So this morning the FedEx truck dropped off a Fallout that I got from eBay. It had a bad push-pull tone pot. (Sorry if I was bidding against any of you). Ahead of time I had ordered a new Alpha pot from Amplified Parts, since the G&L Online Store was out of them. After about an hour (I work slow) I had the new pot soldered in, guitar re-strung, and everything was working. However I had soldered one set of the leads to the bottom of the pot instead of the top (the Wiring Diagram sketch has the tone pot drawn split in half so I just didn't pay enough attention to top vs bottom. I had to pull the pot to get the humbucker working, rather than push it in, and it was just wrong. Luckily it is easy to remove the pickguard and electronics with the strings on and I swapped the wiring to the correct spot. Now I have a great working Tribute Fallout. [s]The P90 is powerful but maybe not bright enough for my taste. Anyone know the best remedy to brighten up the P90 without making the humbucker any brighter? Should I just find a P90 that is a bit brighter?[/s] Edited: I am a dummy and spent the time to set the string height and everything else but forgot to set the pickup height. This P90 is pretty nice and is pretty well balanced with the humbucker.
Here she is:
It's missing the tone knob. I didn't know they put a set screw type on the push-pull pot so I didn't get the brass sleeve. The factory one has a plastic sleeve it seems and the shaft further broke when I tried to remove it. I'll either dig out a brass sleeve or just get a nice, tight fitting new split shaft knob from the G&L Shopify store.
Those Fallout Tribby’s get the best reviews, maybe one day for me. Was there an issue with the tone pot or a preferred change? I can’t wield a soldering iron to save my life, but will look yer diagrams more and see if I can learn more from what you did.
Glad to hear you found the brightness you were looking for. My only suggestion to add some spark to P90’s is a compressor pedal. I use one pretty regularly and feel it provides some sharpness. Look forward to hearing more about your Fallout.
Those Fallout Tribby’s get the best reviews, maybe one day for me. Was there an issue with the tone pot or a preferred change? I can’t wield a soldering iron to save my life, but will look yer diagrams more and see if I can learn more from what you did.
Glad to hear you found the brightness you were looking for. My only suggestion to add some spark to P90’s is a compressor pedal. I use one pretty regularly and feel it provides some sharpness. Look forward to hearing more about your Fallout.
Sam the tone pot was physically broken (and was advertised as broken - shaft just pulled completely out). I just wanted to wire it the same as factory. I just messed up when I first installed it by soldering the red and white wire to the bottom row rather than the top row.
I hadn't thought of using a compressor pedal to benefit the pickup tones. I have been contemplating trying one out, though, just because the amp I currently use is an Egnater Tweaker 40 and when I get it adjusted "just right" it's a little too piercing on top. I'm guessing a compression pedal would help here rather than modifying an amp that I already sunk too much money into. haha
I think I'm getting half decent at soldering. For guitar stuff I started with pickups and wiring, then moved up to soldering in an op-amp socket in a tube screamer. Now I think I want to move up to building an amp once I decide what model kit to buy (or loose parts). My soldering won't win any awards but I don't have to show it off either... it's usually hidden from view.
Bigjim, I'm glad you got your Fallout fixed up. I also bought a used Tribute Fallout a few years ago and after spending some time on setting it up it played and sounded great. The link below is to a post I made on this board to a piece of music I made where all the guitar parts were played on my Fallout. Check it out if you are interested. Be aware that several people responded to my post that they had problems getting my tune to play; I hope it works for you:
Nice tune, Kit. It did not play for me using the Chrome browser but it allowed me to download the mp3 and play it with Media Player.
I'm actually using this Fallout more than my other guitars right now. The newness has not worn off.
I did get a compressor and it helped with the sound through my Egnater but I've been using a Tonex pedal through the effects loop of a Fender Mustang GTX50 on a clean channel. I think eventually I'll either get a clean amp like a Seymour Duncan PowerStage for the Tonex and play though a cabinet or just get some powered full range speakers. I found some Fender amp models that both pickups sound great through (and some Marshall & Dumble models but the Fender models I'm digging the most). I feel a little blasphemous but I'm not giving up on tubes... just dinking with some digital. The technology is getting pretty good.
The Fallout definitely grew on me when it comes to playing time. I try to rotate my guitars so none gets too neglected. Occasionally when I play one that I haven't touched for a while I rediscover why I like the guitar in the first place.
My best amp is a Swart Atomic Space Tone, but it is too much of a hassle to amp up for recording. When I record I tend to use a Vox Valvetronix which is a digital amp with one vacuum tube at the input stage. It has a line-out so it is the simplest to just plug into a digital recorder.
