Orange Amps Forum

I want to change the pickups in the strat I just purchased and was wondering if you guys can point me in the right direction? I play Blues,Classic rock, and Christian contempoary style of music. I was thinking maybe lolar or lindy fralins. I want to have that vintage strat sound but also would like to use my Blackstone overdrive pedal to get some nice crunch going on also. Anyone have any experience with these pickups ? Any help would be greatly appreciated.


Charles.

Dimarzio Area 61's or 67's. ~$65 each. Noiseless and sound like strat pups. Very nice...

Hi Charles

I know exactly what you're after because that's what I do with my Strat, and also have a Blackstone...

... i've been recommending Toneriders to everyone and anyone here. I put a set of their Pure Vintage pickups in my Strat, and it absolutely nails the classic 50s Strat sound.

Cleans are outstanding, and the overdriven sounds are very good also. The pickup set is really nicely balanced too, giving you the perfect quack sounds. Bridge is useable and not ice-pick sharp, neck is toneful and woody... heck even the middle is useable.

To top it off, they should be cheaper than Lollar or Fralin. Lollar & Fralin also do excellent pickups, in my book the Toneriders are just as good. I got 3 Strat pickups for £60 ($90 USD).

I think something like that would be one of the best choices you could make.

I like the Dimarzio area's as well...but for real single tone goodness...look at Sheptone....thats what I have in my relic strat and love them...

irish_admiral wrote:Hi Charles

I know exactly what you're after because that's what I do with my Strat, and also have a Blackstone...

... i've been recommending Toneriders to everyone and anyone here. I put a set of their Pure Vintage pickups in my Strat, and it absolutely nails the classic 50s Strat sound.

Cleans are outstanding, and the overdriven sounds are very good also. The pickup set is really nicely balanced too, giving you the perfect quack sounds. Bridge is useable and not ice-pick sharp, neck is toneful and woody... heck even the middle is useable.

To top it off, they should be cheaper than Lollar or Fralin. Lollar & Fralin also do excellent pickups, in my book the Toneriders are just as good. I got 3 Strat pickups for £60 ($90 USD).

I think something like that would be one of the best choices you could make.

A big +1 for the Toneriders,

I (on Joe's advice - cheers!) dropped some Pure Vintage Toneriders into a Strat and couldn't be happier. Pretty much ditto to all Joe has said about them above - I'm a fan of the middle position generally as well as positions 2/4 and it really nails those classic strat tones.

Hey Joe thanks for the advice, I may give those toneriders a try. I listened to some sound samples of the Dimazio area pups and I was real impressed with those also. I had a set of Sheptone hmbuckers in my Les paul custom and they were great but I have no idea what the single coils sound like for the strat,although they would be another option.

Charles.

Well, i really liked the tone of the new road worn strats from Fender. They have Tex-Mex pickups in them.
So i ordered a set and will try them in my own strat. Will comment as soon as they are built in and tested.
Since they're not that high priced, it's not really taking a lot of risk....

Grtz, Bert.

cbutler wrote:Hey Joe thanks for the advice, I may give those toneriders a try. I listened to some sound samples of the Dimazio area pups and I was real impressed with those also. I had a set of Sheptone hmbuckers in my Les paul custom and they were great but I have no idea what the single coils sound like for the strat,although they would be another option.

Charles.

If you get them in the UK, dangleberry used to do a return policy if you didn't like them. The Tonerider clips aren't that great, but trust me, they stand up alongside any of the other pickup makers.

Tonerider was started by an English guy who moved to Hong Kong (that's why they're cheap) - I found some of his old mates on a forum when I was researching them. He had previously done custom builds for them. I guess he just took a few of the best designs and made lots of them for cheap... not cheap components though.

Foef wrote:Well, i really liked the tone of the new road worn strats from Fender. They have Tex-Mex pickups in them.
So i ordered a set and will try them in my own strat. Will comment as soon as they are built in and tested.
Since they're not that high priced, it's not really taking a lot of risk....

Grtz, Bert.

I too was very surprised at how nice the Road Worn Strat I played was. I didn't have high expectations... I was shocked that the bridge pup was NOT ice-pick brittle and piercing, and was also very surprised at how good the middle pup and blends sounded. Overall, I was very impressed at the whole setup of the guitar -- good action, very good feel on the neck. My only complaint was the tuners were a little bit weak -- I tuned from standard to DADABE, and down to CGDGBE, and back to standard -- and they half the tuners were overly touchy (as in, tightened way to easy), and the other half were way too loose. Probably just a simple adjustment. Other complaint (other than the look ) was the way the frets were dressed... just a little bit sloppy when compared to a pricier Fender, such as my '52 Hot Rod Tele, or any of the Americans that come from the Custom Shop.

Fralin Vintage Hots, Suhr FL Classics and Grosh Vintage 60's (Fat 60 in the bridge) are my favorite single coils out of all the sets I've owned myself or tried in a customers guitar.