I am amazed

H

Helldogg

New member
I just had to pick my jaw up off the floor again. I did a deal with Frank Falbo for an Ibanez guitar, an RG 550 he asked me what pups I wanted in it I said whatever you have. I told him an idea of what I was looking for. He recommended some Ibanez INF pups he'd swapped magents in.

I laughed and said INFS yuck! He said to try em and if I didn't like em he'd swap. OMG I plugged in the guitar and really honestly could not believe it. They sounded GREAT the neck was absolute magic, I have never had a better sound. The bridge was airy and crisp with a great growl.

Now the funny part, I wasn't into the 550 (not a maple neck guy) he traded back and gave me a beautiful Ibanez saber. He took the INFS back with the 550. The saber is h/s/s/ so I couldn't use the neck :( as I didn't want to route the guitar ( even though Frank generously offered to do it) instead he gave me an IBZ F2 for the bridge that he tinkered with.

WOW! Even better than the INF Punchy, toneful and smooth as glass and agressive as hell, he also coil tapped it for me. He also did a noname neck single the tweaked for it. The best single I have EVER played, twangy and with a really cool quack I just love!

I don't mean to sound so gushy, but really I am amazed by the way Frank took what I considered garbage and turned them into some of the best pups I have heard.

These put my other pups to shame. From now on Frank is my pup guy! I think he really can nail any tone, I told him what I was wanting and he nailed it not once, but TWICE and with bottom end pups no less!!!

Seriously folks if you need pup advice he is the man! Next pups I get are going to Frank for tweaking. I wish the major manufacturers could do what he does. I have always been happy but un satisfied with the pups I ve had in my guitars. Frank really got me in the zone and I thank him very much.

Oh BTW Frank if you read this, how about redoing all my pups?? :)
 
Re: I am amazed

Wow, thanks for the kind words. What did I do? It's a long story, but..

For starters, I made hybrids from both INF's. They have a typical "neck/bridge" wind, so I used the stronger bridge pickup coils toward the neck. So both pickups read around 12.4k, but with stronger 43AWG neck side coils, and weaker 42AWG bridge side coils.

The neck pup was Ceramic (yuck!) so I replaced it with an A5, but it's custom Airbuckered. There's more air on that neck side coil than on the bridge side coil. That evens out the coil volumes a bit, and adds dimension. The bridge side coil is almost fully magnetized, which blends well with the middle single coil. As a humbucker it's smooth and thick, maybe a cross between a Santana tone and the Air Norton. But with more clarity and treble cut due to the coil mismatch.

The bridge was A5 and I replaced it with a large ceramic magnet, with "vari-air" in that the magnet is angled slightly. Ceramic doesn't "air" the same as Alnico. Ceramic is a more rigid field, so it's more like simply lowering the pickup. It just reduces output a little. It is not the same transformation that you get from Airing or degaussing Alnico. On the low strings, the bridge side coil is a little stronger, and on the high strings, the neck side coil is stronger. That, in addition to the hybrid wind, makes for a "Distortion" pickup that's versatile enough for all kinds of rock and metal, not just the "brick wall" sound you get from a typical Distortion pickup.

I knew what he wanted, so it was easy to design it that way. The reason you don't see this kind of stuff on factory pups is simply because it's too involved for production.

I have no doubt that the Duncan Custom Shop could wind a pickup exactly like what Ted wanted, without having to use all the tricks I did. I just used the tricks to maximize what I had to work with, and the result was great.

His Saber has the IBZUSA F1 (not F2) which is wound near Super Distortion specs. So I replaced the regular Ceramic with a tall Distortion Ceramic plus Vari-Air.

It's all stuff that a DIY'er can do. The variable air gaps were just the fine tuning. The hybrid and magnet swaps were 80% of the difference. So if you've got a set of INF's feel free to duplicate the procedure. It's a vast improvement.
 
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