be disappointed.

Ah great to know. The demos aren't particularly helpful – Brett Kingman was too clean and the other ones were buried in effects.

Yeah, they've got just the right about of bite without being 'hot' pickups. Probably in a similar vein to the ones in my MIA Standard (Twisted Tele?). But then I'm no expert, just like what I like.

Righteo, Cruel Mistress set has landed and lovingly swapped into my 2009 USA Tele
Off the bat, the pickups are interesting- the neck you can see the exposed wiring under the metal cover, and the bridge has beveled magnets on the top, and a nice solid steel plate. All see high quality and lightyears away from the absolute trash that was in there previously. USA bridge pickup was harsh and muddy somehow at the same time and they didn’t even bother with a back plate. Both neck a bridge seemed to have some random giant screws in the base for whatever reason. Neck pickup wasn’t bad though.

Also, wiring had several ground solder lugs and wire distributed throughout, no doubt to aid in assembly but kinda pointless. I took the liberty to remove the extra crap, shield the control cavity, create a single star ground and remove all the back of the pot grounding trash. With the shielding it basically means you only have one ground wire, one output wire, and the two hot pickup wires going to the plate with everything else going to the star ground. It is WAY quieter and far easier to service/pickup swap.

Glyn had added a complementary treble bleed to the package so I added that to the volume whilst also doing the 50’s wiring thing. It’s really good!

Ok, pickup sounds. Gorgeous, articulate, sweet, bit of grunt but no ice pick, depth without muddiness, clear but have snarl if you dig in, beautifully balanced as a set. I was a bit worried that it might be a little underpowered but it’s not - it’s just a refined higher output set with enough balls and output to get rocky but cleans up perfectly to twang away. Previously I’ve generally headed towards waaaaay over powered with Dimarzio Area T Hot, Cavalier Dual Lion/Firebird Neck, Chopper T with humbucker in Neck, or a bit more refined with Lawrence
Keystones and Twisted Tele/Broadcaster combo.

This set sits between those two extremes with a bit more pinch but nowhere near the excessive brawn those other sets have had. I have been very pleasantly surprised by how on point Glyn’s recommendation were too - I had mentioned I liked more ambient/rocky tones through an AC30. I would say that the demos don’t really do them much justice in all honesty.

Taking a punt on the local dude was an excellent choice and I do recommend anyone to give them a crack - these are Lollar/Fralin level boutique quality.