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Epiphone Sorrento


thefathand

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Hey friends,

Just bought another 1996 Epiphone Sorrento and I'm thinking about changing the pup covers to the cream white ones like the guy in the top link has. Anyone know where I can pick some up? BTW, in the top link the Sorrento has had new pups installed, anyone care to venture a guess as to what make pups are in that guitar, the player don't remember. Also, anyone have an Epi Sorrento from the 1990's. Anyone here own a 1990's Sorrento? The price of the 1990's Sorrento's has gone up in the past few years. They used to sell for right around $400 in 2006 but now they sell for as much as $700. Sure you can still get a good used one for a good price, I mean cheaper than $700 but you really gotta keep your eyes peeled. Oh, the 1962 Anniversary issue is not to be confused with the ones made in the 1990's because the tone is all different. In the 1990's they were made at the Peerless factory in Korea with P90 pickups and the new 1962 re-issues were made in China with mini humbuckers. Supposedly the new Anniversary re-issues are made with Gibson USA mini humbuckers but I don't see how Gibson would make any money with that idea. Here's a couple of pics of my 1996, I used to have a silver metal flake but sold it a few years ago and I've had buyers remorse ever since. ~Cheers!

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

My observations. First I doubt that his pickups just have different covers. Not an easy thing to change out, and his sound better than any Epi PU I've heard. There'd be desoldering involved. Epiphone P-90s (at least the several I've dealt with) have their covers soldered on. There's a reason why pickup makers and rewinders charge more to rewind an Epi P-90, than make a new one, if they'll even do that anymore (Lollar stopped recently). The thing that I found about crème color is, if you're just doing covers, you're OK. If you decide to start matching things like knobs or pick guards or whatever, everyone has a different idea on what crème is. It'll drive you crazy, if you're AN4L about stuff like that, I was. Finally gave up and went to black, on my Casino. Have fun with it though, look at different P-90s, if you want to change the color, it'll save you some head aches. Nice guitar you've got there, BTW.

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I dig the one in the video- the tort guard and cream pickups puts it firmly in gretsch aesthetic territory. I've had my sights set on a p90 sorrento lately, congrats on picking one up!

 

There are a few options for swapping the covers. Allparts has your cream covers. Tweed, I wasnt aware the p90s are soldered?

 

Those are probably Fralin pickups in there. I prefer Lollar pickups generally, and would consider swapping for these if it were me! as for matching hardware, I dont think you need to go all creme just by switching pups. I like mixing and matching, and going all one color could be too matchy-matchy. Like I said, its easy to take those orange epis into gretsch territory and get something like this

 

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10-4 on the Lollars. After trying 8-10 different P-90s, the Lollars are my favorite, too. Although, my ZBD has Biltofts on it and they work very well, for a jazz vibe.

 

As for the chrome covered Epi P-90 dog-ears, I considered de-soldering the covers on mine. But I was warned by both Jason Lollar and Pete Biltoft (local guys, for me), that finding covers that matched the pole spacing may not be as easy as it seemed. I had not been all that impressed with the stock Casino PUs, so I went with crème dogears, from Biltoft. Great pickups, and at the time, the Casino was my "jazz" guitar. But as I mentioned earlier, trying to match the other bits drove me crazy. I bought black covers and everything was fine. Those moved to the ZBD, when I picked up some used Lollars to put on the Casino, which had become my go-to Rock guitar. I get the crème color thing, but I'm more of a matching kind of guy. Here's the Casino, from stock, to crème, to black.

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There'd be desoldering involved. Epiphone P-90s (at least the several I've dealt with) have their covers soldered on.

 

Wow, interesting info about the soldering, never would have thought that. Luckily I have other projects I'm working on right now so any mods on my Sorrento will have to wait. [thumbup]

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  • 3 weeks later...

I have 2 90's Sorrentos, made by Peerless, made about a month apart. One has black metal covers that are loose-fit over the magnets, and that one has an old Gibson mini humbucker installed in the P90 cover at the neck.

 

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The other has chrome covers and I have not taken the pups off of that one to see what they might be. There was a lot of hand work on those guitars and they both are different in feel even in weight. I like them a lot - they are different animals from Casinos, and I have two of them, too.

 

FWIW, I like Epiphone P90's as much as Gibsons...they are a little different, but both have a really clear tone that can get very filthy when pushed hard. Gotta love them!

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