Jon Kammerer Customs
Building premium guitars since 1995
Phone: 319-795-2631
Jon Kammerer Customs
222 Timea St.
Keokuk, IA 52632
222 Timea St.
Keokuk, IA 52632
Tone Pod
What is a Tone Pod? Well, kind of a long story. Initially when I started making electric guitars I didn't like the look of cheap plastic pickup mounting rings. So I directly mounted the pickups to the top of the guitar body. Over time, the stress of the pickup spring could cause the screw head to chip the paint. So after a few years, I started mounting the pickups to the cover plate on the back of the guitar. It worked well, and worked as intended. However, while pulling off the cover plate on the back one day, I thought wouldn't it be nice if I could just quickly disconnect the pickups from the rest of the wiring as I've already got the pickup removed from the body with the cover plate. At the time I was just starting to work with Vaughn Skow and I was already using Seymour Duncan's on my guitars. Vaughn said he would be happy to build his custom pickups for me to match Duncan wiring, so I started wiring all my guitars at that point with what would become the future Tone Pod wiring harness. I got to work on developing the Tone Pod plate which allows you to remove the pickups from the guitar with just 2 fingers. I have finished development on the final version which will allow the pickup harness to disconnect/reconnect as you are pulling the Tone Pod out of the body. Any newer version of my guitars with the rear mounted pickups can be easily converted to the Tone Pod wiring harness. I plan incorporating the Tone Pod system into all of my electric guitars in the near future. Currently we have a patent application for the Tone Pod system, and in the future would like to see it as a universal pickup plate for 2 pickup guitars.
How much will they cost? Depending upon the pickup manufacturer, Tone Pods should range in price from $150 to $400.
What is available? Currently most 4 lead pickups from Seymour Duncan are available. Vaughn Skow also has a large variety of pickups custom wired for me. Vaughn's tones include vintage Tele splitting to a modern Tele, P-90's, Filtertron's, and some of his own custom creations. I am also talking with other pickup manufacturers to see if they want to be involved with the Tone Pod system
What is the advantage of having the Tone Pod system? There are several. The first is that once you have a guitar body style that you like, you can have any tone you want from it. If you’re on a budget, you don’t have to take the risk of selling your favorite, most comfortable guitar to try getting a new tone, just invest in a new Tone Pod for a fraction of the price. If you are a studio player or just gigging with limited space, extra Tone Pods can be stored in your guitar case letting you have several different guitar sounds available within seconds.
Can I use my own pickups in a Tone Pod guitar? If it is a 4-lead pickup with the same wiring as a Seymour Duncan pickup, I should be able to wire it into a Tone Pod for you.
Can I use a 2 lead pickup in a Tone Pod system? Yes, but it won't be able to coil split.
FAQ's
