Toneriders

Well after alot of reading on this board and alot of listening, I decided to try some tonerider Vintage hot alnico 3's. I have a Melancon Artist T, with the pickup mounted to the body and wanted more snap and twang and alot of the folks in the know here kept talking alnico3, so I tried them. I figured at the price if I liked them, great, if not I could send them to Don Mare and he would do them right. Happy to say they were more than what I expected. They added alot of shimmer and sparkle to the git, the tone knob has more use now. The Melancon is hollow swamp ash (5.9 pnds) and did sound dark, but now has more of the sound I was looking for. I will be trying don's "Heart of Nancy" later, since I am a huge Roy fan. I will now keep these in mind for other Teles I get. The other cool thing was when I pulled the pickguard off, the Mel was routed fer a P90 and a middle pickup! So I guess I might look into that later!

Sargeslide

Ok, update. They sound great, and I am getting another set for my G&L. The Melancon was great for blues and rock before, but now I have Pete Andersons tones from ACL. This git souds soooooo amazing now. The guys in the band don't want me to play anything else, and frankly, niether do I!

I highly recommend these

Sargeslide

+1. I put a set of the Pure Vintage in my Strat, and they sound great

It's amazing to me that Toneriders are flying somewhat under the radar. I think they are amazing pickups. Not only "for the money"...but regardless of price.

As Andy said, the Pure Vintage strat set sounds great. I've had a set in my strat for a while now and for the first time in many a moon, I have no desire to try any other pups.

My buddy loves the Classic Blues set and another TDPRI buddy raves about the City Limits set. The Toneriders replaced Lace Hot Golds and Kinmans respectively.

While I dig the Vintage Plus T set, the Hot Classics really nail it for what I like to hear.

Great people at Tonerider. They really believe in their product and take great pride in R&D, build quality, materials and most of all, TONE!

I would highly recommend checking them out next time your shopping for some pups. Oh yeah....the Tonerider Humbuckers are amazing. I see they now offer P-90-'s too. Can't wait for a report on those.

As Andy said, the Pure Vintage strat set sounds great. I've had a set in my strat for a while now and for the first time in many a moon, I have no desire to try any other pups.

+1
I also have the Pure Vintage set. It's actually the 4th set of pickups that I've tried in this Strat.
Since they are in, I haven't wasted one second thinking about other Strat pickups.

Well, as much as I love the MFD's in my G&L ASAT, I am replacing these with the vintage Hots. The problem is- everyone is sold out! So I have to wait a few weeks before I can get another set! But for me, it's gonna be worth the wait!

Sarge

Hi BB

You seem to know the tonerider pickups pretty good. I just bought a pair of Telecaster Hot Classics and now I'm looking for a middle position Strat pickup in order to build what they call a Nashville Telecaster. Any advise on how to select the right pickup to fit in there?

I was thinking about the Fender Hot Alnico 3 as they use the same magnet type and the are pretty easy to find used .. but I'm just not sure if searching for the same type of magnet is really the way to go ...

I use a set of Rocksongs in my Dot and they are superb .They are good for just about any tone except twang . I really would never change them I also have a Hot Classic bridge in my Tele .great blues sound .love em .Still twangs of course .The telecaster sets are real vintage sounding .just lovely .They are highly under rated by many of the pickup recommenders on forums .They are very well made.Nickel plated where appropriate and use vintage wiring .They make many other makes look cheap and badly made.

I've got a pair of the "PAFs" in a Les Paul, they are some of the best sounding humbuckers I've ever heard.

anyone compare these to GFS pups? i mean obviously they are pricier, but are they worth it?

im particularly interested because they have pups that are only slightly overwound(6k), as opposed to the overwounds that GFS sells at around 8-9k

I have a GFS Lil Puncher in a guitar and I feel real ambivalent about it. It is just okay. In other words, it transmits sounds. I don't have the equivalent ToneRider, but I have some City Limits and others in a Tele and Strat and they are great pickups for me. BB knows of what he speaks. The build quality of the ToneRiders also looks top notch.

The Toneriders run at a higher price point than GFS, but I think the difference is definitely justified. I also suspect that Tonerider has more consistent quality control, but I only have one set of GFS p'ups (as opposed to three Tonerider Strat sets - City Limits, Classic Blues and Pure Vintage - all outstanding).

I think i can chime in here, i had 2 of their H90's recently and tried them in different guitars, absolutely lovely, i loved the roundness but also that razorblade grit.
Although they're discontinued now the new ones will probably be at the same level.

They still had a small lack of definition, especially with chords but the attitude was right.

I also had a P90 rebel in the neck position and have to say, what a monster, it sits there like a ton of sustain and it could also sound like a churchbell if it wants to. Slightly better than the H90 soapbars (also costs 15$ more).

I've listened quite a lot to tonerider single coils and they sort of lack that little definition what becomes the price tag, but what's craved of pickups that costs 90$/each it's not bad.
But they are players pickup, smack in the face, i love the sound of the classic blues on a MIM fender of what i hear on youtube, i believe runs on 100$ a set, give or take.
Will certainly try out a set any given time, a distinctive punch in the sound that new makers are trying to find back to.

My take on compared to GFS i can only say that GFS lacks a little quality that tonerider has, surely the GFS 59 vintage counts at that level but a good listning on their other pickups only a few come up to that level.

Don't forget about the Bill Lawrence Keystone single coil Strat pups. They cost well under $100 shipped, sound just fabulous, and made in the USA so you're supporting America during the troubled economy. Wonderful product but only *if* you can get them.

The problem is that Bill Lawrence's customer service is terrible. These folks NEVER answer e-mails and I don't know how they can conduct business that way. (At least 5 times over the past year I've tried to purchase an extra set of Keystones and L-200's but they've never answered my emails. I've had to seek other alternatives and frankly, I'm very disappointed and rather choked.)

I'm seriously thinking of trying a set of the Tonerider Pure Vintage as an alternative to another set of the Keystones.

flatpicker, you could do what I did, buy a set of keystones via the online shop. I know they might take a while to turn up, but I'm OK with the waiting, I trust them to get arround to sending mine when they can.

Hi BB

You seem to know the tonerider pickups pretty good. I just bought a pair of Telecaster Hot Classics and now I'm looking for a middle position Strat pickup in order to build what they call a Nashville Telecaster. Any advise on how to select the right pickup to fit in there?

I was thinking about the Fender Hot Alnico 3 as they use the same magnet type and the are pretty easy to find used .. but I'm just not sure if searching for the same type of magnet is really the way to go ...

I think the Fender would work well as would the Tonerider Classic Blues, City Limits or Pure Vintage strat middle pup.....although I personally would not worry about matching magnets....or having a 'hot' pickup. A Dimarzio Blue or Red Velvet would do the trick too. Good luck!