Scrapyard Dog Plus - Oil City Pickups

This review is for The Scrapyard Dog Plus humbucker pickup by Oil City Pickups UK
www.oilcitypickups.co.uk

This Pickup is from the humbucker range from Oil City Pickups and is priced at £48 for open coils and £58 with nickel covers.

These pickups are hand made in the UK by a guy called Ash who runs the company, actually I think he's the only person who works there. He takes a lot of pride in his work and is happy to talk to you about what you want from your pickups he will even make modifications to suit your needs.
I phoned Ash and spoke to him about the equipment I use and the sound I was after, he then suggested one of his Scrapyard Dog Plus humbuckers for the bridge position in my guitar which is a vintage output, asymmetrically wound pickup with a four conductor output, with alnico 5 magnets and a higher output of 12k . I placed my order and he told me it would take a week for him to make the pickup and get it to me.

My Stratocaster was going to a guitar tech to have new pots, jack plug, switch and wiring plus a full set up so I had the pickup installed at the same time.

I have to say this pickup is incredible for the money, it's hand wound and made in the UK with high quality parts and comes with a lifetime warranty.
For £58 (I ordered the one with nickel covers) you get a lot for your money.

The sound is very clear and it works really well for the classic rock tones through to your 80's metal sound. But even on a clean channel this pickups sounds incredibly warm and would be perfect for blues. With so many uses this pickup is very versatile and you also have the option of wiring it up to have split coils so you can switch between the single coil strat sound and the chunky humbucker sound at the flick of a switch.

Pros - Handmade in the UK form high quality parts
Lifetime Warranty
Good customer service
Very warm sound
Price

Cons - None I can think of

So there we have it www.oilcitypickups.co.uk check them out if you're thinking of upgrading the ones in your guitar.

I second that. I just received my pickups recently and finally had the time to sit down and carefully replace the Ceramic Stock-pickups my Les Paul came with.

I chose to buy them in the Zebra-color scheme, because I think that looks coolest, and it shouldn't have any effect on the tone. I've just taken my LP for a test run, and I'm very satisfied with the SD+ set.

I did spend a while chatting with Ash before buying anything, to make sure that I got just the right product, and as soon as I said I wanted something that could give me the Trebly sound of 70's and 80's Rock, he guided me in the direction of the SD+ Pickups. And yes, they can give me a very good Classic Rock tone. But the awesomeness doesn't stop there! I tried running the set through all 8 Amp-models in my Amp just to see how versatile they really are, and I was amazed.

The pickups sound nice when I run them through ANY kind of amp-model, whether it's a Fender '57 Deluxe Reverb, a VOX AC30, an 80's Marshall Amp (I think it's the JCM800, but I'm not sure) or a modern Mesa Boogie Amp. Of course, there are some of the amp models I use more than others (the Marshall, VOX and '57 Deluxe Reverb are the ones I use most), but the fact that they sound good through any amp just goes to prove how versatile they are. They can easily go from a nice clean or slightly dirty Blues-tone to a hard-rocking 80's tone that sounds like Guns N' Roses or Motley Crue.

Pros:
Great quality for the price
Lifetime warranty
Very versatile
Very nice sound

Cons:
The wires were a bit hard to get to fit through the holes when installing the Pickups.

All in all, I'd say these pickups were a great investment. The LP already felt great to play, but now it also SOUNDS great.

sounds like you've got yourself a very versitile guitar now :) I've had my SD+ pickups in my strat for a while now and often get compliments on the tone from people. Next will be to upgrade the mini humbuckers in my Epiphone Wilshire when Oil City Pickups release their mini humbucker that is coming very soon apparently.

Yeah, my LP has definitely improved after the change. Funny thing is, before this change, I only really used my LP with the British 80s amp model (which sounds like a Marshall), because it's the only one that could give me a sound I liked (the Fender Models and British 60s only really sounded good with my SG and ES, both of which use their stock Alnico Classic II PRO pickups).

Before the change, I would usually just crank the Gain and Treble and kill the Bass (with my Les Paul, that is). Now, I find that it sounds great with almost any kind of tone. I can dial in a nice Blues-tone through an emulated VOX AC30, or a modern Rock/Metal-tone through an emulated Mesa Boogie amp, and it will still sound great. Or I can use a nice clean '65 Fender Spring Reverb and a heavy distortion from a Dist-pedal and still get it to sound great! And that's despite those all being emulated amps and not the real deal. I honestly think those 103£ were very well spent!

i know what you mean, the SD+ pickups in my strat is much more versitile than the pickups in my other 2 guitars and i'm not saying the pickups in my other two guitars are bad, they're stock pickups but they're pretty decent sounding ones but in no way are they as versitile as the Oil City pickup. The only problem now is i need to save some money to change the pickups in my other guitars to Oil City ones