tv jones power tron... what is it?

[rockskate4x]

I really like the fender la cabronita guitars that I've been starting to see around the internet, but I have yet to find out whether the tv jones power tron pickups that they have are single coils or humbuckers or what.... before I spend $300 on a set I wanna know what I am getting! Do you guys know what the scoop on these pickups is?

 

[nexrex]

They are humbuckers. I have a powertron neck and powertron plus bridge in my Epiphone DOT, and they are awesome. Their website describes them as "the ultimate marriage of twang, fatness, sparkle and warmth".

I would have to say they are not lying.  :icon_biggrin:

 

[Jusatele]

I love the things
My next build will have a set, I am going with hot rodded p90s on this build, I can wind those myself
I want to build a Cabronita. I do like the way it is set up, but do not like antiqued guitars
why pay over 3 bills for a beat up guitar?

 

[simple]

I have 3 sets in various guitars; Powertron neck position and Powerton plus in bridge position. They're awesome.

 

[kboman]

How would a Powertron mate with a P90 in the neck? Or any of the other 'trons?

 

[Justinginn]

What makes them sound different/so good? How are they different than a normal Seth Lover-designed humbucker?

 

[Nando Vallart]

Anybody played with the Super'Tron?

 

[Jusatele]

What makes them sound different/so good? How are they different than a normal Seth Lover-designed humbucker?

Basically, we would have to buy one of each and tear them apart
count windings, are they scatter wound or not, how tall is the bobbins, how are they spaced, what is the alloy of the magnet, is it potted, vacuum potted, what gauge is the wire, how big are the magnets and the list goes on. I can tell you this, he is doing something different than the rest of the guys, he gets a great snarl, a great distortion and a great fatness out of a powerful PU and those all are hard to balance, so what the secret is I would want to know, I would unwind that puppy wrap by wrap, as I am sure all the big companies have already, and use a caliper on everything, get the mags analyzed. I heard the video they have posted with ZZ TOP, and I was blown away, After this build, I am going do a Cabronita build and when I order those pups, I am going to order a third just to rip to pieces.

 

[Justinginn]

Yeah I was hoping it wasn't the little details that made it sound so good, you know? You just want it to be something obvious like the chrome case so that you can slap one on without doing the homework to figure out how it's wound.  :doh: Seems kinda like TT's approach of redesigning the coil shape. Since these pickups have decent output, I'd guess they've got some wire on there so it probably does have a lot to do with the coil shape. I'm still dying to try some Roadhouses.

 

[Jusatele]

I was always a very inquisitive kid,  So one day around 14 or 15 I took a pickup apart, and decided that would not be hard to reproduce, My first pickup winder was my mothers sewing machine with a few screws drilled into the flywheel to hold a bobbin. ( I think she never forgave me for that even to her death)
anyway I took a few magnets from some car parts, some fiber board, a roll of wire from my fathers ham radio stuff and wound up a pickup. Wish I still had that POS. It sucked, I knew nothing about polarity, insulation, wire gauge, magnetic fields, or anything. Well I asked my dad and he bought me a book about microphones. By the end of the year I had bought my mother her own bobbin winder. ( Dad made me work all summer mowing yards to pay for the new sewing machine he made me buy her) and learned about polarity, wire, Resistance, Capacitance, and electrical fields, I was winding some killer stuff, but my week point was my magnets, It took me a few years to figure out that you needed to go buy some decent magnets. Once I FIGURED OUT the difference in types and alloys of magnets I could control my results by matching them. I had gotten bad PUs from the music store and learned about potting etc, I through trial and error figured out what makes power, what makes brite, what makes quiet, etc. It is just a hobby now but I really appreciate what goes into a pickup.