Disappointing TC PolyTune 3 QC

Musicman20

Just had a new sealed PolyTune 3 delivered. 3 issues:

- wonky screen fitment,
- thin paint with a number of marks and scratches on it,
- cannot for the life of me unscrew the bottom to get to the switches....it's absolutely jammed. 

After hearing about the footswitch issues I'm starting to think I should get the TU-3W.

Wazmeister

The TU3w is superb with a great buffer too

Grunfeld

Musicman20 said:

 ...I'm starting to think I should get the TU-3W.

I can't think of a single proper reason why I need one of those other than I find them so nice to look at. 

Musicman20

I've had the odd issue with TC products but nothing major, until now.

I've even got their bass rig and it is superb. Fantastic build quality. The RC4 for the amp head is built like a tank.

This does make me wonder whether to bother trying the recent Flashback and Hall of fame upgrades. This new Polytune 3 feels a little flimsy.

I had a Boss TU-3 for years and it always felt like it would never break. Tuners have to have a very rugged chassis and switch. The last Polytune I had was fine but this one feels different.

Alnico

They've been bought out by Behringer.

The TU-3 is world class, built like a tank by a reliable company and I've never seen or heard of a bad one.

Musicman20

Alnico said:

They've been bought out by Behringer.

The TU-3 is world class, built like a tank by a reliable company and I've never seen or heard of a bad one.

Yeah, I was disappointed to hear this a few years back. I hoped it wouldn't change things. This might be a rogue pedal, but even the packaging feels and looks cheap. The box is some weird textured black card and it has stained the pedal which makes it look even worse with the scratches. They don't even put it in a cheap bag.

If this is the way things are with them, I'll keep my pre-buy-out gear from them and go for Boss, which has always been exceptionally good quality.

ICBM

They haven't really been bought by Behringer, both companies are owned by the same overall holding company. (Technical difference I know.)

In any case, the drop in TC quality predates this.

Alnico

ICBM said:

They haven't really been bought by Behringer, both companies are owned by the same overall holding company. (Technical difference I know.)

In any case, the drop in TC quality predates this.

Ah,..........My mistake.
Thanks for the correction, I genuinely didn't know that.

ICBM

The irony is that if they had really been bought by Behringer, the quality might well have gone up...

Alnico

Musicman20 said:

Alnico said:

They've been bought out by Behringer.

The TU-3 is world class, built like a tank by a reliable company and I've never seen or heard of a bad one.

Yeah, I was disappointed to hear this a few years back. I hoped it wouldn't change things. This might be a rogue pedal, but even the packaging feels and looks cheap. The box is some weird textured black card and it has stained the pedal which makes it look even worse with the scratches. They don't even put it in a cheap bag.

If this is the way things are with them, I'll keep my pre-buy-out gear from them and go for Boss, which has always been exceptionally good quality.

I use a Boss GT100 now and the built in tuner is very good. Instead of hitting pedal number 1 and 2 together to activate it, I chose to buy a Boss FS-5L which goes into the 'Sub-Exp' jack and can be assigned to just about anything. Mine is assigned to remotely and instantly operate the on board tuner which then uses both of the massive screens.

If I didn't have this pretty fantastic system, I'd have another TU-3 in a shot.

The thing I always come back to is the Jam Session we had after the guitar show in 2015 in Birmingham.
My Peavey Solo Special 120 (Now owned by @ICBM ) played up and so did my Zoom G3 so I ended up using Ian's back up amp, a Fender Rivera Era Studio 50 with no effects, just what was on the amp. I was using a 25ft lead but I had my TU-3 with me and wanted a tuner so I used 2 x 25ft leads on that makeshift stage.
The sound I got from my Oil City powered Telecaster into that Fender amp was so good, everyone said at the end of the night......"Either Ian Buys your Tele or you buy his amp, they sound amazing together !"
(As it goes I took the amp home that night and bought it.)

Through 50ft of guitar lead, neither one of them expensive ones, I've always attributed a large part of that to the buffer in the TU-3. It sparkled like a Tele should and lost absolutely nothing through all that cable.

Maybe I'm wrong about what happened that night, there was a lot of beer going on but I'd certainly use one if I wasn't using this GT100 for everything right now, even if part of that is placebo.

For £65 they're the best gear investment I know of................in fact I might just get one as a back up anyway.

ICBM

Alnico said:

My Peavey Solo Special 120 (Now owned by @ICBM ) played up

That was that nasty DIY headphone socket which was doing that… now removed and the hole plugged. If it hadn't had that I would never have believed you .

One of the few amps I would have no worry about using with no backup.

Alnico said:

Fender Rivera Era Studio 50

Those are really great, and were some of the first truly good-sounding and reliable solid-state amps made - and definitely the first by Fender!

Alnico

ICBM said:

Alnico said:

My Peavey Solo Special 120 (Now owned by @ICBM ) played up

That was that nasty DIY headphone socket which was doing that… now removed and the hole plugged. If it hadn't had that I would never have believed you .

One of the few amps I would have no worry about using with no backup.

Alnico said:

Fender Rivera Era Studio 50

Those are really great, and were some of the first truly good-sounding and reliable solid-state amps made - and definitely the first by Fender!

Yeah......the peavey fault confused me until you told me what it was but I'm glad you're happy with it.

I sold that Fender amp back to @IanSavage in a moment of daftness and whilst I'm Glad he got it back i will admit I do miss it.

Ian if you read this and you want to sell it back to me again anytime, let me know.

It was quite simply the best SS amp I've ever heard.