'Oily Towers' ... all the latest from Oil City Pickups

samzadgan · March 2014

Just got my Iceman home, new pickups installed…they sound amazing. Ash ( @TheGuitarWeasel ) did a great job, not only helping me choose a great combination (Scrapyard Dog Plus in the Neck and A8 NightFighter in the bridge), but also installing and putting in the coil split as well.

After playing tonight for a few hours, I can honestly say that these pickups are a notch above the rest…in humbucker mode they sound clear and fat without being muddy and powerful yet still has a lot of character, both with distortion and fuzz. With the coils split they have a luscious sound on clean, which are perfect for chords, where you can almost hear each string ring out. The best thing, with single coil mode is with fuzz they sound really fat. With the coil split option i now have a lot of different options with and a lot of different tones to choose from.

This is all with thin strings and tuned to E, I haven't even tuned down to C and set up with my regular 12-60's. I can't wait to hear what they will do then!

It was a pleasure doing business with Ash, a knowledgable man with a lot of great stories too!

And BTW…the double cream looks amazing on this guitar!

OilCityPickups · March 2014

And yes ... while the guitar was in my charge ... after fitting the pickups ... I did gratuitously boogie around with the said guitar at knee height, chugging out all the Kiss riffs I could remember

ThePrettyDamned · March 2014

:O Double cream?!

equalsql · March 2014

Hi Ash,
Do you do an alnico 3 version of your Blitz Spirit neck pickup?

OilCityPickups · March 2014

I can certainly do an alnico 3 version to special order. It would take about ten working days as I seldom carry alnico 3 bar mags in stock, and get them in from the US. PM me if you are interested.

not_the_dj · March 2014

Ash, can you do the Blitz Spirit with gold covers?

OilCityPickups · March 2014

Indeed I can do gold covers (gold plated nickel ... not brass ... they add £12 per pickup over the uncovered price of £48.00 each

equalsql · March 2014

TheGuitarWeasel said:

I can certainly do an alnico 3 version to special order. It would take about ten working days as I seldom carry alnico 3 bar mags in stock, and get them in from the US. PM me if you are interested.

pm'd

GuyBoden · March 2014

I'd like a Tele neck pickup for playing Jazz, you know less treble.

Any suggestions?

OilCityPickups · March 2014

I may well be able to come up with a T90 ... a Tele P90 ... ought to be possible. The other option is my Hardman Tele neck. That is pushing 10k and is far more P90 like than a standard Tele unit.

GuyBoden · March 2014

TheGuitarWeasel said:

The other option is my Hardman Tele neck. That is pushing 10k and is far more P90 like than a standard Tele unit.

Many thanks, could you advise me what Tele neck pickup has less treble and more middle, your Hardman or HonkyTonk Angel?

I been playing for 35 years, so I know I can roll the tone pot down, but that results in less output.

Many thanks
Guy

OilCityPickups · March 2014

GuyBoden said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

The other option is my Hardman Tele neck. That is pushing 10k and is far more P90 like than a standard Tele unit.

Many thanks, could you advise me what Tele neck pickup has less treble and more middle, your Hardman or HonkyTonk Angel?

I been playing for 35 years, so I know I can roll the tone pot down, but that results in less output.

Many thanks
Guy

The angel has a softer treble and more of a mid 'hump'.
My Wapping Wharf (new on my site) has the most mids of all ... as it is an Angel with a tap at the normal 9.8k output ... then wound up to 15k. It allows a standard Angel sound and a big, fat, mid boosted sound with a push/pull pot or a dpdt switch.

GuyBoden · March 2014

TheGuitarWeasel said:

GuyBoden said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

The other option is my Hardman Tele neck. That is pushing 10k and is far more P90 like than a standard Tele unit.

Many thanks, could you advise me what Tele neck pickup has less treble and more middle, your Hardman or HonkyTonk Angel?

I been playing for 35 years, so I know I can roll the tone pot down, but that results in less output.

Many thanks
Guy

The angel has a softer treble and more of a mid 'hump'.
My Wapping Wharf (new on my site) has the most mids of all ... as it is an Angel with a tap at the normal 9.8k output ... then wound up to 15k. It allows a standard Angel sound and a big, fat, mid boosted sound with a push/pull pot or a dpdt switch.

Many thanks.

ThePrettyDamned · March 2014

TheGuitarWeasel said:

GuyBoden said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

The other option is my Hardman Tele neck. That is pushing 10k and is far more P90 like than a standard Tele unit.

Many thanks, could you advise me what Tele neck pickup has less treble and more middle, your Hardman or HonkyTonk Angel?

I been playing for 35 years, so I know I can roll the tone pot down, but that results in less output.

Many thanks
Guy

The angel has a softer treble and more of a mid 'hump'.
My Wapping Wharf (new on my site) has the most mids of all ... as it is an Angel with a tap at the normal 9.8k output ... then wound up to 15k. It allows a standard Angel sound and a big, fat, mid boosted sound with a push/pull pot or a dpdt switch.

