The LAST P90 question...from me anyway.

[madgrinder]

Will P90's fit here? http://i19.ebayimg.com/02/i/01/f1/26/ec_1.JPG

[picker]

Not the standard size P-90s, no. I have seen the Peavey guitar you have up close, and the pickups are not the same shape/size as a P-90. I think maybe the humbucker-sized ones will fit.

 

I kinda wonder if you will hear a major difference between the P-90s and the ones already in the guitar. Both are single-coils. Let us know what you hear if you make the change.

 

Vande

[madgrinder]

BTW, it's an early 80's USA Peavey T-15...20 frets, short scale like a Rick.

[madgrinder]

I need a "spanky" 70's porn-flick kind of sound for playing some ska/punk.

[webe123]

Originally posted by madgrinder:

BTW, it's an early 80's USA Peavey T-15...20 frets, short scale like a Rick.

Man! I used to own a T-15! Matter of fact, it was my very first US made guitar that I could afford! The dealer in my area was a HUGE peavey dealer and I got it for a killer price. Later on, I traded it in for a peavey T-60. Those (the T-60s) were as heavy as lead, but made great boat anchors!

[Guitarzan]

Originally posted by madgrinder:

I need a "spanky" 70's porn-flick kind of sound for playing some ska/punk.

now there is a tone description that says it all!!!

[Guitar Geezer]

Originally posted by Guitarzan:

Originally posted by madgrinder:

I need a "spanky" 70's porn-flick kind of sound for playing some ska/punk.

now there is a tone description that says it all!!!

Gonna remember that one

[James-Italy]

Madgrinder- don't ever worry about asking too many gear questions on this forum. Lots of very helpful people.

 

I didn't answer your original thread because I have the same P90 equipped guitar that Caevan has, a Les Paul Studio Gem, and Caevan covered it all. P90s in my guitar gives me a different twist but still retains the Les Paul-ish tone, at least to my ears. Probably not the best " 'spanky' 70's porn-flick kind of sound for playing some ska/punk", but it would get you a lot closer than a Les Paul with Humbuckers. If they fit, P90s in a guitar like you've shown you should get you plenty of porn!

[Guitar Geezer]

Originally posted by madgrinder:

Will P90's fit here? http://i19.ebayimg.com/02/i/01/f1/26/ec_1.JPG

Send it to me...I got a Dremel..and some time on my hands

 

But then.....you may not get it back for a few months while I work the bugs out of it

 

Oh yeah..just to make things more complicated

Look at this one for $199

http://www.fender.com/misc/winternamm2004/squier/web/Tele_Custom.jpg

Duncan Design P-90 type, string thru bridge

LP style vol and tone knobs.....

 

Plays very good

A tele with cajones

 

So many guitars

So little $$$$$

[sigh]

[Blue Strat]

If you decide to get rid of those Super Ferrite pickups, send 'em to me! I love those things!!

 

I had a Peavey Patriot with those in it and like a dumbass, I sold it. It's the only guitar I've even had (aside from my current blue Strat) that could do the twangy intro to Smells Like Teen Spirit. Just roll the volume knob back to about 2 or 3 for the intro, then turn it back up for that massive grind!

[Werewolf by Night]

http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/icons/icon14.gif Hey! I also had one of those early '80s Peavey T-15s, an all-natural, all-maple one, as my first US-made, doesn't-$#?%-too-bad, playable, tunable electric guitar! I kinda miss it sometimes. I was still a kid, and worked hard that Summer of '83 for a farm/produce store to buy it, and a (horrible) solid-state Peavey Deuce 2x12 combo. I used an original, vintage Electro-Harmonix Big-Muff-"Pi" and an Arion flanger with that rig!

 

That axe has a very short scale, 23.5", to be exact. The low strings will always have a tendencey to sound a bit tubby because of that, especially in standard tuning. You almost need to either tune up a whole-step, and/or use heavier gauge strings (that's actually how I got started using "elevens"). But the high-strings, the plain ones, can sound sooo fffaaatt and round it's almost wrong! I also found that the volume and tone controls on the T-15 had their own "sweet spots"; turn your volume down somewhere between 7&1/2 and 9&3/4, with the neck or neck & middle pickup selection, and you may hear a subtle clarity and cleaning-up in the low-mids, which may aid you in your quest for "spanky" '70s porn-flick kind of sounds for playing some ska/punk. Then set tone to taste.

 

http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/icons/icon2.gif O.K., back to the "soapbar" question:

 

Two things here:

 

(1) IF a standard humbucker will fit in there, then the Gibson P-94 or Seymour Duncan Phat Cat will fit in there. (Don't even concern yourself with "standard" P-90s here, there'd be too much difference to rout and drill for, and direct replacement pickguards for your T-15 are likely hard to come by, other than having one custom made.)

 

Standard humbuckers mounted in pickguards use a center-to-center mounting-screw spacing of 3" to 3&5/32" (I measured on several guitars to arrive at this rather ambiguous figure). The space needed in the pickguard opening for the pickups themselves is about 1&1/2" x 2&3/4", with a 3/16" radius in the rounded corners.

 

Now, you need to consider two things here: the mounting-screw spacing, and the size and shape of the pickup cavity routed in the wood underneath your pickguard. IF they'll fit a standard humbucker, the pickups noted above will fit fine. IF the screw spacing is fine, but the route is not, it could be routed to fit. If nothing will fit, then you have to decide just how much hassle and money this refitting for new pickups is worth!

