The Gretsch FilterTron is something rather special. Originally designed in 1954/5 by Ray Butts for guitarist Chet Atkins who wasn’t satisfied by the DynaSonic pickup he was using. It has become a classic but often misunderstood pickup.

What is the Filtertron sound?

It has left a distinct mark on the sound of Rock’n’Roll. It’s the sound of Malcolm Young, Brian Setzer, Billy Duffy and plenty more. That unmistakable ‘Clank’ on the attack of the note is the essence of the FilterTron.

I started playing guitar because of the sound of a Gretsch FilterTron. Listen to Malcolm Young on the intro to “Jailbreak” – that’s what I’m talking about. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRo2m6RYJpI

But you don’t only find FilterTrons in Gretches, there’s the rather cool Fender Cabronita Telecaster for instance.

So what’s inside a Gretsch FilterTron?

So how does it make that distinctive sound? What makes it so different from a PAF?

Here’s a vintage Gretsch FilterTron from 1961, let’s take a look under the hood.

With the cover off it looks quite different from a PAF. There are 2 rows of adjustable poles and they’re bigger than on a Gibson. The top of the bobbins are rather neatly hidden by a thin plate.

The Technical Stuff

Here’s where it gets really interesting. Those are very narrow bobbins and this one measures only 4.2KOhms. Not a lot of coil strength there but look what they’re sitting on. That is one fat magnet. It’s an Alnico V and literally twice the thickness of the magnet that you’d find in a PAF. So not only more powerful magnetic material but double the amount of it compared to a Gibson. That makes it quite a different beast.

So that Gretsch FilterTron sound consists of a weaker, thin sounding coil so lots of highs and twang from the windings and getting the aggression, attack and ‘clank’ from the powerful magnet. A powerful magnet gives an immediacy to tone. You can really feel it when you play a guitar with a larger magnet.

This is the original Gretsch FilterTron, the design didn’t change much through to the late 60’s although there are plenty of inconsistencies. They can have a dc resistance from 4KOhms up to 5KOhms.

By the 1970’s they had changed the design and really they just didn’t sound like Gretsch’s any more.

A lot of the modern ones are simply small Gibson style humbuckers with cool looking covers and just miss the whole point of the FilterTron sound. This tone is not for everyone but for some of us it’s simple the best sound an electric guitar can make.

It’s all about those weak coils and that monster magnet. There is more than one way to make an electric guitar pickup.

The work I did on this original set of Gretsch pickup really inspired me to design my own take on the Filtertron pickup. I call it ‘The Tron’. It has the same magnet as the original to give it that character but with slightly different coils. I have wound the bridge pickup to be on the upper end of the old ones to balance it with then neck pickup. Back in the day the bridge and neck were identical.

The Tron is available with a few different insert colors – for more information follow the link below.

Updated July 2024

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