That sounds absolutely awesome.

OilCityPickups · March 2014

It was developed from an idea by a customer ... his custom unit finished up interesting enough to be made for the gen-pub.
It also has alnico 5 for the bottom three strings ... and alnico 2 for the top three: fat bottom end and singing sustain on the top strings.

EricTheWeary · March 2014

I suspect I will never get around to posting a picture but my Pawn Shop 51 now has an Oil City Cow T Ron Standard at the bridge. The bad news for Oil City is it is the one I picked up on here second hand ( sorry...) however it absolutely looks the dogs bo****ks and on a quick play through works massively better than the original Fender pick up in combination with the neck Texas Special.

With the coil tap it is getting quite wimpy but that in combination with the neck is great, full bucker alone is great, full bucker plus neck is great ( which was a horrible,clangy combination with the original in) and the transition to the neck alone is more natural now. For me a massive improvement and 4 very useable sounds plus one in reserve whereas it was, well it wasn't getting any use at all before.

I will have to do some proper loud playing ASAP.

OilCityPickups · March 2014

EricTheWeary said:

I suspect I will never get around to posting a picture but my Pawn Shop 51 now has an Oil City Cow T Ron Standard at the bridge. The bad news for Oil City is it is the one I picked up on here second hand ( sorry...) however it absolutely looks the dogs bo****ks and on a quick play through works massively better than the original Fender pick up in combination with the neck Texas Special.

With the coil tap it is getting quite wimpy but that in combination with the neck is great, full bucker alone is great, full bucker plus neck is great ( which was a horrible,clangy combination with the original in) and the transition to the neck alone is more natural now. For me a massive improvement and 4 very useable sounds plus one in reserve whereas it was, well it wasn't getting any use at all before.

I will have to do some proper loud playing ASAP.

Glad you like the 'Cow' ... the four conductor wiring is really only meant to help those that mix Cows with other pickups to get the phase right. Usually I sell pairs as just vintage braided as sub 3k per coil is silly for a tap :-)
Getting Oil city pickups installed ...new or second hand ... all helps the world takeover bid!

OilCityPickups · March 2014

The first public outing of the new humbucker designed with Jonathan from Feline ... look in the single pickup LP :-) The Treatment in full swing:
http://live.mytaratata.com/emission/taratata-n488/video/4794/the-treatment-highway-to-hell-2014-multicam

EricTheWeary · March 2014

TheGuitarWeasel said:

EricTheWeary said:

I suspect I will never get around to posting a picture but my Pawn Shop 51 now has an Oil City Cow T Ron Standard at the bridge. The bad news for Oil City is it is the one I picked up on here second hand ( sorry...) however it absolutely looks the dogs bo****ks and on a quick play through works massively better than the original Fender pick up in combination with the neck Texas Special.

With the coil tap it is getting quite wimpy but that in combination with the neck is great, full bucker alone is great, full bucker plus neck is great ( which was a horrible,clangy combination with the original in) and the transition to the neck alone is more natural now. For me a massive improvement and 4 very useable sounds plus one in reserve whereas it was, well it wasn't getting any use at all before.

I will have to do some proper loud playing ASAP.

Glad you like the 'Cow' ... the four conductor wiring is really only meant to help those that mix Cows with other pickups to get the phase right. Usually I sell pairs as just vintage braided as sub 3k per coil is silly for a tap :-)
Getting Oil city pickups installed ...new or second hand ... all helps the world takeover bid!

Ahh, well its a guitar that comes with a coil split knob thing anyway so no point not using it.

OilCityPickups · March 2014

EricTheWeary said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

EricTheWeary said:

I suspect I will never get around to posting a picture but my Pawn Shop 51 now has an Oil City Cow T Ron Standard at the bridge. The bad news for Oil City is it is the one I picked up on here second hand ( sorry...) however it absolutely looks the dogs bo****ks and on a quick play through works massively better than the original Fender pick up in combination with the neck Texas Special.

With the coil tap it is getting quite wimpy but that in combination with the neck is great, full bucker alone is great, full bucker plus neck is great ( which was a horrible,clangy combination with the original in) and the transition to the neck alone is more natural now. For me a massive improvement and 4 very useable sounds plus one in reserve whereas it was, well it wasn't getting any use at all before.

I will have to do some proper loud playing ASAP.

Glad you like the 'Cow' ... the four conductor wiring is really only meant to help those that mix Cows with other pickups to get the phase right. Usually I sell pairs as just vintage braided as sub 3k per coil is silly for a tap :-)
Getting Oil city pickups installed ...new or second hand ... all helps the world takeover bid!

Ahh, well its a guitar that comes with a coil split knob thing anyway so no point not using it.

Put a resistor in the coil tap connection to make it a partial tap ... that fattens things up nicely while still being all singlecoileywoily

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'Oily Towers' ... all the latest from Oil City Pickups

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