 

(2) Try the control-tweaks mentioned above, and try out a few Electro Harmonix Small Stone phase shifter pedals. (They're notorious for varying, so try several, original-vintage and new-reissues, to see if you can't find THE ONE that suits you. Be sure to try both switch-positions on each pedal you scope out, too.) They sound killer with single-coils in general, and "soapbar"-stylees in particular! Very reggae/ska/'70s pone-flix! I got told that mine sounded "like a reggae-organ" together!

[fantasticsound]

Originally posted by webe123:

Originally posted by madgrinder:

BTW, it's an early 80's USA Peavey T-15...20 frets, short scale like a Rick.

Man! I used to own a T-15! Matter of fact, it was my very first US made guitar that I could afford! The dealer in my area was a HUGE peavey dealer and I got it for a killer price. Later on, I traded it in for a peavey T-60. Those (the T-60s) were as heavy as lead, but made great boat anchors!

I'm currently rewiring our T-60. (My parents bought it for my brother in 1978. I purchased it from him in 1984 and have owned it ever since. Needs a fret job in the worst way, too.

[Werewolf by Night]

Hey, Neil- are the pickups in your T-60 the same size as those in a T-15? (I know they're not the same pickups.) If so, what're the dimensions? Ant that of the mounting-screw spacing?

 

Do they mount to the 'guard, or are they in mounting-rings?

[Blue Strat]

Originally posted by Caevan O'Shite:

That axe has a very short scale, 23.5", to be exact. The low strings will always have a tendencey to sound a bit tubby because of that, especially in standard tuning. You almost need to either tune up a whole-step, and/or use heavier gauge strings (that's actually how I got started using "elevens"). But the high-strings, the plain ones, can sound sooo fffaaatt and round it's almost wrong!

So, Caevan,

 

Do you think that the Patriot had a similar scale length? I was thinking it was close to 25" or so, but I could be wrong. Maybe the short scale length is why Cobain played those Mustangs, Jaguars, and Jazz Masters? I've been wanting a Duo-Sonic or Mustang for so long.

[Your Ad Here]

I had a t-40 bass for a while. Heavy as hell and sounded like shit! It did play in tune though - I'll give it that.

[Werewolf by Night]

Originally posted by bluestrat:

"Do you think that the Patriot had a similar scale length? I was thinking it was close to 25" or so, but I could be wrong. Maybe the short scale length is why Cobain played those Mustangs, Jaguars, and Jazz Masters? I've been wanting a Duo-Sonic or Mustang for so long."

I don't know what a Patriot's nominal scale-length is for sure, but I'm pretty sure that it wasn't as short as the T-15's 23&1/2". I'd guess that it was more like a Strat's 25&1/2", or at least a Les Pauly 24&3/4".

 

I think that the shorter scale-length on some of those Fenders may have been a good part of the feel and sound that he (and many other players) liked 'em, definitely. Duo Sonics and T-15s seem to be from the same neighborhood!

 

Yet another old original vintage guitar that I should have bought- an old '50s Duo Sonic that had been refinished, but was otherwise all original! Damn... what was the matter with me?

[fantasticsound]

Originally posted by Caevan O'Shite:

Hey, Neil- are the pickups in your T-60 the same size as those in a T-15? (I know they're not the same pickups.) If so, what're the dimensions? Ant that of the mounting-screw spacing?

 

Do they mount to the 'guard, or are they in mounting-rings?

I don't know if the outer dimensions are the same, but the T-60 pickup had pickup mounting rings that mounted in four, rather than two, places. All were spring loaded, so I assume they intended players to alter the angle of the pickups as well as the overall height. Changing pickups would definitely require new rings. I'll have to measure them tonight.

[Werewolf by Night]

So, madgrinder- I'm beginning to think that you should embrace the T-15 for what it is, the way it is, a cousin of vintage Fender Duo Sonics and Gibson 3/4-scale Les Paul Juniors and Specials. Cool budget short-scale electrics with maverick attitudes!

 

http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/icons/icon3.gif Here's another idea for you:

 

http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/icons/icon2.gif If you can get your hands on a T.C. Electronics "Chorus-Flager + Pitch Modulator" pedal, there' a cool little trick that I discovered, that can take any guitar and add some Fendery cluck and scooped-mid twang:

 

In the "Pitch Modulator"-mode (there's a three-position toggle-switch), if you use both of the stereo outputs into a Y-cord or two mixer inputs panned together for double-mono, you can dial-in a variabley "snarky", out-of-phase tone without any modulation-sweep by turning the "blend"-knob from chorus towards pitch-modulation.

 

The signals present at the two outputs are out of phase with each other, so the chorus and flange effects will disappear when they're mixed together, and the above effect is made possible.

_________________________________________________

 

Neil-

 

I love being able to adjust the axial-angle of a pickup, most especially humbuckers!

 

The neck-humbucker in my Les Paul actually has too shallow of an angle to it, so that the pickup's distance from the strings is greater over the inside/"slug"-coil, and closer over the outside/"screw"-coil. (Normally, the rings are cut so as to even-out the pickup-to-string distance between the two coils.) A little of that '90s production inconsistenecy that people rag on Gibson for...

 

I tried to compensate for this by bending an oposite angle into the pickup's metal brackets, and guess what? I lost a lot of what I liked about my neck-pickup sound, and gained a lot of congested mids! When I bent it back so that the pickup was "wrong" again, with the "screw-coil" getting a stronger signal, it sounded the way I wanted it to, the way it did when I bought it! Almost, in a way, kinda like a Strat's neck-pickup, but bigger and fuller and with a little more impact.