Jon Moore Custom P-90

Pair of P-90 pickups with Alnico V magnets, 9500 turns on neck, 10500 turns with 3-wire output on bridge for out-of-phase cabling. Opposite winding/polarity on neck and bridge pickups.

All specs defined by Jon himself after exchanging a few e-mails. Jon really took time to understand what kind of sound I wanted, and offered several options. The process of defining what I wanted with Jon was a real pleasure.

Special mention for building : I am in electronics engineering, generally working on very small series, handmade equipment for train control systems. From my professional point of view, Jon's work is simply perfect : the pickups I received had first choice components and wires, and global mounting seems sturdy and reliable.

Needed a pair of P-90 pickups to change the stock pickups of a Hagstrom F-200P, which sounded a bit muddy. Moreover, the stock pickups had same winding and polarity, and kept humming even in bridge + neck position.

Sound : WOW.

Sound is articulate and clear, with very good dynamics. Both pickups sound subtle and bright, very balanced, with crispy treble and round basses. They really interact with my tube amp, yielding any kind of sound from blues to rock and indie, even suitable for jazz. Out-of-phase combination of both pickups sounds neat, kind of funky.

I've been playing on and off for 20 years, in several styles (blues, indie, bossa-nova, trying to play jazz) and currently own about 5 mid-range electric guitars (One Telecaster, several Hagstroms, one Yamaha AF-75). This pickup is exactly what I wanted.

Chose it after echanging a few an e-mails with Jon: he is a gentleman and for sure knows its job.

I asked John to underwind me a pair of p90's, 9500 winds in the bridge, 9000 in the neck, for my 67 special SG RI.

67 SG Special Reissue GOTW

Awesome, the underwind reduces output a bit, but cleans and tightens the bass and make the guitar sound a bit more "sparkly". Crunchy stuff sounds better too as the bass notes are clearer. Outstanding balance, clarity and tone.

I've had Gibson, Lollar, EB MM90's, and Rio Grande's, I like these best by far! Great sound, great build quality.

had jon wind these to try and recapture the sound of the old "staple" style pickups.. talk about throwing someone a curveball? jon didnt flinch and researched the parameters and wound something truly special.

cant tell you the specs, because i am not really knowledgeable in that area.. but they sound simply incredible.. look different from stock p90's because of the magnet poles

but they fit a stock soapbar space very snuggly

put them in an asian copy of "tele" F hole semihollow body guitar.
replaced the stock pickups and no other mods were needed.

no other changes made to the overall guitar because the neck is chunky and the pots/wiring were decent to begin with

10 + all the way

great clarity in the neck.. very sweet sounding. over drive nicely and get rough edged driving the amp unto T Bone territory easiily

very nice jazzy sound when rolled off. extremely versatile.

bridge is hotter without being harsh

30 year player. have spent years tinkering with guitar parts and pickups to find just the right combinations. play jazz, blues, rock.
you can do anything with these, and they dont sound like every other pickup. will give you a unique sound

jon is totally righteous and a pleasure to deal with. he became interested in this project and thought it through. cannot say enough about him

highest rating possible. great bang for the buck

Custom wound P-90 neck and bridge pickups. I had Jon over wind the bridge pickup 10%, and he used Alnico magnet cores because I needed something meaty for a heavy rock/metal sound.

Jay Turser SG Copy

All I can say is go out and buy these pickups. These are by far the best pickups I have ever purchased. Period. The stock Chinese P-90 pickups in the Jay Turser were adequate, but the tone left much to be desired. When compared to my Gibson Les Paul Special with P-90s, they sounded a bit smeared and lacked definition and clarity that I got with my Gibson. When I replaced these pickups with the Jon Moore customs, I was blown away. The sound improved 1000%. It literally sounded like someone had removed a heavy blanket that was draped over my amp. The sound was clear, bright, focused and extremely present. The guitar itself became much more responsive to my playing and actually breaks up better with a nicer overdriven distortion when compared to my Les Paul Special pickups at the same gain settings. I absolutely LOVE these pickups. The improvement in tone is better than any tube swapping or effect pedal placed inline between the guitar and amp. You can't get any better than this. And after picking up my Turser SG for $200 used, these pickups have transformed this budget sounding guitar into a real player that rivals instruments costing 10 times as much.

These pickups are absolutely the best pickups I've heard, and I've been playing for over 25 years. I wouldn't hesitate to pick up another pair if I needed pickups for a guitar. If I decide to build my own guitar again I will definitely by Jon Moore's pickups. They really are that good. If my guitar was lost or stolen, I would cry for a day and then scour the local pawn shops looking for a replacement that I could slap these pickups into. For anyone looking to get a quality instrument with tone for days on the cheap, I can't recommend more highly picking up a Jay Turser SG for $250 and slapping a pair of these pickups in it. You will definitely not regret it. And your total out of pocket will still be less than $400. Now that's a deal.

Hand made and custom pair of P-90s. Bought off of eBay from the guy himself. AlNiCo IV 10k and V 11k magnets. We discussed what I like to play/ listen to... what the guitar was and he then made me a pair of KILLER pickups.

Peavey Firenza (slab mahogany body with maple bolt-on neck). Gotoh P-90s installed with Chinese ?!?!?! pots and caps. All have been replaced with QUALITY American and vintage caps. Very vintage style wiring with Tone attenuator and Volume Bleed circuts. Bumble Bees and Oil Caps.

These pickups are clear and LOUD. The tweaks with the Vol bleed and all helps alot... these PU certainly sound like a really really tight Tele pickup that has eaten one too many twinkies. It has a certain lushness to it but plenty of bark and spank.

Back it off and it certainly rolls into some tasty Jazz tones.

These are certainly high quality pickups that come from an artisan who gets it. Very much in the realm of Fralin, Lollar, Bare Knuckle. This guy and the REAL Bill Lawrence are all you EVER need for pickups.

Between Jon Moore and Bill Lawrence... you don't need another pickup manufacturer.

This guy (www.tonefordays.com) just gets it. Vintage, hand-guided work at a VERY fair and reasonable price. He talks to you about your insturment... what you are looking for... what do you listen to?

Of course, there are other really solid pickup companies out there. A pair, direct from him... after a few email consults... is $130.00 plus shipping. Entirely vintage build and vibe.

You cannot go wrong with this guy. These pickups certainly made a very nice guitar with some really cheap crap for the guts into something that is very hot and fun to play. I would absolutely get another set from him... see what he does with an off-setting of some tasty humbuckers...

May need to find another Heritage Les Paul that needs some love again...

Hand wound Alinco V magnet Neck and Bridge P-90s.
Slight overwound for the bridge and underwind for the neck.

1972 SG III (super resonent striped finish)
Replacing overwound humbuckers.
Wanted punchy clarity from top to bottom.

High output yet no muddyness. I play crunky rawk and roll. These things sing when carressed and scream when thrashed. What mare can I ask for? I've been dropping everything and anything in this old SG for a while (it's very abused so I don't mind routing or drilling in it, though as said above the wood is beautifully resonent) and this is the tone I've been seeking all along.
I told Jon that I wanted pickeups that would sound robby robertson if he played in teh Hot Snakes. Somehow he knew exactly what I was talking about and hooked me up with a perfectly matched pair of scorchers.

I'm going to drop JS Moore pickeups in all of my guitars. No lie. I'm thinking of buying a tacocaster soon to drop in his tele sets and I'm confident it will growel circles around my buddies 77 US tele.
Ferthermore jon is an awesome guy to work with and I love that he is in Hamilton. Effing right.

P90 Alnico V Neck and Alnico II Bridge.
Neck: 8 Ohm Bridge: 8.5 Ohm

PRS Sopbar SE
Bridge and Neck
Stock P90


Needed something that would show the instruments natural sound.

Straight into a Fender Twin Reverb. When pushing the amp these pickups are just insane. The neck is big, round and in your face. I can go from clean JazzTown to BluesVille simply by turning the volume up or down.
The bridge however takes you from heavy Punk Street to 70s Rock Avenue.
Even trough my $100 Kustom crap amp at home these pickups sound good

If they were destroyed I would not need to buy new ones because they come with lifetime warranty. If stolen I would call Jon Moore in a heartbeat. I have been playing for 10 years and tried many of the big pickup gurus and Jon is second to none.
Excellent build quality and customer service. He will wind them anyway you want for a price almost anyone can afford.

If you???re just reading this review to get the ???short and sweet??? low down of these pickups, then here it is: My J S Moore Pickups are outstanding. I really can't think of how the quality or customer service could be improved upon. These are the best P-90???s that I have ever played. Jon Moore did an outstanding job in both product and communication for an unbelievable price. Do yourself a favor and go to http://www.tonefordays.com, send Jon an email describing what instrument you have, what it sounds like, what rig you use, and what kind of sound you would like to get out of it. He will wind an awesome set of coils, custom tailored to YOU.

You'll see that I gave a rating of 9 for these pickups. I want to give them a 10, but 10 gets thrown around so much, I fear that it has lost all meaning. So don't really pay attention to my numbers, read what I've written to get a feel for the quality of these pickups.


And then here is the longer review ???
This is a custom wound set of JS Moore P-90 soapbars. They have AlNiCo 2 magnets, are scatterwound, and have approximately 10,500 winds each. The lead wire for each is braided single conductor. The finish wire was accessible for me so that I could wire the pickups for series operation. I did not bother to measure the impedance of the pickups, and I really don???t think that value is all that important as you can order whatever you like.
The pickups are solidly constructed and just ooze quality.

Again, J S Moore pickups are custom wound to the user???s tastes. It really doesn???t get any better than that. I contacted Jon, told him what I needed in these pickups and asked his opinion. He got right back to me with what he felt was best for my needs, built the pickups, and shipped them right off.

This is where things get interesting. These pickups were designed to help fill-out a $160, Chinese, Jay-Turser SG-Jr style copy. The guitar is called a JT-45-2. The regular JT 45 has one dogear pickup with a wraparound tailpiece. My version, has two P-90 soapbars. Why did I buy this cheapie guitar? I bought it because I wanted something in an SG shape with a wraparound bridge and two P-90???s and I didn???t want to go broke doing it. The playability of the guitar is excellent by the way. The only small issue is the intonation and that will soon be remedied with a Badass-style bridge. I showed pictures of the wood inside the guitar to Jon and he agreed with me that it was most likely basswood. I described to him how, when played unplugged, this guitar had a brighter and more articulate tone than my mahogany SG faded special. I also described to Jon what my rig was like, how I usually run it, and what type of music I played. Jon got back to me right quick and recommended AlNiCo 2 Scatterwound and overwound.

I???ve been playing and gigging for 13 years now. As said before, these pickups sound unreal. I play heavy/hard rock music and these pickups have all of the guts, meat, and presence that I was looking for. Rhythms sound thick and full and leads cut through with liquid tone. These P-90???s complement the natural tone of the instrument beautifully.
All of the tones I can get from these pickups, bridge, neck, parallel, and in series, sound fantastic. They sound far superior to the stock Gibson P-90???s that I have in my ???93 Gibson LP.

Again, do yourself a BIG favor and go to http://www.tonefordays.com, send Jon an email describing what instrument you have, what it sounds like, what rig you use, and what kind of sound you would like to get out of it. He will wind an awesome set of coils, custom tailored to YOU. You simply can???t get this type of quality and service from so many of those other big name companies out there.